Upgrade problem

EuropaCuisson

Hello,

I'm IT Manager in a Company (so I'm not NAV Center). And I have an experience for more than 15 years in NAV development.
I think I can say I have a very good skill in NAV.

When I'm hired on my current company, the had an NAV5.0 version.

So I started 'myself !) the upgrade process => 2009 on RTC => 2013 => 2018
Switching to 5.0 to 2009 RTC is a big process. Form to page, 3-tiers architecture, ...
and users take a long time to accomodate...

After 1 year, now, we are fully in 2009 RTC.
So, according to Mirosoft, the next step is to switch to 2013 R2.
I started the conversion of our object.
And (on february !!) I asked to our NAV Center to receive the upgraded licence
They say that is no more possible to simply upgrade the licence to 2013. They must ask "a special case" to Microsoft to do thaht. But, no problem, that simply take more time ...

After lot of email ... I finally receive a response today : "Sorry, it's not possible to upgrade licenses, you must directly go to dynamic Central" ...

But according to all pages I find on Microsoft, to upgrade from 2009 to Central, we must passe to 2013 and 2018
There is no direct upgrade pass.
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/business-central/dev-itpro/upgrade/upgrading-to-business-central-on-premises

I'm wrong about this ????

Or we must do the 3 upgrade without "staying on the version", and working only fro the upgrade on central ?
and we must do the upgrade of data in the 3 steps in a line (in a single week-end, difficult) ?

And without the possibility to stay for some month on each versions, we accumulate the possible problem.
We have lot of customization.


When I asked the license on 02/2019, they say that there is no problem...
And now, impossible ...

I know that after 31/03, it's normally more difficult, that wa announced, it's the reason I asked my license on 02/2019...



But now... what to do ...


Thx

swpolo

Hello,
For a now it is possible way is to upgrade to BC365 on premise version. It means that objects should be converted the same way as usual merge.
If you consider refactor your customizations and move them to extensions you can do it on BC365 on premise.
I think you did unnecesary steps in your upgrade way so you spent much more time that it should be.
At the moment you should uprade 2009RTC to BC365 onprem. It is not good idea to upgrade to NAV 2013R2.

Slawek_Guzek

They already made an investment in NAV, have paid for their license, and apparently, if they were able to get new licenses back in Feb, they have also paid all yearly maintenance fees. Now MS is forcing them to go to BC and therefore forcing to pay for the same thing again and again, this time every month for every user.

If they could get 2018 license they could stay with a connection-based licensing model forever should they wish, with BC the need to pay a monthly subscription per every user.

Not a good business for them as the end users, imho.

EuropaCuisson

Yes, we have paid all yearly maintenance fees from 2009.
And now that we want to use our upgrade right, we can't.

We can't go to the version we want.
+ We must pay now our consultant to help for the migration (more difficult to upgrade 3 version in one time)
+ Yes, you are right, thers is some user license modification. But I think we can go to on premise version, and have perpetual license?

I have a meeting in 2 weeks with our NAV Vendor to discuss all that.
But actually, it's simple : "Oh, sorry, you can't have other license than BC. But it's not a problem, you can pay to have some consultant to help you to upgrade. But, because, yourself (and not our payed developper) had made some modification in you NAV, we can help you, but under your responsibility only, we can make sure all is ok, ...."

But from my point of view, the start of the problem, is that they don't give me the licence when I ask them (02/2019), from what I find on web, at this date, there was no problem

And they never warn us about this problem in the future.
I work on the complete upgrade from 1 year, and they know that ...

Slawek_Guzek

I would stick to the point that you have requested a new license before the deadline. Dig out old emails to have a proof handy. Since you have requested it before the deadline it is, imho, or it should be your NAV partner problem to get it now.

Should they have delivered it when you have asked there would be no problem.

EuropaCuisson

Yes, I have lot of e-mail, where my contact (sales representative, I think with a limited know of NAV) confirm that there is no problem for the license.
I have explained all my process and asked to confirm by e-mail, And he confirm by e-mail (multiple times ...)
And in another context, he is also confirmed by e-mail that a part of is job is to give advice and warn us about possible problem (with a copy to my boss) ...