Okay, here I am again with another HPRC horror story:

We are trying to get NetBase/SharePlex up and running between our 
host computer in Ohio and the remote machine in Texas.  Upon arrival 
in Texas, I INSTALLed from an SLT on that machine and restored 
all files from Ohio (from a backup I brought with me).  Somehow, 
in all the confusion, I lost NS/3000 on the Texas machine.  
Evidently it wasn't on the SLT (or I loaded an SLT from the Ohio 
machine which doesn't have NS/3000), anyway, I couldn't find the 
original installation tapes so I called the HPRC and requested a 
SUBSYS tape for NS/3000 for our machine.  After being told that 
there were no engineers available, I waited for 2 hours (we have 
four-hour response) and then called back, only to be told by the 
engineer that they couldn't help me, as I would need to contact 
a "contracts person" who could verify that we were entitled to 
NS/3000.  The engineer gave me an 800 number which I called.  
The person I spoke to there said to call another 800 number, but 
at least she gave me the name of my "contracts person" (which 
BTW is not the same as the support agreement person).  I finally 
reached my contracts person's voice mail at 6:30 PM EST, which I 
figured was not a problem, since the contracts people are 
probably on the west coast, right?  Well, I tried to contact 
him until about 9:30 PM EST, to no avail.

The next day, I started calling at 8:00 AM EST.  When I received 
no answer, I called the HPRC and opened another call.  My contracts 
person finally returned my call at 11:00 AM EST.  He informed me 
that he was out of town and gave me the name and number of his 
replacement, whom I immediately called.  She was not in, so I 
had the operator transfer me to someone else (after leaving a 
voice mail).  This person was not interested in helping me at all.  
She kept telling me that if we lost the tape, then we would have 
to buy the product again!  After about four attempts at explaining 
what I wanted, I asked to speak with her supervisor, who, of course, 
was not available, so I left voice mail for her as well.  I finally 
got in touch with someone who sent me a SUBSYS tape, but I was 
informed that it *is* HP's policy to charge for replacement tapes!
Although she wouldn't (or couldn't) tell me why or how much it 
would be.

So, it took me two days of phone calls to get a replacement SUBSYS 
tape for just one product (we never did get a SUBSYS tape for 
NetBase/SharePlex, we're using a demo tape from Quest), and  I 
have no idea if we're going to be charged for it or not.

Is this the normal modus operandi of HP when it comes to replacement 
software tapes?  Has anyone else ever been in this situation?

If anyone from HP would like to have them, I have the call id's 
and names of people I spoke with, just in case you care.

Jim Phillips                            Manager of Information Systems
E-Mail: [log in to unmask]      Therm-O-Link, Inc.
Phone: (330) 527-2124                   P. O. Box 285
  Fax: (330) 527-2123                   Garrettsville, Ohio  44231