Cisco CTS: A One-Stop Service Shop

When I worked in account management, I had a customer who ran into a problem with some networking equipment late one Friday night. We tried calling the original equipment manufacturer (OEM), but the person who answered the phone didn’t know the customer’s environment and struggled to pinpoint the issue. After trying a variety of fixes, updating to the latest firmware, and then reverting to the old version, the customer’s network was down. 

After experiencing several hours of downtime and numerous escalations, the customer's system was finally restored when an engineer followed a hunch.

This scenario is exactly why CDW created CDW Technology Support—to allow customers to readily have access to technical support from a trusted and certified provider. Through relationships with several partners, including Cisco, we help organizations simplify their service requests and speed up their time to resolution.

One of the most attractive aspects of Cisco CTS is that it offers customers a single point of contact. CDW provides end-to-end ownership of all incidents and service requests. We also provide support for maintenance, hardware replacement and software troubleshooting — truly creating a one-stop shop that simplifies IT support and eliminates hassles. The single point of contact is crucial for improving the speed of call resolution. We’re able to field requests as soon as customers contact our team via phone or live chat, and then we assign an engineer in a timely manner according to each customer’s specific service-level agreement. 

Core switch goes haywire at 2 a.m. on a Sunday? We’re answering the phone. Network troubles on Christmas Day? We’re here. Cisco CTS provides around-the-clock support via a dedicated service desk every day of the year. The service also provides a dedicated support number, email address and ServiceNow login so that customers can open their cases and view their status online.

If CDW’s engineers determine that a device needs to be replaced, our Cisco CTS professionals will request a merchandise return from Cisco on behalf of the customer and have it sent to their location. Not only that, but we will also dispatch an engineer to meet the part, change out the device and return any defective parts to the manufacturer. We also take care of the administrative details that sometimes get overlooked when IT shops swap out a part. For instance, we update the serial numbers of the new parts on contracts. That might sound like a small detail, but it can end up causing huge headaches later if it’s not handled at the time of replacement.

Customers sometimes ask us whether engaging with Cisco CTS will somehow invalidate or interfere with their warranties from Cisco. No, it won’t. Cisco knows we’re out here, and Cisco CTS is fully backed by the vendor’s existing warranty and support services. The support contract also is purchased through Cisco, so customers do not lose their chances for upgrades or updates. The big difference is that when customers do need to approach Cisco for help, we handle those interactions. This saves time for organizations’ internal IT staffers and can also lead to better outcomes. Any time a customer makes a service request, our Cisco CTS team has likely seen similar requests before. As a result, we’re able to troubleshoot and diagnose problems quickly, communicate with Cisco effectively and help our customers get back to business.