Schools Week - Arbor’s Kickbacks

[CHiLL]

What a pathetic post and to top it all off, they reference a quote from The ParentPay Group, who's subsidiary, EES, have not exactly been straight with their contracts for SIMS.

 

@Bromcom_Darren is this really what you need on this forum? Bromcom's reputation for reliability isn't exactly stellar on here and now your own company is posting stuff like this.

Edited October 1, 2024 by CHiLL

[TechMonkey]

... Putting down the other side(s) rather than shouting about your own is poor form.

This ^.

 

This is, on the whole, a professional forum. I would hope companies would follow the same. Yes, companies do cruddy things and should be taken to task for it. But publishing, publicising and revelling in it does not sit right.

[DrCheese]

All I keep taking away from behaviour like this is that they would behave exactly like ESS/SIMS did when they were on top if they got to that point.

 

Instead of learning from the past 20 odd years they just want to take over & we'll be back to square one, with an arrogant company lording it all over us. Never developing their product, never really caring about the customers.

Replacing one bad company with another.

 

The worst thing about edutech is when companies get above their station & just let the products wither on the vine whist suing everyone who tries to break that mold.

Nothing Bromcom show here shows me they would do differently.

Edited October 1, 2024 by DrCheese

[Marci]

Know your audience… This is LinkedIn fodder, not for here (or BC community site).

 

The day-to-day users *don’t care* & you just attract backlash from the lower decks (who are having to work around system problems daily likely far in excess of their prev MIS, so are already disgruntled).

 

Executives make the decisions and are accountable, and they rarely hang out with the grunts / are a teeny ratio here…

[dmj]

It occurred to me that if schools were any good at contract negotiation; Bromcom would become top of the list for paying 'kickbacks' for breach of contract everytime they violate their uptime SLA's.

Sadly, none of this ever seems to get negotiated into the contracts and we just put up with random slowness with no recourse whatsoever.

[PotNoodleTech]

It occurred to me that if schools were any good at contract negotiation; Bromcom would become top of the list for paying 'kickbacks' for breach of contract everytime they violate their uptime SLA's.

Sadly, none of this ever seems to get negotiated into the contracts and we just put up with random slowness with no recourse whatsoever.

 

For that to happen Schools would need high level legal bods on their team, which given the recent thread about IT staff being paid the same as tesco shelf stackers, is franky a pipe dream in blue sky land.

[dmj]

For that to happen Schools would need high level legal bods on their team, which given the recent thread about IT staff being paid the same as tesco shelf stackers, is franky a pipe dream in blue sky land.

 

Agree. The current situation, though, is that these companies are walking all over schools.

[psydii]

Agree. The current situation, though, is that these companies are walking all over schools.

 

Indeed, from observation, SLAs in contracts are worthless, unless the client engaged a legal team who were instructed to make ensure they were enforceable as part of the contract negotiation.

[DrCheese]

Indeed, from observation, SLAs in contracts are worthless, unless the client engaged a legal team who were instructed to make ensure they were enforceable as part of the contract negotiation.

 

Yeah... I've never had much luck getting anything out of companies if they screw up mid contract. Which is why I'm really not a fan of the 3 year contract stuff that's creeping into everything, as you have zero clout aside from renewal time

[MurphyMurphyMurphy]

The posts that Bromcom make on here are comical. Their PR would be improved if they kept quiet.

 

I was just thinking the same thing. What are they thinking???? Who is running their PR?? You can have fun with it, make some jabs about features your MIS has that Arbor does not, but dryly stating biased facts and legal precedent? Honestly, what are they thinking? Do you think any of DMs care if Arbor is doing something illegal (not saying they are)? We only care about choosing the best MIS.

[Jaan]

I vote ban the account ROFL

[supportman]

I was just thinking the same thing. What are they thinking???? Who is running their PR?? You can have fun with it, make some jabs about features your MIS has that Arbor does not, but dryly stating biased facts and legal precedent? Honestly, what are they thinking? Do you think any of DMs care if Arbor is doing something illegal (not saying they are)? We only care about choosing the best MIS.

