The 3 Most Important Questions To Ask Your IT Service Provider

The decision to outsource your IT is a huge one. You’re essentially entrusting the nuts and bolts of your organization to outsiders. It can be nerve-wracking, but if you ask the right questions and get the proper information before signing on with your vendor of choice, you should be able to begin your working relationship with confidence.

But how are you to know which questions are the right questions? Of course, different things will be important to different organizations depending on their size, budget, and unique needs. Ask the IT service provider the following three questions. Depending on their answer, you’ll be able to deduce whether or not they will mix well with your organization on a cultural level and on a needs-based level.

1. Will I Be Consistently Working with the Same Engineer?

One of the most frequently asked questions that we get asked during sales calls is whether we work on site and if we assign a specific engineer to each account. As with anything, different IT service providers have different business models. They might work on the basis of providing mostly remote support and sending out whichever available engineer that has the time to address on-site issues as needed.

At iuvo Technologies, specifically, we don’t believe that it’s efficient to send “whoever’s available” to a client. You get a dedicated team of technicians that match your requirements and whom you can count on because we believe the value of developing relationships with our customers. By doing this, our team is able to get to know your business inside and out. We know your technology, we know your current needs and work with you to figure out what’s coming down the pike.

Similarly, you get to know your technician as they become an extension of your business. Of course, in the case of an emergency we might have to send out “whoever’s available,” because we wouldn’t want to leave our clients hanging when they need us most - but you can always rest assured that our entire team is prepared and ready to provide you with the assistance that you need, when you need it.

2. What Types of Systems and Equipment Do You Service?

No two IT service providers are the same. They may have different business models or different areas of expertise. However, one thing that many of them have in common is that they focus mostly on Microsoft products and workstations. This is partially because, when you look at the big picture of the corporate landscape, most organizations run on Windows. But this poses a problem for businesses using Mac OS or Linux, since they can have a hard time finding any IT service provider (nevermind the “right” one).

We’re happy to say that we have experts in Mac, Windows, Linux, AWS, and Azure. We also have a great deal of depth in network and server work, not just desktop maintenance.

3. What Happens During Nights, Weekends, and Holidays?

This is one of the primary concerns that pretty much anyone dealing with any sort of vendor has. Trusting your IT to an outside organization can alleviate a lot of stress, but when things get hectic overnight or during off-hours it’s important to know that your IT service provider has your back and is available to ensure things are made right - or at least contained - during your non-business hours.

It’s also important to ask what their Service Level Agreement (SLA) is during these times. It’s likely that their response times will be slower during off-hours and weekends, so you’ll need to make sure that their responsiveness meets your business’s needs. If their SLA states they’ll get back to you within four hours, but your business cannot afford to be down for more than one hour, even if it’s the middle of the night, then that’s a clear indication that it may not be the organization for you.

Learn more about what it’s like when you’re working with an IT service provider by reading our eBook, What To Expect When You’re Expecting IT.