The two most common types of IT support are “managed services” and “block hours.” Which one is right for you?
Block hours
You buy a bundle of hours up front and burn them down as things break. It feels cheap when nothing goes wrong — but the incentives are backwards. The more problems you have, the more your provider earns. Nobody is paid to stop things breaking.
- Good for: very small businesses with simple needs and low reliance on IT
- Watch out for: surprise bills in a bad month, no proactive maintenance, slower response when you’re not on a contract
Managed services
A fixed monthly fee covers monitoring, maintenance, security and support — usually priced per user. The incentive flips: the fewer problems you have, the better it works for both sides, so your provider is motivated to prevent issues rather than bill for them.
- Good for: any business that relies on its systems being up — which today is most businesses
- Watch out for: knowing exactly what’s in and out of scope; a good agreement spells it out on page one
Our take
We offer both, and we’ll tell you straight which fits. If IT going down costs you money, managed services almost always wins on total cost — the invoice is predictable and the 2am problems get prevented instead of billed.
See what our managed support covers or ask us which model fits your business.