What to look out for
I don’t complain. Something I learnt from a great business coach that the negativity never leads to anything good.
So this is not a complaint, rather an opportunity for teaching. Both to PushIT the business as well as potential customers who want to know what it is like to deal with them.
I had a meeting with 2 of the directors/owners and I really don’t know what they expected would be the outcome of their approach. The finance director said to me “do you want me to tell you what will happen… if you don’t do as I say right now.” In the kind of way that he thought he was holding a pair of pliers to somebody’s private parts. At that point I lost it and told him to go a f himself.
To PushIT I say:
Never in a million trillion years is that the way to talk to you customer of over 5 years, who has come to talk to you about how to work together going forwards. The only thing you achieve is to push them away. Even if that is your intention there are better ways to do it.
To small businesses (anything less that £5m revenue is small) looking to outsource IT support, looking for IT equipment and connectivity; these are the lessons I have and you don’t need to make the same mistakes I made:
1. Refuse to sign anything that bundles IT services together. Just go somewhere else if anyone tries to convince you this is the only way – it is not. You can go to Microsoft, Vodafone, BT and so on directly. You can but hardware separate and if you need to get support make sure it’s on a different contract. Otherwise, you might end up having that contract waved in your face like I did.
2. Check the term of the contract. Business contracts are usually long but it’s possible to get terms of 12 months. Don’t sign the 5 years contracts – go somewhere else.
3. Check the exit terms. Another reason you want to have separate contracts for each item is that you can invoke the exit term of some of the things when you no longer need them. Giving you the flexibility you need in your business.
4. Insist of no auto renewal. Connected to exit terms insist that the contract doesn’t just roll into another 5 years, especially without you getting any kind of warning. So don’t sign if there is auto renewal or at least insist on PushIT being obliged to warn you (in person not some automated e-mail) that your contract is going to renew and are you ok with it.
I hope this can help other businesses make informed decisions.