Rockwell Automation tech support - so Rude!

I couldn't help noticing that our big complainers have a combined post count that's less than 50 and that 6 members came back with a positive experience.

cumon - you can argue that you get put on hold, or that they're not knowledgeable enough (troubleshoot from script), but why would you generalize that people whose job is customer service are rude - particularly with so much positive feedback here? These guys typically pride themselves in helping you solve your problems.

surferb said:

I couldn't help noticing that our big complainers have a combined post count that's less than 50 and that 6 members came back with a positive experience.

cumon - you can argue that you get put on hold, or that they're not knowledgeable enough (troubleshoot from script), but why would you generalize that people whose job is customer service are rude - particularly with so much positive feedback here? These guys typically pride themselves in helping you solve your problems.

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My career has revolved around Rockwell products for close to 25 years. It's quite obvious they are very very good at customer support. My comment was describing one event.

You "cumon" pal.

SD_Scott said:

My career has revolved around Rockwell products for close to 25 years. It's quite obvious they are very very good at customer support. My comment was describing one event.

You "cumon" pal.

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Your reply seems to agree with Suferb and his statement.
but then your last line sounds like fighting talk,
and you took it personally.

I have had the privilege of meeting Suferb, so don't take it personally,
I saw him as a big man, that I look up to, and I am in awe of his perception and abilities.

I have worked with AB / Rockwell products since 1993 and my experience with tech-support is positive.
Denmark is a small marked for Rockwell and we know the Danish support people by name.
I am talking to the English talking support when it is "line 2+ " questions I have, and also here are no complaints – not even from the poor guy I talk with every day in a week to solve a problem.

It can be a problem if it is from their side look as a “read the manual” problem, and the person there is calling don’t understand the manual / the advice from the support. So it is a question about your own attitude when you talk to support.

I'm sorry that you didn't understand my intended usage of colloquialism to lighten the mood.

Their "very very" good customer support is certainly not obvious from your post. I'm not sure if it was: the expletive, the part about the support rep being incompetent, or the fact that he was yelling that led me to interpret your post in that context. In fact, I had a few bad experiences with them in the late 90s when I worked for a Rockwell Certified Solution Provider. In one case I was instructed to reformat the hard drive and reinstall the operating system to fix a program bug. My point was that ranting about customer support on a 3rd party forum is less than productive. I'm glad we seem to be on the same page.

SD_Scott said:

My career has revolved around Rockwell products for close to 25 years. It's quite obvious they are very very good at customer support. My comment was describing one event.

You "cumon" pal.

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SD_Scott said:

A Rockwell guy completely chewed my *** off one time. It was my second day at work at a new company. I called him about an RS232 point I/O card. He was yelling at me and the info he gave me was wrong. I was new so I didn't feel like I could tell what I thought. It was crazy Though.

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My best was trying to diagnose an error on a remote rack. After 45 minutes, the tech support guy said - "All indications are pointing to you having a problem". I said you think and he busted out laughing and said that was the stupidest thing he said in a long time.

We did fix the problem after a while.

I on the rare occassions I have used support (of the free kind) I have found them to be pretty good, however they do push the point about paying for the support & can sometimes make you feel guilty by not paying, my real gripe is that in one year we purchased over £20,000 worth of software this included RSlogix 500, 5000, RSview32, rad, power32 ME etc.
This was a large one off order & the reps were clambering at the door, however after the initial 12 months with no support needed I had a problem on the RSView, I found them a little reluctant to help & pushed for me to pay for the tech connect, I have to go to the higher management for this kind of thing & guess what "we pay all this money & they want more", was the answer, instead of ensuring our specs include AB as the main standard we now plump for siemens & mitsi, I have had pretty good response from both certainly as good as rockwell without the pushy attitude.
Sorry rockwell but you have fallen out of favour & lost some lucrative sales.

Its a great idea to use chat sessions. That way we can record things.

Support is hit or miss. If you are asking questions about RSview/linx/logix you will probably get a very good answer. If you are aksing questions about interfcing with other manufacturers products it really depends on the person you get and their level of confidence. They do not get a lot of trainging on other products. It also depends on wheter you are talking to someone in customer solutions or tech support.

