9th June 2018
Tech Support Needed Now
We are now open Saturdays! Why are we doing this? Our industry is mostly about 3 main things – initial purchase, ongoing support and disaster recovery. The initial purchase of a device can usually wait for a few days to get an exact model into stock or to custom build a PC however even this process becomes urgent if the existing PC has died.
We are also noticing an increase in the number of customers that simply cannot get away from their own work during the traditional Monday to Friday business hours. These customers have previously got friends or relatives to drop gear off to us, however this can be a mistake when computers are so complex and personal devices.
After the initial sale of a PC, customers focus their attention to the ongoing support of these devices and again due to their very nature this can be rather complex. There is certainly a number of computer users that leave more complex computer work or document deadlines until they ‘have more time’ on weekends and this can become their undoing if computer issues strike.
I also see so many procrastinators encroach further upon a Uni assignment deadline or similar, by all of a sudden performing their own ideas of computer maintenance when in fact they should simply be typing in Word. When going through Uni, I have been guilty of this myself and it often led to some extreme hair pulling and requests for assignment extensions!
The ongoing support of a PC does not always fall during normal business hours and sometimes a 30 second phone call is all that is needed to determine what option is best clicked on some new pop-up message. We have 8 incoming lines so that we don’t miss phone call during the week so why were we content to miss phone calls on Saturday mornings?
The last and most concerning aspect of owning a PC is that of disaster recovery. Here, I am talking about a computer that suddenly won’t boot up at all. This can happen without any warning if your PC has a hardware fault. It can also happen due to no fault of the user from a software update and again – this can be thrust upon the user without any choice.
Whether you run a business or simply use a PC at home, when it breaks down it is a disaster and leaving it sit for an entire weekend seems like such a waste of time. We still hear of wait cues at computer shops of sometimes a full week, unless you pay extra. I have never understood how this works because in the 20 years that I have run Kerr Solutions we have always been able to start on fixing a PC within an hour or two of its arrival.
In the event of a dead PC, it is extremely rare that a customer does not need a fast solution. After all this dead PC is sometimes their only major link to the outside world. We’ve had a close look at the IT industry and our own opening hours and have decided that opening 8:30am to 1pm Saturday’s will benefit a lot of existing and new customers.
Next week we are going to explore the topic – Laptops or Desktops, which is the more reliable?
Future Byte Me topics can be emailed to [email protected] and Bruce is contactable at Kerr Solutions, 205 Musgrave Street or on 49 222 400.
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