By Paul W. in Announcements | 07/07/2011
Amethyst IFA, on Howard Street in North Shields, recently discovered some of the drawbacks of being a paperless office. Namely, what happens when the technology crashes and you don’t have technical back-up.
Amethyst provides a comprehensive range of investment, mortgage, tax and financial planning services. Malcolm Butler, 46, Alan Dennett, 49, and Paul Richardson, 41, are partners in the business.
Earlier this year they found themselves faced with a problem. And it was a big problem, as Malcolm Butler recalls, “We have 12 PCs, all of which are connected to a Server.
“In May the Server crashed. We got straight onto our Internet Service Provider. They checked it out then came back to us and said, ‘Nope, nothing wrong our end, it must be an internal problem at your side of things.’
”Well, at this point we knew we were in big trouble because our IT man, Paul Richardson, was on long term sick leave.
“The information on the Server is very important, very sensitive and vital for the everyday running of Amethyst. We had also lost access to the Internet, a serious handicap, potentially crippling in fact.
“This is because e-mail is really essential for us. In addition, we use financial and research agency websites; access on-line fact sheets and applications forms; submit tenders for business to financial institutions.
“A lot of our business is done on-line.
“We have data back-ups of course, held on storage disks and kept offsite. This would be a short-term aid, in being able to access information, but in no way a long term-term solution, it’s just not convenient or practical.
“We needed the Server to be up and running and so were facing a serious problem. And then my colleague, Alan said, ‘Hang on a minute, what about that IT chap, the one who came by last week and left his business card?’”
The IT chap in question was Paul Waite of Waite IT.
Malcolm continues, “There then followed some frantic searching of every drawer in the office – and thankfully we found the business card.
“Paul Waite was great. I rang him and said help – and he did. Once I had explained to him the seriousness of our situation, Paul re-arranged his work schedule and came straight out to see us.
“It worked out really well for us. Paul is local, easy to do business with and he offers very competitive rates.”
Paul Waite spent half-a-day with Amethyst IFA, at the end of which time he had solved their IT problems. To Malcolm Butler’s great relief, it wasn’t long before systems were up and running again.
He explains, “It really brought home to us the importance of having good technical support and being able to turn to someone like Waite IT in an emergency.”