All in all if you have a bad experience you shoul call again an ask to speak with a support manager. There is one for each product support area. You should have your case number to provide to them. If th ey tell you to call a compnay like kepware for support on a product that they are OEM'ing from KEPware then have the case number and persons name that you talked to. Kepware will contact Rockwell in that case. The only way you can improve your support experience is by letting those in charge know what is happening. As he former Tech Support Manager at KEPware I know that I apreciated those calls no matter how bad. It allowed me to train my people better.

AB has just sent me a new password for logging in. This password is supposedly valid from 25th Oct. It does not work, my existing one does!My existing password was issued by the Tech connect people so that I could connect to the Knowledge Base, apparently there is no coordination between different departments responsible for passwords.

Support in AB varies from dept to dept and from person to person. Overall it is OK. I have had some real issues with AB tech support over the course of my career which spans about 30 years.

First one was when we had undertaken a project to retrofit 52 Injection molding machines with AB 1771-QD Injection control module. This was a bleeding edge technology at the time which was later superceeded by 1771-QD/B. I have discovered at that time that switch over from Inject to Hold based on Cavity pressure did not work. I spent 3 weeks arguing with AB's plastics division people. All I could hear was that they have tested it and it works. Finally I asked them what actual product did they make when they were testing and to my surprise I found out that they were just dry cycling the machine! I told them to test by making a part, when they did they found out that they had a bug. This episode marked the most stressful time of my carrer and I don't wish that on anybody. I have spent few sleepless nights wondering if I can get the system working and all because of AB's stuborn refusal to even consider that they could have a bug!

Second problem involved incorrect comm driver for the Ultra 5000. The one that came with the CD did not work, well it kinda did but it was sporadic and inconsistent. After 3 days of sweating and arguing with the tech support I downloaded another driver from the web site and viola it worked. The worst part is that both drivers had the same file name, no version control. The first problem concerning the QD module I can kind of understand, a new complex product is bound to have bugs, but this problem has absolutely no excuse and shear stupidity of not having version control calls for heads to roll!

Considering how much we pay for the tech connect and the fact that knowledge base use requires tech connect contract I give Allen Bradley C.

You have to PAY for AB support??
There's a lot of automation equipment manufacturers out there who'd be happy to help for free.
My tech support, beit phone based or from my local apps guy is phenomenal, and I mean absolutely phenomenal. Guess I'm lucky...

My experience with Rockwell support generally amounts to "Check your grounding, and call me in the morning", so I usually muddle through by myself.

That, and our downtime is measured in the thousands per minute, so I really don't have the time to traverse the "Seven Circles of Automated Phone H!ll" that seems to be required to connect oneself to a support guy.

However, I have never had a Rockwell guy be rude to me. Ineffective at times, yes, but never, ever, rude.

I have usually found the support (phone in) to be good, and never rude.
The email support I have found (only used it twice) to be absolutely hopeless.
I am convinced that they don't read the question, then send irrelevant and ineffectual answers and both times with a link to the knowledgebase was that was dead.

I wish I had saved the full text of my last question but it was something like this.
About 12 months ago I created a PV+ project using a kepserver.
Since then every project I do, when I try to create a run time file pops up a box "unable to add kepware server configuration to runtime file"
Click OK and everything continues and works OK. I am only using RSLinx Enterprise in the ME Studio project, no other OPC servers are configured, and the KEPserver service is set to manual start and is not running.

Here is the answer I received between the XXXXs

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Here is the answer to your question:
Make sure your project does not have any OPC server

Do not run Kepserver

Please use the following link - see our Knowledge Base regarding this error

http://rockwellautomation.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/rockwellautomation.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=55954

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

To me that answer was a total waste of mine and their time.

Regards Alan Case

I get a Not Available At This Time error message. Please quote it or add a screenshot. I'm curious...

AB tech support has new direct call routes with 3 number extensions to get to the tech support group you want instead of going through the traditional phone menu. Their support website has a .pdf with all the tech support extensions. Pretty handy. AB also has teamed up with a remote desktop service that can take share control of your computer. That came in handy for me when I was working on installing a RSView32 ADS server and tech support could go on the computer and help me with all the DCOM settings you have to give security permissions to.