Come on Broadcom - the support portal is not acceptable for enterprise customers

[ashleyw]

so after waiting a while, 

I'm trying to check entitlements and downloads and our ability to navigate the site in general.

I have our contract number, account numbers and our perpetual support end date of 2025-11-13.

I can't find any of our entitlements loaded - just a lot of other unrelated contracts for other divisions within our group that have no bearing on my specific contract.

I think, no problem, I'll try and open up a support case, but then the SSO loop begins and I end up with a pop up saying;

"Error: We could not process your request, please try later"

I'm sorry but this is unacceptable and an absolute abomination compared to the previous VMware site.

I'm really disappointed that my first interaction with the Broadcom support site has failed and this has a direct bearing on how we'll be approaching our renewal in November 2025.

thanks Ashley

update: 24/05/2024

We used to have a contract number of say "1234578" and when we searched for that contract number it returned nothing, After trawling through the dozens of contracts under the complete list of entitlements we found out contract being listed as "VO-12345678-R:24NOV22" . Sadly the search doesn't find contracts using the original contract number in the search.

It really isn't hard to keep the contract numbers search field the same as the original one or at-least modify the search to look at the original contract number attribute on the underlying database schema (assuming Broadcom have been clever enough to retain the original information - which I doubt). What a complete waste of time.

[Khalid Aburrub]

Almost Same Scenario happens with me on support portal and license as we just purchased a new license and needed to reconfigure   before we can use as (each key is only for a single CPU while hosts have 2 CPUs )

one more thing nothing migrated from mylearn portal we can't find old enloments for online courses or certificates 

I'm disappointed 

[HostaHost]

I'm on day ten waiting for license keys we are paying for support on to become accessible.  I've got a production environment running on eval keys right now because they can't figure this garbage out.

[Bruticusmaximus]

It's kinda' funny that I was alerted to this "Hey Broadcom, this is an abomination" post via Broadcom's own digital digest mail. LOL 

[psiess]

Abomination is a good word for this clusterf*ck.

[psiess]

What a mess.  I'm in the same predicament.  Our entitlements didn't transfer over from VMware, I can't find any of my Broadcom site IDs (which they claim were sent...they weren't) and I can't open a ticket in the support portal

BROADCOM...if you're listening (but I doubt you are), open the VMware portal back up and allow customers to download their entitlements, since you were unsuccessful at transferring them.

[todd via]

I am the SVP of Cybersecurity and have been in the industry for 28 years.  I have never seen such a convoluted website.  No entitlements are visible and I can not even download any software.  I have been waiting for over a week for my account to be validated.  I am so glad internally, and as a MSP, we are transitioning to Microsoft Hyper-V, Azure, etc.  

[BRUNO BENATO ROSA]

We are having the same problem.
No my.vmware rights were transferred to the new portal.

A real mess and disregard for corporate clients who depend on this portal.

I don't understand why UNIFY everything into a RIDICULOUS PORTAL that doesn't work.

Go back to MY.VMWARE.COM as it is at least a decent portal to navigate.

[Colin Gallo]

+1 to to this mess. I'm in the same boat of nothing having transferred over, and the open a support case SSO loop gets me as well. I guess I'm glad to see I'm not alone? I guess it's time to spin up an MS Hyper-V or Citrix Hypervisor host.

[psiess]

We are taking a serious look at Proxmox.

[PaulB2]

I called in to support and they were able to add my entitlements. I suggest you give that a try.

I've had talks with all the players in this space and am going to pilot XCP-ng (Xenserver).

[HostaHost]

Nutanix AHV looks like a very strong option for us, but we also have a heavy deployment of centralized storage, so a lot of hardware is going to have to get to the break even point of early retirement vs vmware pricing before we can move completely.  We're going to do a large chunk before the next renewal though.

[Tim Norris]

+1 as well.  We have none of our entitlements transferred over.  I got to broadcom support via a chat and they could not find them, they pointed me to Dell.  I've got a Dell EMC renewal certificate, but nothing on that certificate ties to anything broadcom has a record of.  So, now I've been bounced around within Dell's support.

[Harro Melenboer]

And same here. It is June 26th. About 2 Months of migration has passed.

And still the same issues:

I see no entitlements.

I requested a SiteID, but when I want to open MY CASES, I end up in an SSO loop to Wolken and eventually resulting in "Error: We could not process your request, please try later"

The same if I want to open a New Case.

When will this be fixed?

We are paying top dollar, or at least my boss is, for licensing and support, and even this basic functionality does NOT work. 

Definitely bad advertising for Broadcom...

[Mariano Jose Coccia Carballido]

The same here!

It's a shame...


