sonofsanta Posted June 7, 2019 Posted June 7, 2019 Sorry, don't mean to rant... just too much going on, without this being added to the mix! Innit. The last minute nature of all this is irritating, because surprisingly I don't have £10k just lying around to upgrade the system... not quite how school budgets work, that 1
Lister Posted June 25, 2019 Posted June 25, 2019 We've received an email from CIVICA, stating that our (NRS) catering system is in need of an upgrade, with Bronze, Silver and Gold options listed at a cost from £3k, £12k or £44k (over 5-years) respectively. Thanks. Could I ask how many tills that quote was for?
MYK-IT Posted June 25, 2019 Posted June 25, 2019 Hi @Lister This was for 5 tills. By pure coincidence, we had a Civica rep in this morning, to discuss our options further. Looks like we can, for now, just go with a 'revised' Bronze Package (to just include Sync2 and VM Migration) as our tills are Window 8.x (and SSD etc); whilst appreciating that we'll have to upgrade to the Version 8 Civica Cashless Solution during the next 18-24 months (e.g. Silver package) once they stop support for our current version (6 - i think).
Edu-IT Posted June 25, 2019 Posted June 25, 2019 Could I ask how many tills that quote was for? What would £45k get you?
ozydave Posted June 25, 2019 Posted June 25, 2019 Have NRS gone significantly downhill since the Civica takeover, or have they always been terrible as a company? We had them in a while ago bidding for catering across a MAT and they made a big thing about upgrade paths for tills (we've been burnt before).Never had a problem with NRS. But since civica taken over....#here I just want to go on a long rambling monologue but fear I would be kicked off edugeek forever# Suffice to say I hate everything about Civica. They will screw every last penny out of you. I can't even start on Res3200 since they took over. I'm going for a sit in a darkened room to calm down. We will be moving catering companies asap. They want to charge us 12k for the upgrade [emoji34]
sonofsanta Posted June 26, 2019 Posted June 26, 2019 ...whilst appreciating that we'll have to upgrade to the Version 8 Civica Cashless Solution during the next 18-24 months (e.g. Silver package) once they stop support for our current version (6 - i think). That's interesting... we were told we'd be okay on version 6 for another 4 years or so, at which point our tills would be 10 years old and we'd probably need to replace them anyway.
MYK-IT Posted June 26, 2019 Posted June 26, 2019 What would £45k get you? The £45k (in fact, £47,770 over 5 years) would get you everything within the Silver Package (~£12k, all new equipment) with the addition of "5-Year Support and Maintenance", "Software End of Life/End of Support Cover" (e.g. TLS) and "Latest Civica Cashless Solution". Why anyone would go with that, and pay a £33k premium over the Silver Package I am not sure (even factoring in the paying for the annual additions, over an extra 4 years wouldn't cost anywhere near the difference!).
MYK-IT Posted June 26, 2019 Posted June 26, 2019 That's interesting... we were told we'd be okay on version 6 for another 4 years or so, at which point our tills would be 10 years old and we'd probably need to replace them anyway. That is indeed interesting to know.... If we can extend the current equipment / stay on same software version for (up to) that long, that would help. I must admit, was surprised that to reduce initial costs, CIVICA also offered to take out the "upgrading tills to Windows 10" bit, as our tills are currently on Windows 8.1 OS (W8.1 Extended support until 10th January 2023) Migrating NRS to a VM Server of course makes sense, although for us would mean re-configuring our network quite a bit, as currently the tills and NRS PC are all on their own physical network, with a secondary NIC (on NRS PC) VLAN'ed out. If I then host the NRS VM Server on our Virtual Hosts, I'd have to reroute all the tills (network traffic) back / from server room something extra to add to the ever extending "to do during summer" list!
MYK-IT Posted June 26, 2019 Posted June 26, 2019 (edited) We will be moving catering companies asap. They want to charge us 12k for the upgrade [emoji34] This is something that I never quite understood the logic of myself, of a school (including our own) spending a fortune to implement a Cashless Catering System, for then an external catering company to use / benefit from... During my conversation with the CIVICA rep yesterday, she advised that it was common practice to include the requirements (and costs of implementing / supporting) a Cashless Catering System within the Tender Process, so that the external catering company would covers the costs (over the contract period), not the school etc. Edited June 26, 2019 by MYK-IT 1
PotNoodleTech Posted June 26, 2019 Posted June 26, 2019 Our catering is done by the LEA and the LEA paid for the cashless system and it's install (cabling etc). If you are paying from school budget for the LEA Catering department's systems then you are doing it wrong (as you are probably already paying the fee to the LEA for that service so you're paying twice!). My advice is to check agreements/SLAs to see where you stand.
tech-man Posted June 26, 2019 Posted June 26, 2019 Our two nrs virtual servers are running 2008 r2 - does anyone know what options / costs are for upgrading this?
Sonic3 Posted July 1, 2019 Posted July 1, 2019 In the same boat here. I even suggested to Civica that I upgrade the OS on the tills myself and they just reinstall their software etc. but they won't allow it. So we're left with either forking out £10,000 or switching to another till system
johnabbots Posted July 1, 2019 Posted July 1, 2019 In the same boat here. I even suggested to Civica that I upgrade the OS on the tills myself and they just reinstall their software etc. but they won't allow it. So we're left with either forking out £10,000 or switching to another till system What version of Windows are your tills on and when have they said you have to upgrade from? Cheers 1
mavhc Posted July 1, 2019 Posted July 1, 2019 Make sure when you switch to another till system you won't have similar surprise costs 1
Sonic3 Posted July 1, 2019 Posted July 1, 2019 What version of Windows are your tills on and when have they said you have to upgrade from? Cheers The tills are running Windows POSReady 2009 so yeah, Civica are right about them needing an OS upgrade ASAP. They told me the ParentPay/TLS stuff will need to be sorted out by October this year.
Passat1983ICTech Posted July 2, 2019 Posted July 2, 2019 hi there we have her a Cunningham system her witch runs from a hyper v server then one PC in the kitchen all till run from the to the tills very nice system works well only problem is have to check hard disk as they did not make it big for all update and adding user to this
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