An explanation of the Extended Support phase for Business & Developer products
Extended Support is the second phase of the Support Lifecycle for Business & Developer products. The key differences between the Mainstream Support phase and Extended Support phase are that the “no-charge” support options are no longer available and that we no longer provide new non-security hotfixes. This means that customers will need to open paid support cases (such as Premier, Pro or Pay Per Incident cases) to obtain support for their product. For those customers who require new non-security hotfixes during the Extended Support phase, a special program called Extended Hotfix Support (EHS) is available. I’ll save the detailed discussion about EHS for another posting.
One of the important things to note is that Extended Support is still a publicly supported phase. Many Premier and Pro customers who already open paid cases with Microsoft will notice little difference in the support that is provided in this phase. They will continue to be able to open paid cases, receive security updates, obtain support assistance from their Technical Account Manager, etc… In reality, few customers need Extended Hotfix Support unless they have a history of requesting or requiring non-security hotfixes.
Like the Mainstream Support phase, it is important to note that support is only provided at a supported service pack level.
The Extended Support phase is provided for a minimum of 5 years or 2 years after the second successor product is released, whichever is longer. This means that the Extended Support phase may be extended to longer than 5 years, if the second follow-on product release is delayed. The basic reasoning behind this policy is that we don’t want to completely end support for a product unless there are 2 newer versions of the product for customers to migrate to.
At the end of the Extended Support phase, Business & Developer products are no longer publicly supported. This means that there is no more paid support, no support assistance and no further security updates. Customers are highly encouraged to move a supported product as soon as possible.
Please tell us what you think! Does this better explain the Extended Support phase? What can we do better to explain this on our main site?
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