Source: Vector choice - URS Preferred Partner
What distinguishes high-quality, reliable IT support from mediocre or substandard service? Is it lower prices? Flat-fee service? At Vector Choice, we believe that several key factors set great providers apart from the rest. When our clients switch to us, we often hear the same feedback: they didn't realize their previous support was subpar until they experienced excellent service.
In today's blog, we highlight ten things that top-level IT providers always do. It's time to stop settling for tech headaches and subpar service that could put your company at risk. Great IT providers:
Answer the Phone During Emergencies In an emergency, you can't afford to wait on hold or hope for a callback. Reliable IT providers know that time matters and will either answer their calls live or respond within 30 minutes or less.
Are Consistently Easy to Reach and Highly Responsive for Non-Emergencies They are readily available even for small tech support issues. Ask your staff if they enjoy working with your IT provider or if they're tired of dealing with repeated issues, unhappy customer support, or long wait times. If the answer is negative, that's a red flag.
Offer After-Hours Support At a minimum, any reputable IT company should answer their phones live (not through voicemail or phone trees) and respond from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on weekdays. However, high-quality IT companies offer support outside regular hours, providing fast responses during nights and weekends.
Proactively Monitor Your Network You shouldn't be the one alerting your IT company to issues. Their technicians should monitor your systems for downtime, breaches, inefficiencies, and more, coming to you with proposed solutions and updates.
Have a Customer-Centric System That Is Easy for You to Use Can you easily open a ticket in their IT management portal for quick issue resolution? A proper ticketing system ensures requests are not overlooked, skipped, or forgotten. If they lack such a system, it’s time to question their customer focus.
Prepare, Propose, and Implement a Cybersecurity Plan Cybersecurity is crucial. If your IT team hasn't provided a plan to protect your business, they might not be qualified to offer the level of support you need, putting you at risk. Work with an IT provider that takes cybersecurity seriously and regularly proposes new security solutions.
Provide Detailed Invoices That Clearly Explain Charges Know exactly what you're paying for. Avoid flat fees without clarity on included services and beware of low-cost providers that 'nickel and dime' for every request. Ensure your IT provider is transparent about costs.
Carry Cyber Liability and Errors and Omissions Insurance Ensure your IT provider is adequately insured to cover any issues they might cause, such as network downtime, data loss, or property damage. Ask to review their insurance policies for peace of mind.
Conduct Periodic Test Restores of Backups Regularly testing backups ensures data is not corrupt and can be restored in an emergency. Your IT provider should treat your data as if it's as valuable as their own.
Complete Projects on Time and Within Budget If your IT provider frequently adds fees or delays projects, it's time to switch. Great IT providers accurately estimate timelines and stick to schedules and budgets, communicating promptly if issues arise.
Stop settling for poor IT service. Tech nightmares should be a thing of the past. To see what trustworthy, reliable IT support looks like, request a free, no-obligation Network Assessment from our team. We'll identify optimization opportunities, highlight vulnerabilities, and suggest improvements for your business's technology.
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