Over 80% of small and mid-sized businesses are taking up to
half a day to fix IT problems that result in
downtime.
In a survey of 450 UK small and mid-sized enterprises, conducted by
market research analyst Vanson Bourne and commissioned by
Microsoft, 66% of respondents said they had experienced significant
technology downtime in the last two years. Nearly two-thirds of
those asked admitted they suffered an IT failure at least once
every three months.
The IT managers, business owners and partners surveyed said their
costs from infrastructure downtime came from wasted man hours, lost
sales, reduced customer satisfaction, costs of fixing the problem,
and lost opportunity costs from having to spend valuable time
fixing technology. Eighteen per cent calculated that they lose
between five and 20 man-hours a year from downtime.
According to the British Chambers of Commerce there are nearly four
million small to medium businesses in the UK, each of them almost
totally reliant on technology for their survival to some extent or
other.
Kevin Withnall, director at Vanson Bourne, said, "There is a
disconnect between the value [businesses] apply to technology and
the support they have put into place to make sure it works
24x7."
David Frost, director-general of the British Chambers of Commerce
said, "Our advice to all of our members is to ensure they have an
appropriate level of cover, either through internal resources or
using an external company. That way, if something goes wrong, they
can have the reassurance of knowing that they can be back up as
quickly as possible minimising the damage to their business."
Surprisingly, the research also found that only a fifth of
companies use a third party to support or back up their IT in case
the technology fails, even though 88% recognise their businesses
could not operate without IT.
The survey was carried out for Microsoft Services to promote an
existing service called Essential Support.