On 2024-06-25 13:29, Harro Melenboer via Broadcom wrote:
> And same here. It is June 26th. About 2 Months of migration has passed.
>
>
> And still the same issues:
>
>
> I see no entitlements.
>
>
> I requested a SiteID, but when I want to open MY CASES, I end up in an
> SSO loop to Wolken and eventually resulting in "Error: We could not
> process your request, please try later"
>
>
> The same if I want to open a New Case.
>
>
> When will this be fixed?
>
>
> We are paying top dollar, or at least my boss is, for licensing and
> support, and even this basic functionality does NOT work.
>
>
> Definitely bad advertising for Broadcom...
> -------------------------------------------
> Original Message:
> Sent: May 13, 2024 06:19 PM
> From: ashleyw
> Subject: Come on Broadcom - the support portal is not acceptable for
> enterprise customers
>
>
> so after waiting a while,
>
> I'm trying to check entitlements and downloads and our ability to
> navigate the site in general.
>
> I have our contract number, account numbers and our perpetual support
> end date of 2025-11-13.
>
> I can't find any of our entitlements loaded - just a lot of other
> unrelated contracts for other divisions within our group that have no
> bearing on my specific contract.
>
> I think, no problem, I'll try and open up a support case, but then the
> SSO loop begins and I end up with a pop up saying;
>
> "Error: We could not process your request, please try later"
>
> I'm sorry but this is unacceptable and an absolute abomination
> compared to the previous VMware site.
>
> I'm really disappointed that my first interaction with the Broadcom
> support site has failed and this has a direct bearing on how we'll be
> approaching our renewal in November 2025.
>
> thanks Ashley
>
>
>
> update: 24/05/2024
>
> We used to have a contract number of say "1234578" and when we
> searched for that contract number it returned nothing, After trawling
> through the dozens of contracts under the complete list of
> entitlements we found out contract being listed as
> "VO-12345678-R:24NOV22" . Sadly the search doesn't find contracts
> using the original contract number in the search.
>
> It really isn't hard to keep the contract numbers search field the
> same as the original one or at-least modify the search to look at the
> original contract number attribute on the underlying database schema
> (assuming Broadcom have been clever enough to retain the original
> information - which I doubt). What a complete waste of time.
>
>
> Reply to Sender :
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>
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[Brent Ruston]

This is ridiculous!  There were no entitlements on my portal.  I opened a case that sat there for a week with  no response.  I finally call support on the phone, wait on hold for a period of time, and finally am connected to someone that doesn't speak English very well.  It seemed as though he was going to resolve my problem, but instead botched the job.  He created a new Site Id for some reason, and now my contract is associated with his new Site ID, but I still cannot download any software, and I desperately need to get going on my server upgrade.  I tell the guy that it still doesn't work, and guess what?  HE HANGS UP ON ME!  I have called back and I am on hold for another support person.  I hope the next one is better than the first one.

[vmrulz_new]

Same same.. their integration must still be in work because this can't possibly be as bad as it appears. They should have done like Dell and bought them but mostly left them alone. I'm finding similar catastrophe's with my company merging with a larger company.  Hopefully I can continue to get my esxi images through our h/w vendor.

[dessimus]

I had a ticket open for over a month with no movement to resolve access to our primary Site ID.

To quickly resolve, go to the Support portal, open the Virtual Chat in the lower right corner.

Start a new conversation, select: vmware > type a query > "contact us" > Report a New Case > Customer Care/ Licensing > Chat with an Agent

They fixed my Site ID access pretty quickly and I have my entitlements again.

[psiess]

@dessimus Did you know your site ID beforehand?  

[dessimus]

No, but I had my VMware Account IDs from the VMware licensing portal prior to the migration.

[psiess]

Ok thanks.  I'll give it a try next week. 

[Colin Gallo]

This worked. About 10 minutes from start to agent, and then 10 more minutes until I could access downloads. I knew VMware account no. and got new Site ID via steps below. Not sure if he needed either or both.

He needed me to have already submitted an access request to the Site ID, which he then went in and approved.

I found my Site ID under My Profile > Build Your Profile > Yes, I want to Build My Profile > I am Interested in Broadcom Software > Submit > Site ID is noted on screen.

From there, back to Support Portal, click on your name, then Request Access. Submit new request with that Site ID. Then a case is opened, that the chat agent can access and approve.

Wolken SSO login is still broken and looping when trying to open the access request case.

Good luck!

[sistek]

yes same happens here (spain)

Wolken SSO login is still broken and looping when trying to open the access request case.

:-(

[psiess]

I was finally able to get past the SSO loop and access the Wolken support portal.

I used this link:  https://ca-broadcom.wolkenservicedesk.com/web-form to open a ticket stating that I could not access the portal to open and manage tickets.

[psiess]

THANK YOU!  This worked for me.  I already had access to one site ID (albeit, not my site, not my company) so I used that to open the support request.

From there, I opened a chat, got a live person, and told the agent that I needed to find my site IDs.  The agent asked for the email address associate with my VMware products.  From there, he sent me 4 site IDs.  

I then used the Request Access link in the profile dropdown.

I added each of the site IDs provided by the agent.  Within 48 hours, I had access to all of my licenses.

I hope this helps others.

[Ken Bernard]

xenserver all the way, Broadcom is a joke now.