 

The funniest thing is Bromcom probably IS the best MIS out there 😂. Its certainly the most fully featured anyway.

 

But your right, all these statements from Bromcom trying to make the points (which are actually fair) are just not communicated very well.

 

I guess its better than EES Sims who just do remain silent so we can make fun of them and their 40 million pounds investments and Next generation timelines

[sefton]

The funniest thing is Bromcom probably IS the best MIS out there 😂. Its certainly the most fully featured anyway.

 

But your right, all these statements from Bromcom trying to make the points (which are actually fair) are just not communicated very well.

 

I guess its better than EES Sims who just do remain silent so we can make fun of them and their 40 million pounds investments and Next generation timelines

 

Given the reliability and capacity issues we keep seeing reported on here (which will only be a small sample), I think that is very arguable.

[supportman]

Given the reliability and capacity issues we keep seeing reported on here (which will only be a small sample), I think that is very arguable.

Its been fine though recently.... They even wrote an incident report about what went wrong and how it was fixed.

[Ditto]

Its been fine though recently.... They even wrote an incident report about what went wrong and how it was fixed.

 

When was the "fixed" date?

[supportman]

When was the "fixed" date?

3rd September I believe. There was an issue with the Azure capacity increase that has been resolved.

[Ditto]

3rd September I believe. There was an issue with the Azure capacity increase that has been resolved.

Trouble is there have been grumbles on Edugeek post that date (26/9) around performance, one that the helpdesk acknowledged - https://www.edugeek.net/forums/mis-systems/233791-bromcom-sso-issue-slowness-18.html#post2050602

 

Of course it could be a local issue, but it takes many months to rebuild the reputation after the multiple issues reported.

[supportman]

Yeh can't disagree with that, I just want people to be informed as many schools are looking at the MIS change.

 

Its far too easy to just put Arbor, Bromcom and Sims into certain boxes. That's an over generalisation.

 

People should test out all the MIS's and make informed decisions based on how good the system is as well as price.

 

The best thing that can happen is there is a fair and open competition which drives innovation and prices downwards.

[PotNoodleTech]

Well you can put SIMS into a box ...a 20 year old box ................. as no one in their right mind is going to go through a gynormous procurement excercise, risk getting sued, and then pick the one that literally has not had one improvement in the last 10 years and have lost 30% of the market in the last year or two?

 

It's Arbor v Bromcom a two horse race. SIMS is dead in the water as far as I can see and once the 3 year contracts that the whole country was forced in to are over I think it will cease to exist.

Edited October 7, 2024 by PotNoodleTech

[synaesthesia]

True - we've just completed ours, it was a 3 horse race between Arbor, Bromcom and one other firmly in the "other" box, and it certainly wasn't SIMS. I wouldn't have been disappointed with either of the two big names based on capability. BC's PR does leave a sour taste in the mouth, but it's little different to the aftertaste when buying from Amazon or watching another amazing SpaceX launch. You know the end result is going to be decent in spite of the utter arsery that goes on behind the scenes.

[Bromcom_Darren]

3rd September I believe. There was an issue with the Azure capacity increase that has been resolved.

 

Please find below the RCA for the Issues we faced at the start of September.

 

Major Incident Root-Cause-Analysis (2nd - 5th September 2024) (bromcomcloud.com)

 

Thanks

Darren Moody

Bromcom Community Manager

[howartp]

Please find below the RCA for the Issues we faced at the start of September.

 

Major Incident Root-Cause-Analysis (2nd - 5th September 2024) (bromcomcloud.com)

 

Thanks

Darren Moody

Bromcom Community Manager

That's behind your login portal so unfortunately non-customers can't see it.

[supportman]

That's behind your login portal so unfortunately non-customers can't see it.

Here you go

 

Major Incident Root-Cause-Analysis 2nd-5th September 2024.pdf

[dmj]

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why lift and shift is a bad approach for could services.

[Primus]

That RCA has so many weird aspects I barely know where to start.