[ACJones]

Hi there.

I administer BES (single server, non-segmented, v4.0.5 running against Exchange 5.5) for a fairly large company, and have done so for several years. A few weeks ago I received our BES 4.1 disc after requesting it from said carrier (which will remain unnamed so as not to "incriminate"). I started making arrangements to install this upgrade (plus latest SP/hotfixes) having read the upgrade documentation and postings on this forum and decided that, in our situation (i.e. server already v4.0.5, devices all v4+ and Enterprise Activated), the procedure should be quite simple.

My situation is this: our carrier have now turned round, despite providing us with the 4.1 disc and making no mention of this at the time, and said that they will not support a "self-upgrade" to 4.1. Instead they "kindly" offered to send (insist on sending) a Technical Architect to perform the upgrade for £1500. I can't with a clear conscience recommend that our company pay this fee knowing that all the Architect will do is run setup.exe and click "Next" a few times, but I don't see that we have much choice. Even though £1500 may seem a drop in the ocean to a large company, money is money and this is more a matter of principle.

Has anybody else encountered similar difficulties in upgrading to 4.1, please? Does anybody believe that my carrier's caution in this matter is, given our circumstances, realistically sensible? Or am I right to be suspicious that we may be being ripped off here?

I have found lots of help on these forums before and have a great deal of respect for the folks here. Your thoughts would be appreciated, please.

Regards,

Adam.

[Zharin]

I am confused on why you would go through your Carrier to upgrade a BES server. Generally, BES support would go through RIM.

[voiceBerry]

If you company is a fairly large comany, I believe that your company dedicate
a lot of money to to carrier every years.

And I believe that they also do not want to lost your company(^.^)
So talk with carrier, do it by youself! Insist your opinion.

[ACJones]

Thanks for the comments, guys.

Zharin - that's a very good point, and not one that I believe we've considered. To answer your question, we have always received support for BES from our carriers (to date we have had two). It is the carrier who escalate support incidents for BES to RIM if necessary. Without looking into it I wonder whether this situation is country-specific; will RIM support BES for UK-based companies? Just wondering whether this might be why we have never been offered direct support as a possibility. I will certainly investigate this...

voiceBerry - unfortunately all the talking that can be done has been. If we insist on doing this upgrade ourselves, our support for BES will be suspended indefinitely. If we were to perform the upgrade then call the carrier for support (even some months down the line where the problem may not even be upgrade related), the carrier would insist on sending a Techie out to "repair" the server whatever the fault (obviously faulty because a monkey - me - performed the previous upgrade!</sarcasm>) Our support would then allegedly return to normal. It seems we can't get away from having a Techie out one way or another. The whole situation really is quite unsatisfactory

[gziz]

i have never heard of a carrier "forcing" a company into doin gthis. but what you can do is do it your self adn then buy a support contract with RIM for much cheaper then 1500 and they will support you directly.

[bertiebassett]

ACJones

Let me guess - Vodafone Corporate UK - if you don't want to name and shame then I will... I find this policy that they force on their corporate clients pretty off side when the client know what they are doing.. and especially now on 4.1 etc and later releases the installation executable is a lot slicker than 3.6

For our American friends the model is different here in the UK - the BES is provided via our carriers (or resellers) and then all 1st line support to the IT department is provided via the carrier or reseller (well in the case of O2 & VF for sure) rather than directly via RIM.

If you were on O2 then you'd get the disk install and go. If you have issues then get on the phone to their BB support desk - 8-10 M-F and 9-5 Sat (on call back) and they'll help you through any issues.

In terms of your options - clearly you can't be in a position where you are unsupported but the first thing I would do is check when your' berries are out of contract - if this is in the next 6 months then it helps your negotiating position....if you get my drift...

You could also look at a T-support contract from RIM. This comes with 5 different levels of support and means that you can call a RIM techie directly 24x7 x365. It is possible to sign up for T-Support in the UK, but no doubt if you try that through your VF account manager you might find them a litle unhelpful.

I know of an independent specialist BB company who do loads of complicated installs and customised development work - they charge £850 per day..

Hope this helps

bb

[ACJones]

Hi - thanks again for the replies.

bertiebassett - I couldn't possibly comment on the accuracy of your guess! Thanks for the advice though. Certainly helps to clear a few things up. In the short term we will have to pay for an assisted upgrade, but in the long term I am keen to enlist support for BES directly from RIM (leaving device support to the carrier) to save this hassle in future. I will investigate the possibility of getting this switched.

Regards,

Adam.

[elgauchogrub]

I've found that T-Support is really worth the money (we use Tx2) and time you save rather than dealing with a wireless provider, especially for server or database related issues.

BlackBerry

Technical Support Services Pricing Components

Level Prg. Fee Cost per server Cost/Active CAL*
1 - £ 289 £ 11.00
2 - £ 369 £ 15.00
3 £ 5,789 £ 439 £ 17.00
4 £ 29,409 £ 439 £ 17.00
5 £ 44,119 £ 439 £ 17.00

[only1eagle]

Also with T-support you get full access to all the software (upgrades hotfixes etc)

the providers get you by telling you you can have the software/upgrade free but then pay them for their support wich is lacluster most of the time.

I would highly suggest getting t-support. you will get the software and then have support from actual RIM technicians.

PS your issue is why I am bringing the BES from the UK to the US. It was nice to get the software free the first time, but now we own the software we can get t-support for alot cheaper!