3Com confident with inhouse move

Networking vendor 3Com has claimed its channel will reap the benefits from its decision to bring all customer support back in-house.
The vendor, which has used an outsourced support model for the past three years, has ploughed $12m (£6m) into IT systems and support staff over the past six months to support the shift.
Since 20 August, every European customer with a service contract has been receiving level one, two and three support from 3Com’s own staff in the UK. Customers with warranties will move to the new model in October.
Imran Khan, senior director for services in EMEA and Asia Pacific, said the change would set 3Com apart from rivals such as Cisco and Avaya, which still use an outsourced model for support.
“Three years ago, everyone was talking about outsourcing as the way forward, now we know it’s not,” he said. “To delight our customers again we needed to take that core competency back in-house.
“We had lost a real feel for our customer base and were a bit isolated. Even though services levels were being hit we wanted to enhance that.”
Greg Carlow, managing director at 3Com Gold partner Repton, welcomed the move. “We think 3Com bringing support back in-house will improve support levels,” he said. “When it’s your own people, they’ll work hard to get the job done.”
Ed Callacher, networking divisional manager at 3Com distributor Bell Micro, said: “Any vendor that can support its own kit on its premises has an advantage, as any problem can be resolved quicker.”
Khan added the move would allow 3Com to slash problem resolution times by 50 per cent.
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