There is an old adage “when a deal appears to good to be true, it generally is too good to be true”.
We had a recent example where a Client moved to a new supplier to provide their IT support in Glasgow.
Several weeks into their new agreement, they have had a server failure and now need to perform a disaster recovery procedure.
Astonishingly the new provider never requested any information relating to the backup and disaster recovery solution in place when they took over the site.
Given how important this is to businesses, it’s a real clanger and in my view, shows a lack of care and appreciation for the good of the Client.
At OCD, we pride ourselves on our proactive service which cuts unscheduled downtime by almost 80% over most other IT providers.
It’s very likely that the money they felt they would “save” on this cheaper deal, has now been eaten up due to the failure, which, from a conservative point of view, equates to circa £750 per person per day in lost productivity.
Therefore if you have 10 staff, you have potentially lost a significant amount of money if your server is down for one day.
Anyway, it’s really something we should all bear in mind, if a deal seems to good to be true, it generally is, be wary!
There is a responsibility on the service provider to price their service appropriately for the service they promise they will deliver.
There is also a responsibility on the Client to look at a proper ROI and proof that the provider is capable of and will do what they promise.
We are seeing the same situation more and more at present given the economic conditions – companies are buying the business – reducing their costs by 50 – 60% to win business which can be fine, but not if you are promising the same level of service as you used to – it’s simply not common sense and doesn’t work.
The problem is you can’t ultimately provide a good level of service if you’ve priced it at 2 bob and a baloon!
We all have to be very, very careful if we are going for the cheapest possible deal, it’s likely we’ll get a level of service which equates to what we’ve paid and that will cost more in the long run in frustration and dissapointment, or worse still, potential damage to your business and your brand.
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