I can't answer about the customer experience of using Smart Care, but I can help provide some guidance on the differences between the two services. Hope this helps.
Smart Net Total Care and Smart Care are both smart support services and both include Cisco’s award winning support, including technical support, hardware replacement, knowledge base access and OS upgrades. There are three main differences—first line of support, size of the network and offer customization.
For first line of support—Smart Net Total Care support is provided directly through Cisco, the customer technical support is provided by the Cisco TAC. Smart Care, on the other hand, is sold and supported through a qualified Cisco Partner, so the customer would get their first line of support from the partner (the partner can work with Cisco TAC if needed).
For targeted network environments—Smart Net Total Care has been designed to support large, dynamic networks. It is able to support tens of thousands of devices. Smart Care is targeted to mid-sized customers—from 10’s up to 1000’s of devices.
For customization—Smart Net Total Care is a defined service with a well-defined list of capabilities, which include technical support (TAC, OS updates, hardware Replacement and cisco knowledge base), and smart capabilities (installed base and contract management, alerts, device diagnostics). Smart Care has a base level of capabilities, but the partner can choose to add specific features and functionality to meet their customer’s needs. The base functionality includes the technical support and smart capabilities of SNTC, and also has additional features designed for smaller networks—monitoring, disaster recovery, and technology assessments.
Bottomline, you will need to evaluate the Smart Care offer that your partner provides and compare it with what Smart Net Total Care can offer to see which best meets your network and business needs.
