That should tell you everything you need to know…

well I never said their sales team was good ha

Thanks for closing the loop - always interesting to hear about any progress when stuck in a bureaucratic logjam.

So to fully close the loop, I convinced the client to go to AWS after this week's debacle. I showed them how simple it was to spin up a new box on AWS, and everything just worked. Then, I showed them how DIRECTLY within the AI help interface, as SOON as you say you "need to speak to a human" it gives you the SUPPORT TICKET INTERFACE to fill out RIGHT there. No "you must have a support contract to ask about a billing question" horseshit. DIRECT access to the support ticket system.

The customer has agreed that we should pivot to AWS. Microsoft has officially lost a $10M, 10 year contract, and it's going to their primary competitor.

I wonder how often this really happens, just so they can save a few bucks on tech support?

There's also digital ocean and hertzner cloud if you don't want to enter the AWS money pit. Though if you're looking to become a forensic accountant, AWS billing is great training