Dell / Unisys / Smartech

[dkmccann]

Several months ago after almost a year of self directed study I passed the tests and received my A+ certification. I was looking for some way to put it to use without taking on a full time job when I found something in Craig's List. Under Technical Support I found "Break/Fix Tech Needed ASAP!" That was Monday (Labor Day). I applied and by Wednesday I was in front of a Dell customer replacing a system board in a brand new Dell laptop.

I do not get reimbursed for mileage. I receive only $18 a call and that is not received until 30 days after the call. In business book keeping it's called net 30. My status is an independent contractor. Which is what I want. I am doing this to get Dell laptop experince. I intend to take only one or two calls a day. Smartech claims they only take one hour each. They say to call in if it takes more time than that. I don't know what happens when you do call asking for more time. Does anyone else out there have Smartech experience? Would I be better off working for Unisys (couldn't be any worse)?

Thank you for listening
dkmccann age 57

 

[raleighwolverine]

Several months ago after almost a year of self directed study I passed the tests and received my A+ certification. I was looking for some way to put it to use without taking on a full time job when I found something in Craig's List. Under Technical Support I found "Break/Fix Tech Needed ASAP!" That was Monday (Labor Day). I applied and by Wednesday I was in front of a Dell customer replacing a system board in a brand new Dell laptop.

I do not get reimbursed for mileage. I receive only $18 a call and that is not received until 30 days after the call. In business book keeping it's called net 30. My status is an independent contractor. Which is what I want. I am doing this to get Dell laptop experince. I intend to take only one or two calls a day. Smartech claims they only take one hour each. They say to call in if it takes more time than that. I don't know what happens when you do call asking for more time. Does anyone else out there have Smartech experience? Would I be better off working for Unisys (couldn't be any worse)?

Thank you for listening
dkmccann age 57

Hi!

I am a field tech like yourself and I have been doing this for a while now with another company. As far as your pay situation, it's not a good one. With your A+ you can find much better. As far as the time each call should take, yes they may average one hour each, but in reality, you don't really know whether or not that call is going to take 30 mins or 1 hour and 1/2. If it does take over that hour, yes you should call in to Dell. If it takes 1 1/2 to two hours or more Dell will give you a labor only which will pay you for a second call.

My advice would be to find another job. That company is getting paid a whole lot more than $18 for a call and you are doing most of the work and spending your gas money and applying wear and tear on your vehicle.

Anon

 

[mp187263]

Dead thread, but this caught my eye and hopefully will be helpful to others.

My company is a subcontractor for Unisys / Dell and we get $70 per hour for each call. I would say demand a raise. The agreement these days is to call Dell if the call starts to go over 3 hours in which case a labor-only ticket needs to be opened. I don't believe Unisys provides Dell work for their own employees, they sub-contract it to a local tech company or a truly independent contractor (self-employed) in most cases. If you are doing Dell calls, you must have all your Dell certs, which your company should have arranged for you. If you do not have those, all the calls done by you will be flagged as failures by Dell. Your Unisys representative can help you set that up. If you want to be truly independent, I would also recommend sub-contracting for some of the other big outsourcing firms like CompuCom, Compugen, Fujitsu, Decision One (they can be difficult to deal with), and even Moneris, replacing debit machines. Altogether, you should be able to make a fine living as long as you can keep up with the work, but of course there are always periods of downtime during which there won't be any work. The bottom line is, you can either be independent or find a job with a company that already sub-contracts with several of these tech outsourcers, the latter being the most stable choice. Chances are it will also be a computer shop where you can get bench work experience and put your A+ to use a little better.

Best of luck.

 

[rixtertrader]

Double-dead thread, but here is updated information.

They pay $19 per call now, and you can just forget about "labor only" pay. That was not available for me as Dell/Unisys changed policy. So you will find yourself eating that extra time on the phone and it really hurts. Smartech simply does NOT pay. You will waste a lot of time (in addition to gas, ins, wear/tear of veh) with paperwork, travel, online updating two systems per call, and overage of time due to unforeseen situations (which happen a lot!). All that eats into your $19, which alone is little pay for making house-call repair calls. Seriously, avoid this situation unless you just want to get a little warm-up practice in (as was my case). Smartech is not showing their contractors much respect (and are simply greedy no doubt).

 

[Perdun]

I used to work as independent contractor for Smartech. This company doesn't pay well and always sending you far away from your home location. This company is terrible to work for. I used to pay $25 per call and would say that isn't enough at all. You more spend on gas and mileage. I'm not recommending work for Smartech. Bad place to work for.

They pay $19 per call now, and you can just forget about "labor only" pay. That was not available for me as Dell/Unisys changed policy. So you will find yourself eating that extra time on the phone and it really hurts. Smartech simply does NOT pay. You will waste a lot of time (in addition to gas, ins, wear/tear of veh) with paperwork, travel, online updating two systems per call, and overage of time due to unforeseen situations (which happen a lot!). All that eats into your $19, which alone is little pay for making house-call repair calls. Seriously, avoid this situation unless you just want to get a little warm-up practice in (as was my case). Smartech is not showing their contractors much respect (and are simply greedy no doubt).[/quotemsg]

 

[aaroniousnh]

Double-dead thread, but here is updated information.

They pay $19 per call now, and you can just forget about "labor only" pay. That was not available for me as Dell/Unisys changed policy. So you will find yourself eating that extra time on the phone and it really hurts. Smartech simply does NOT pay. You will waste a lot of time (in addition to gas, ins, wear/tear of veh) with paperwork, travel, online updating two systems per call, and overage of time due to unforeseen situations (which happen a lot!). All that eats into your $19, which alone is little pay for making house-call repair calls. Seriously, avoid this situation unless you just want to get a little warm-up practice in (as was my case). Smartech is not showing their contractors much respect (and are simply greedy no doubt).

 

[lobo699]

Does anybody responding to this thread know of any other Unisys subcontractors other than Smartech?