One of the most important parts of Costpoint is the continual support that Deltek provides. Initially, you may use a member of the Costpoint Consulting staff to provide you with on-site training and implementation assistance. However, our trained Costpoint support staff handles the on-going, day-to-day support, primarily through telephone. If you later need on-site support for a special situation, we will be happy to schedule our next available general or technical consultant.
All users can call whenever they encounter a problem or question which cannot be readily answered or resolved from the manuals. It is most efficient for you and for us if you have one person in your company or in each department designated as the Costpoint "expert." Questions should be addressed to that person first, and then if the "expert" cannot answer the question, either that person or the person with the question should call Deltek.
The Costpoint support lines are open Monday through Thursday from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., and on Friday from 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. In addition, we provide Extended Support on Friday evenings from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m., and on Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, using one "on-call" support technician in each area. To obtain Extended Support, place a call to the appropriate support beeper; the beeper numbers are listed below. During the months of January and February, we provide Saturday Extended Support in-house, without the use of a beeper.
If you think that you may need additional technical support over the weekend, you should call in advance to obtain an emergency number for that period of time. To schedule Emergency Support, call the main Customer Support number, 703-734-8606 and ask to speak to the manager of the Costpoint Technical Support area. The Emergency Support hours are Monday through Friday 8:00 p.m. until 11:00 p.m., and Saturdays from 9:00 a.m. until 11:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.
Regular Support schedule and phone number:
Monday - Thursday:
8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. (703) 734-8606
Friday:
8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. (703) 734-8606
Extended Support schedule and phone numbers:
Friday:
6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. via beeper
Saturday:
9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. via beeper
Costpoint General Support beeper:
(800) 709-6061
Costpoint Technical Support Beeper:
(800) 709-6069
Customer Support holidays are as follows:
New Years Day |
Labor Day |
Presidents' Day |
Thanksgiving |
Friday After Thanksgiving |
Memorial Day |
Independence Day |
Christmas Eve (half day) |
Christmas Day |
|
The handling of support calls at Deltek is designed to minimize your waiting time. Many software companies require you to wait on the line until their support personnel become available; this costs you time and money. Instead, we have a team of Support Receptionists who will take your call and log it into our call-tracking system. Please do not attempt to explain your problem to the Support Receptionists. They do not have the skills necessary to resolve your issue. The Support Receptionist will ask you for your company ID, your name and phone number, what product you are calling in reference to, whether your call is general or technical in nature, and a brief description of your problem.
When your call is taken, it is logged into our online call-tracking system and is immediately visible to our support staff. Support calls are prioritized according to the time the call was placed, and response times are recorded. Our policy is to return calls on a first-call-in, first-call-returned basis. Our goal is to return all calls with an initial contact in an average of less than one hour. The only exception to this rule is calls flagged as Urgent. These calls are given the highest priority and added to the top of the call-tracking queue. They will be the next call to be returned by the next available support representative.
In some cases you may already be working with someone on a problem and can only follow up with that person. Please feel free to ask for that person by name, although you may not get a return call as quickly since that person may not be immediately available.
Let your receptionist know that you are expecting a call from Deltek. If you are not available when we call back, we will leave a voice mail letting you know that we returned your call. Your call remains in the call-tracking queue but moves to a new position as if you had just placed the call, and the return call process begins again. Our call tracking system records each attempt we make to reach you.
There are three types of customer support that Deltek offers; you will need to specify the type of support at the time you leave your message. The support types are as follows:
General Support - The bulk of your support questions should fall into this category. These include all questions relating to the operation or setup of the system and those that do not fit into any of the categories listed below. The support representatives answering these calls are experienced, management level accountants. Please feel free to also provide the receptionist with a one- or two-word description that might help direct the call. Examples of a message are:
Pools/Urgent
Impromptu
A/P Reconciliation
Technical Support - This should be specified if you have received an error message or are having difficulty installing an update to your software. If technical problems arise in the Materials Management area, you should have your call placed in the Technical Support queue. When you're not sure which type of support you need, ask for General Support.
Materials Management - Questions relating to the Costpoint Materials Management folder (Product Definition, Bills of Material, Routings, Engineering Change Notices, Procurement Planning, Purchasing, Receiving, Inventory, Production Control, Sales Order Entry, Material Requirements Planning, Materials Estimating) should be identified as "Material Management General."
You can send a FAX of your report, "print-screens," error message, and description of the problem to our customer support department. The general support fax number is 703-442-9228, and the technical support fax number is 703-734-5762. Once the fax has been received a call will be logged into our call-tracking system and will be subject to the same return call policy stated above. Please do not send faxes on urgent issues; instead, call the main Customer Support number and have your call logged into the system.
You can also get support assistance via the Deltek Web site at www.deltek.com. The Web site contains recent user bulletins, installation instructions, and release notes; information on enhancements and error corrections; other technical information; and enhanced/corrected programs that you can download. You can also submit comments, error reports, and non-urgent support questions via the Web site. Because Internet communication and response times can vary greatly, you should not use the Web site for urgent support questions; please call our telephone support number instead.
In order to access the client support programs and information on our Web site, you must first register to receive the login and password for this area. You can register by selecting the Online Client Registration option on our main Web page. All you need is your Deltek support ID, contact information, email address (very important!), and software/platform information. You should also provide your company address.