[c-nsp] Cisco TAC issues - can someone from Cisco enlighten meon this?

[Justin Shore]

Daniska, Tomas wrote:
> (btw - asking for requeue to bru is what everybody reasonable at Cisco
> recommends to do - of course for europe...)

Does anyone know what the equivalent would be in the states?  I try my 
best to open cases first thing in the morning (CST) when I'm likely to 
get someone in the states.  That said I've still had my share of 
communication problems to overcome.  I had actually had to requeue cases 
twice because of communication issues.  I hated to do it but I needed 
help and I needed it right then.  I couldn't spend 3 or 4 times as much 
time trying to overcome that hurdle.  I had a case routed to Australia a 
few weeks ago.  I was thinking that this would be fine.  As it turns out 
she had one of the thickest accents I've ever heard.  She was not from 
Australia.  Fortunately she went on leave part way into my case (which 
was good because all I ever got from her was form letter replies, 
nothing helpful).  So I requeued on a Friday.  I got an engineer from 
SJC.  That Monday he sent me some more info and then also went on leave. 
  So I requeued for a 3rd time.  That engineer was very helpful and we 
managed to resolve the issue.  He went on leave as the case was wrapping 
up.  I wish I worked at Cisco and had all that PTO! :-)

Steve and everyone else:  when you feel like you're getting the 
run-around from TAC (it happens from time to time, even with the best of 
engineers) you need to ask for the Duty Manager.  If the TAC engineer 
won't connect you with that person or doesn't know who it is grab 
another phone and call back into Cisco.  Give the case dispatch person 
your SR and ask for the Duty Manager.  Explain what you think is going 
off track with the case and what you feel would be the appropriate way 
to proceed.  They should be able to help; it's their job.

I've had to involve the Duty Manager a couple times on highly complex 
issues that involved multiple technologies.  For example I'm calling in 
about an IPSec SPA issue in a 7600 and because it's a 7600 I got routed 
to the switching group.  I need people from both groups and then some to 
effectively troubleshoot the problem.  After a few hours of the 
switching person beating on the problem it was clear to me that he 
didn't have the skills needed to troubleshoot the IPSec SPA. 
Unfortunately he didn't want to involve the other group.  I didn't have 
time to wait for him to come to the same realization that I had so I had 
the Duty Manager do it for him.  The VPN Specialist that they got on the 
phone was extremely helpful in troubleshooting the problem.  We'd have 
hours waiting on the switching guy to escalate the problem if I hadn't 
escalated the case to the duty manager.  Sometimes we engineers are 
reluctant to ask for help.

On the whole I usually have good luck when I call TAC.  Here lately I 
haven't had as good of luck but usually it's not a problem.  The 
engineer frequently leads me to discover what the problem is; I just 
needed someone to bounce ideas off of and talk the problem out. 
Occasionally I'll get an excellent engineer who is extremely deep in the 
technology at hand and he quite literally schools me.  That happens far 
less often I'm afraid.

Justin

PS==>  Ask for the Duty Manager....