1| Slow Response Times
When your IT support provider is slow to react to a situation you have raised, this should sound alarm bells. Being passed onto one party to another within the organisation and acting slow on the ticket raised can be frustrating. Waiting for a few hours for your provider to fix your issue should be an indicator that it’s time to switch providers.
2| Poor Communication and Responsibility
Good providers will always keep in touch and update you when required. Technical problems are often hard to explain to companies that are not technical. Therefore, a good IT support provider will always maintain excellent communication and explain things in layman terms. They should also ensure you are up to date with industry standards. In addition, if something goes wrong, they should be responsible for their actions. This could be a situation where data is accidently lost/deleted or when security measures were not up to expected standards. Such situations would suggest you are not being put first and maybe it’s time to switch providers.
3| Bigger Is Not Always Better
Large IT support providers will have Service Delivery Managers who will deliver your service, Account Managers who will deal with the finances of your support and the support team who will fix your IT problems. This will also include 1st line, 2nd line and 3rd line IT support, which is based on technical ability. Therefore, depending on the issue raised you could speak to a different person each time you call in. No doubt you should receive a good service, but you can be passed onto various of people within the organisation.
A smaller provider’s support team work together to fix the problem. Therefore, there’s a high chance each time you call in raising a problem, you’ll speak to the same person. This person will know your systems inside out and can fix your issue quickly. This could be one of the many benefits to switch to a smaller IT support provider.
4| Persistent Issues
Many of the small IT issues add up over time. When your staff start to become frustrated over these small issues that keep reoccurring, this will cost you time and money. If your IT support provider is failing in this area to find a solution and is only interested in quickly fixing it, this will affect your business negatively. The reoccurring issues are most likely linked to a root problem. Your provider should spend time to find the root problem and fix it for good. If not, it might be time to jump ship.
5| Trust And Understanding
Your IT support provider should make you feel that you completely trust they have your systems secure. They should create a strong feeling of trust within you that if the worst was to happen, they could fix it quickly and efficiently. It can be helpful to choose a large provider, as most specialise in certain industries. This argument is that they may understand your company better. This is not always true, as the smaller providers can offer the same service. They gain a wealth of experience across an array of industries. Overall, your IT provider should understand your requirements and systems; if not, it might be time to leave.
At Cambridge Support we are always on hand to help. Just contact us today at ask@cambridgesupport.com.
