Top Rated IT Managed Services Companies in Cardiff United Kingdom

IT is central to the operation of almost every businesses today. Whatever your industry, products or services, you will need at least some form of IT (I can hear the techies silently cheering in the background). Production facilities use IT systems to keep them running, in many cases even service providers require IT to deliver!

So, what does Managed IT Services mean? Managed services are ongoing support provided by an IT service provider, for a fixed monthly fee. It involves proactive monitoring and maintenance along with priority support and user and device management, to keep IT systems operating at peak performance.

Rather than requiring an extensive in-house IT department, instead you pay the monthly fee, and the managed services company takes care of everything for you. In many cases, this can offer significant savings compared to setting up an internal team, and for a business that relies on IT to simply operate day by day, this is an ideal solution that avoids the need for upfront investment and additional management oversight.

IT managed services covers a wide range of the IT services and solutions any business might need. The exact scope of coverage will depend on your individual business requirements, but the most common features found in a managed services contract would be:

This may include both onsite services such as hardware inspections as well as remote operations, including user management, help desks and so on. Together they form a complete IT service that ensures your systems operate as they should and deliver the user support and data protection that is essential to keep things running smoothly and in compliance with data regulations.

While the monitoring and maintenance may be the obvious areas where IT Managed Services keep your systems running, it is the helpdesk that often proves most useful. A complete support system ready to help your system users solve their problems saves time and money by providing the answers your team need quickly.

If you've ever been in an office with someone who's spent 4 hours trying to launch software that wasn't installed on their system, you will know how valuable a help desk can be...

Of course, it is possible to manage your IT internally, and many companies do this successfully, but there are valid reasons as to why you may wish to go down the managed service route. This is especially true of smaller and growing businesses, where there may not be the existing skillset required, and internal management means setting up a dedicated IT department. Here, costs and knowledge deficiency can be core driving forces towards outsourcing IT management, but there are other benefits that should be taken into consideration too.

These include:

Because IT is so crucial to the daily operation of almost every aspect of business today, how it is managed is incredibly important. When you are just starting out as a business, your IT system may be a couple of desktops, some rented cloud servers and a borrowed laptop, which is ok to manage by yourself. But as soon as your business needs a local network and complex software systems, you may need more than a can-do attitude and your mate from school who made his own computer once.

You need professional management to keep things going. The choice between your own team or a managed service is one of convenience and cost over complete control. A managed service requires much less upfront investment than creating your own team and offers ongoing support regardless of staff holidays and sickness. Every day, you have the service you need. An internal option gives you more control over the way things are done, but also requires significant management.

Like any service you partner with for your business, finding the right option for IT Managed Services means ensuring that you get the features and support you need within your budget.

With so many companies out there offering these services, this requires a methodical approach that involves several steps:

Like everything, this does depend on your precise needs. Some labour-intensive activities such as operating a 24/7 help desk will cost more than others. However, while costs can vary based on the complexity of the IT environment, number of users and devices, and the level of support required, generally speaking, a managed service agreement ranges between $99 -$199 per user, per month.