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This is just... bad. Smallish company here - we have a premium support plan that over the years has cost us like 6k per support issue, all three times because

by lysace 2y ago

This is just... bad. Smallish company here - we have a premium support plan that over the years has cost us like 6k per support issue, all three times because of bugs on their end. Edit: We feel that we need it in case anything really gets messed up - like some complex account hijack or similar. Does this make sense? Are we overpaying for no reason?

nicce 2y ago
They charge on ticket-basis even if it is their fault?
- lysace 2y ago
  They charge a percentage of your spend for access to this support, starting at 10%. Yes, that is both smart and gross.
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  The cause doesn't really matter, you pay for priorized access to them (otherwise you can send your complaints to the customer service like a message in a bottle) It works the same for most companies where their product is a foundation of your business. Think Apple store for instance: you'll pay for premium support tickets to have expedited reviews of your apps, even if it's to work around a bug they just pushed in their new OS update.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- calmbonsai 2y ago
  No. It's usually a small percentage of spend, but there are "tiers" mostly related to how much (if any) of their Pro-Services you're already contracting. One "hack" I've recommended for larger enterprises is to budget a minuscule amount for their pro-services, but only to rely upon AWS "Principal or Product" engineers. I've been involved in far too many "Pro Services Remediation" engagements.
overstay8930 2y ago
Yeah we only have support to deal with bugs within AWS's platform itself, and 99% of the time we need to escalate it with our rep anyways.
- lysace 2y ago
  Oh, the 'rep' - whose primary interest is shilling consulting services for a cut.
written-beyond 2y ago
This attitude of theirs is why I'm never going to recommend or use AWS. When we first decided to evaluate if AWS would be a better fit for us over GCP, they never let our company get past their account verification. We're a small US based company, just a few people. They required verification documents, business registration all a real headache. After all of that we couldn't use a single thing to run, not even cloud shell. It's as if the account was disabled in some very obscure way. We spent 2 weeks arguing with support to please reinstate access to our account, and after 4 false "it should work now" responses they told us to start paying for premium support. PAY PREMIUM TECHNICAL SUPPORT FOR A SERVICE THAT WE NEVER GOT ACCESS TO OR USE.
- xyzzy123 2y ago
  Thats weird, you can open an account with just a credit card and update tax id / business details later. Was it because you were doing "AWS activate" or something? If that experience is much worse than their regular signup process that's both funny and sad :/ With AWS support what I do is enable "developer support" (~$30/month) when I need to ask them a bunch of stuff, then I cancel it for the other 11 months of the year when I don't need their help. It's a bit cheap and I'm sure my account rep would have words if I was a "real business" but in practice it works for me.
  - written-beyond 2y ago
    Nope, bog standard company credit card and account. It's not like that was my first time working with AWS, it was my first time with my company though. It was weird for everyone.
electroly 2y ago
If something goes wrong, you can sign up for a support plan on the spot, immediately file a ticket, and after a month cancel the plan. AWS doesn't care. If you only need it for rare incidents, you don't need to be paying for this every month.
- lysace 2y ago
  Thanks!

by lysace 2y ago

nicce 2y ago

They charge on ticket-basis even if it is their fault?

lysace 2y ago
They charge a percentage of your spend for access to this support, starting at 10%. Yes, that is both smart and gross.
makeitdouble 2y ago
The cause doesn't really matter, you pay for priorized access to them (otherwise you can send your complaints to the customer service like a message in a bottle) It works the same for most companies where their product is a foundation of your business. Think Apple store for instance: you'll pay for premium support tickets to have expedited reviews of your apps, even if it's to work around a bug they just pushed in their new OS update.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
calmbonsai 2y ago
No. It's usually a small percentage of spend, but there are "tiers" mostly related to how much (if any) of their Pro-Services you're already contracting. One "hack" I've recommended for larger enterprises is to budget a minuscule amount for their pro-services, but only to rely upon AWS "Principal or Product" engineers. I've been involved in far too many "Pro Services Remediation" engagements.

overstay8930 2y ago

Yeah we only have support to deal with bugs within AWS's platform itself, and 99% of the time we need to escalate it with our rep anyways.

lysace 2y ago
Oh, the 'rep' - whose primary interest is shilling consulting services for a cut.

written-beyond 2y ago

This attitude of theirs is why I'm never going to recommend or use AWS. When we first decided to evaluate if AWS would be a better fit for us over GCP, they never let our company get past their account verification. We're a small US based company, just a few people. They required verification documents, business registration all a real headache. After all of that we couldn't use a single thing to run, not even cloud shell. It's as if the account was disabled in some very obscure way. We spent 2 weeks arguing with support to please reinstate access to our account, and after 4 false "it should work now" responses they told us to start paying for premium support. PAY PREMIUM TECHNICAL SUPPORT FOR A SERVICE THAT WE NEVER GOT ACCESS TO OR USE.

xyzzy123 2y ago
Thats weird, you can open an account with just a credit card and update tax id / business details later. Was it because you were doing "AWS activate" or something? If that experience is much worse than their regular signup process that's both funny and sad :/ With AWS support what I do is enable "developer support" (~$30/month) when I need to ask them a bunch of stuff, then I cancel it for the other 11 months of the year when I don't need their help. It's a bit cheap and I'm sure my account rep would have words if I was a "real business" but in practice it works for me.
- written-beyond 2y ago
  Nope, bog standard company credit card and account. It's not like that was my first time working with AWS, it was my first time with my company though. It was weird for everyone.

electroly 2y ago

If something goes wrong, you can sign up for a support plan on the spot, immediately file a ticket, and after a month cancel the plan. AWS doesn't care. If you only need it for rare incidents, you don't need to be paying for this every month.

lysace 2y ago
Thanks!