Pay when it breaks, or pay every month so it breaks less. How to choose, and what an IT maintenance contract must cover in writing.
When someone searches for “IT maintenance Douala” or “IT services Yaoundé”, it is often because a computer has just died and work has stopped. That is the worst moment to choose a provider. Here is what you need to decide calmly between call-out repairs and a contract, and what the contract should contain.
Call-out repairs
You call when something stops working, you pay for the visit, and that is it. Nothing to pay in the months when all is well.
It suits a small outfit: two or three computers, no server, work that can wait a day. The drawback is well known. Nobody looks at your machines while they work: updates wait, nobody checks the backup, and on the day of the breakdown the technician discovers your setup at the same time as the problem.
A maintenance contract
You pay monthly or quarterly, and in return someone looks after your machines before they fail. They know your equipment, they have your access, they know where the backups are.
A contract starts to make sense when downtime costs you: a till that no longer works, an office that cannot print, a team of ten people waiting. Or when your customers depend on a server, management software or a website.
A simple yardstick: estimate what one day of downtime costs you, then count how many times it happened last year. If the total bothers you, a contract is probably justified.
What a contract must say in writing
A vague contract protects nobody. Before signing, check these points are there in black and white.
The scope. The list of computers, printers, network equipment, software and websites covered. What is not on the list is not covered, and it is better to know that beforehand.
Response time. Not “as soon as possible”, but a concrete time, with the difference between remote support and an on-site visit. Many problems are fixed remotely, without waiting for someone to cross town through the traffic.
Planned upkeep. Security updates, antivirus, cleaning, disk health. How often, and who does it.
The backup, tested. A backup that is switched on proves nothing. The contract should include regular restore tests, with the result shown to you.
Parts. Included, or billed on top? A good provider also tells you when replacing costs less than repairing.
The report. After each visit, a written record of what was done. After a year, you have the history of your equipment.
Your access. The passwords for your equipment, your website and your mailboxes belong to you. If the contract ends, you keep them, and the next provider can take over without breaking everything.
Breakdowns you can prevent
Electricity is hardware’s first enemy. Power cuts and voltage swings damage power supplies, disks and routers. A UPS on every computer that matters, and protection on the power line, cost far less than a motherboard. Ask your provider to check they are in place and working: a UPS battery wears out, and you only notice at the next outage.
Dust and heat do the rest. A computer sitting on the floor in a badly ventilated room ages faster. Cleaning is part of the upkeep.
Finally, USB sticks passed from hand to hand are still a classic way in for viruses. Up-to-date antivirus and a clear rule in the office save a lot of calls.
How to choose a provider
Ask them to come and see your setup before quoting: a price given without seeing anything means very little. Ask for a sample report. Ask who answers on a Saturday. And ask what happens on the day you want to stop.
At All Techs
We do both, per visit or per month, whichever suits you. We look remotely first, and if that is not enough we come to you: Makepè in Douala, Nkolbisson in Yaoundé, elsewhere by appointment. Backups are tested, and every visit comes with a report. The details are on the maintenance and support page, and the quote is free.
If you would rather have someone in-house, our computer maintenance course teaches how to diagnose a fault and look after a set of machines.
