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Chapter 16. Contacting Global Support Services

Unless you have a Self-Support subscription, when both the Red Hat Documentation website and Customer Portal fail to provide the answers to your questions, you can contact Global Support Services (GSS).

16.1. Gathering Required Information

Several items of information should be gathered before contacting GSS.

Background Information

Ensure you have the following background information at hand before calling GSS:
  • Hardware type, make, and model on which the product runs
  • Software version
  • Latest upgrades
  • Any recent changes to the system
  • An explanation of the problem and the symptoms
  • Any messages or significant information about the issue

Note

If you ever forget your Red Hat login information, it can be recovered at https://access.redhat.com/site/help/LoginAssistance.html.

Diagnostics

The diagnostics report for Red Hat Enterprise Linux is required as well. This report is also known as a sosreport and the program to create the report is provided by the sos package. To install the sos package and all its dependencies on your system, type the following at a shell prompt as root: 
yum install sos
To generate the report, run as root: 
sosreport
For more information, access the Knowledgebase article at https://access.redhat.com/kb/docs/DOC-3593.

Account and Contact Information

In order to help you, GSS requires your account information to customize their support, as well contact information to get back to you. When you contact GSS ensure you have your:
  • Red Hat customer number or Red Hat Network (RHN) login name
  • Company name
  • Contact name
  • Preferred method of contact (phone or email) and contact information (phone number or email address)

Issue Severity

Determining an issue's severity is important to allow the GSS team to prioritize their work. There are four levels of severity.
Severity 1 (urgent)
A problem that severely impacts your use of the software for production purposes. It halts your business operations and has no procedural workaround.
Severity 2 (high)
A problem where the software is functioning, but production is severely reduced. It causes a high impact to business operations, and no workaround exists.
Severity 3 (medium)
A problem that involves partial, non-critical loss of the use of the software. There is a medium to low impact on your business, and business continues to function by utilizing a workaround.
Severity 4 (low)
A general usage question, report of a documentation error, or a recommendation for a future product improvement.
For more information on determining the severity level of an issue, see https://access.redhat.com/support/policy/severity.
Once the issue severity has been determined, submit a service request through the Customer Portal under the Connect option, or at https://access.redhat.com/support/contact/technicalSupport.html. Note that you need your Red Hat login details in order to submit service requests.
If the severity is level 1 or 2, then follow up your service request with a phone call. Contact information and business hours are found at https://access.redhat.com/support/contact/technicalSupport.html.
If you have a premium subscription, then after hours support is available for Severity 1 and 2 cases.
Turn-around rates for both premium subscriptions and standard subscription can be found at https://access.redhat.com/support/offerings/production/sla.html.