Third-Party Hardware Maintenance vs Manufacturer's Warranty: What is Finest To your Business?

By Barbara Thomas


As soon as purchasing computer hardware to your business, method availability is really a major consideration. While you hope it will remain reliable, you should manage the risk that at some time a essential program part will fail, calling for hardware maintenance.

Such failures usually bring about the program being unavailable to users until repaired. This 'system down-time' is also incredibly high-priced when users sit idle and unproductive.

Many assume that the typical manufacturer's warranty will adequately protect them. But the 'small print' of frequent warranties can trigger a smaller amount than satisfactory hardware maintenance benefits for businesses. Even high-priced warranty uplifts may not deliver enough protection against these costs.

Response Times

One of your systems fails, so you call the warranty-provider's telephone hotline and speak to an operator inside a call centre -- possibly overseas -- who simply takes a message.

If the failed procedure is under a 'next corporation day' telephone response arrangement for hardware maintenance, then your staff could possibly be unable to do their job to your day or far more just before the warranty provider even gets around to diagnosing the problem. And with a 'best effort' onsite response, it could possibly be several days prior to a hardware maintenance engineer arrives.

If the system loss has company-wide impact then the implications are even a lot more serious. Normal warranties only cover you for hardware maintenance during working hours -- so a failure over a Friday afternoon could leave your corporation crippled well into the after Monday.

Businesses that can not afford this sort of downtime should glimpse to specialist third party hardware maintenance providers that maximise method availability by tailoring assist arrangements to meet your specific business needs.

Look for hardware maintenance program providers who provide short, defined response times -- such as a guarantee of the response for your call within ten minutes from a trained hardware maintenance engineer who will solve your issue, and on-site response inside 2 hours for important method failures.

Also research organisations who will assign a hardware maintenance engineer permanently to your account. This ensures that they grow to be familiar within your IT environment and personnel -- a issue significant to ensuring speedy response and resolution of crucial system failures.

Parts Holdings

Hardware maintenance response times are irrelevant if you then have to wait for parts to be shipped from interstate or overseas. Equipment manufacturers typically retain replacement components for warranty program in a single location nationally. Like a result, you'll be able to be waiting for 24 to 48 hours though the component you want is shipped, delivered and installed.

A hardware maintenance provider that may be focussed on maximising technique uptime holds spares locally to shorten delivery times. Ask capability assistance providers for an explanation of their parts holding methods and methodologies. Understand what ratio of spares are held against systems under contract and whether these parts are regularly tested. With enough local spares, hardware maintenance engineers can attend internet site on the proper part in hand to additional speed the repair process.

Beyond Hardware 'Break-Fix'

A regular warranty will only cover you for ones repair of one's system, for instance the delivery and installation of replacement parts, and provides no guarantees as to once your hardware maintenance problem will likely be resolved.

A hardware maintenance assistance tailored to maximise systems availability, however, offers a lot more, including:

taking ownership with the 'grey' areas -- for example operating technique problems and other reasons of hardware problems a first-call fix rate of over 95% -- which approaches you won't need to wait for numerous engineer visits just before technique function is restored These superior assistance levels meet the operational requirements of firms which are dependent on method availability. Ask ability hardware maintenance providers for customer testimonials and references to substantiate their support levels.

So, is a regular manufacturer's warranty quite great ample for your business?

A normal warranty assistance could be 'free', but owning staff unable to work -- or clients in a position to contact you -- could end up costing your company heavily inside the extended run. Even expensive warranty uplifts do not completely mitigate the risks.

The beneficial news is that specialised and highly-focused third-party hardware maintenance solutions are accessible to solve this problem.

Your hardware maintenance agreement is also tailored to meet your specific operational needs and risk management strategy. Paid over a monthly basis, they provide much better income flow and operational flexibility -- for about the same as a manufacturer's warranty uplift.

But most importantly, they can reduce technique downtime by several hours a year -- saving you numerous thousands in lost productivity and revenue.




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