In the previous post I tried to just stick with just the facts as to why we left NetSuite.  I read it a number of times and others here familiar with the story agreed that it was clear and factual.  However I heard from our (ex) NetSuite reseller Ray Tetlow of Skyytek and he had a different version of the events that transpired.  I told him numerous times that he was free to post any comments on the D-Tools blog or create his own blog.  He declined because he was going to “take the moral high ground”.  I am not sure what that means in this case.

So I decided to revisit the issue to make sure I covered everything as accurately as possible and did not try and spin this any one way or the other.

We did not leave NetSuite because the software sucked.  The software sucked hard back in the version 7,8  and 9 days but the current version we were on was OK.  I am not aware of any other single vendor software company that can recreate the NetSuite lead to cash process.  Maybe the individual parts are not as good as the competition but having everything integrated into one system has a lot of value.  Based on my extensive research to try and recreate NetSuite functionality in a product like Salesforce.com was going to take four separate vendors.  You can read about it here.

We did not leave NetSuite because of the price.  Yea, it is expensive, the price always goes up, the product levels, packages and options constantly change, extra emails cost 4 cents each and they brutally shifted their focus from an online QuickBooks competitor to the small end of SMB to SAP competitor during our time with them.  So yea, if you are going to compete with SAP your price structure is going to look similar but remember we bought into this when it was Oracle SMALL BUSINESS not SAP lite.

Also we are not stupid here.  Switching costs are huge with any platform change, especially so with a platform like NS that does not give you easy access to all of your data.  See related post on who owns your data.  We knew it was going to be very expensive to switch.  Just the hard costs of the new software platform and data conversion costs were close to $80K.  I figure the total hard and soft costs of the switch were around $200K.

The reason we left NetSuite was their business practices.  I do not think I can explain it any clearer than here. We had a dispute over what contingent means and as a negotiating tactic they threaten to cancel our paid in full account that was not set to expire for five months.  That is like negotiating with the mafia while they have your head in vise.  Who wants to do business with a company like that?  I was actively securing financing for this deal with our bank when we got the first collection letter nine days after the estimate.

The only thing I can add to that story is that Ray Tetlow, the founder of Skyytek claims he had nothing to do with the NetSuite business and collection practices and it was out of his hands.  I do not know what the truth is in this matter.  What I do know is that in a face to face conversation with another NetSuite reseller in the fall and I was told that the reseller controls the deal.

So now I am curious, I assumed that Ray Tetlow was telling the truth but why would another reseller make any kind of contrary statement?  I am hoping that someone with more clout than me can get to the bottom of this.  If Ray Tetlow had nothing to do with the mafia like negotiating and collection tactics then that makes NetSuite the worst customer service company in the world.  Is there anyone from NetSuite that would like to make a public comment on their collection processes and reseller agreements?  Maybe someone from the press could ask these hard questions.