Onsite IT Support in Cambridge

Choosing the right type of IT support - what your options actually are

There is no single right way to buy IT support for a small or medium-sized business. The best arrangement depends on how many computers you have, how often things go wrong, whether you can live with remote-only help or need someone in the room, and how much budget certainty matters to you. This page lays out the real options honestly, including where each one falls short.

When choosing a provider, check how long they have supported Windows businesses and whether they cover your area. We work only with Windows PCs, laptops and Microsoft 365 - not Apple Macs.

Option one: remote and phone support only

Remote support means a technician connects to your screen over the internet, or talks you through a fix by phone, without coming to your office. It is faster to initiate than an onsite visit and suits a wide range of software problems - Microsoft 365 configuration, user account issues, email setup, Windows settings, and many network problems that can be diagnosed from logs and remote access.

The honest limitation is that remote support cannot touch the physical environment. A failing hard drive, a machine that will not boot, a network switch that needs reconfiguring by hand, a printer that has simply lost its connection to the network - these require someone in the room. If your office has even one machine that is genuinely unreliable, remote-only support will leave you frustrated.

Option two: a managed support contract with onsite included

A monthly managed support contract covers your machines with background monitoring, updates and security checks, and gives you access to a technician by phone or remote connection during office hours. The key difference between plans is whether onsite visits are included in the monthly price or charged separately when needed.

Our Business Essentials plan gives you unlimited remote and phone support, with Windows updates, backups and security monitoring all included. Onsite visits are charged separately when they are needed, at a £60 call-out fee plus labour. This suits businesses where faults are infrequent and the office manager is comfortable handling minor physical issues - swapping a cable, restarting a router - without waiting for a technician.

Our Business Premium plan includes everything in Essentials, with onsite call-outs and labour also covered in the monthly fee. Business Premium is the cleaner option for businesses that want a predictable IT budget and do not want to think about whether calling someone out will cost extra.

Business Essentials pricing (per computer per month, ex VAT)

• 1 computer: £36
• 2 to 3 computers: £31.20 each
• 4 to 9 computers: £25.20 each
• 10 to 17 computers: £22.20 each
• 18 or more computers: £21.60 each

Business Premium pricing (per computer per month, ex VAT)

• 1 computer: £54
• 2 to 3 computers: £42 each
• 4 to 6 computers: £38.60 each
• 7 to 9 computers: £33.80 each
• 10 to 12 computers: £31.20 each
• 13 to 15 computers: £28.40 each
• 16 to 19 computers: £25.40 each
• 20 or more computers: £24.40 each

Contracts are billed per computer, not per user. That matters because businesses where one person uses two devices, or where staff share machines, are not penalised by headcount.

Option three: time blocks without a monthly contract

If you do not want a rolling monthly commitment, you can buy a block of support hours instead.

• 4 hours: £312 (ex VAT)
• 8 hours: £592 (ex VAT)
• 16 hours: £1,123 (ex VAT)

This option works well for businesses that have infrequent but complex jobs - setting up new machines, migrating to Microsoft 365, reorganising a network - rather than ongoing day-to-day problems. It also suits businesses that already have some internal IT resource and just need a specialist to call on occasionally.

The trade-off is that time blocks do not give you the same level of proactive monitoring as a managed contract. If a backup starts failing or a security update is missed, a block arrangement may not catch it as promptly as a plan where your machines are actively monitored every month.

Microsoft 365 - what "support" actually means

Microsoft 365 covers a wide range of products and problems. The issues that come up most in a business setting include licencing (assigning, removing and transferring licences as staff change), mailbox configuration, shared mailboxes and distribution lists, Outlook profile problems, Teams setup and permissions, SharePoint and OneDrive folder structures, and security settings such as multi-factor authentication and conditional access policies.

Microsoft's own support is available if you have the right licence tier, but it is not quick and it rarely offers hands-on, in-room help. Having an IT support company manage your Microsoft 365 tenancy means someone who knows your setup can make changes promptly and can come onsite when the problem is not something that can be resolved over a screen share.

Security monitoring - what it includes and what it does not

Both support plans include security monitoring as standard. In practice this means we keep Windows updates applied, watch for software that should not be on your machines, and check that backups are completing as they should. What it does not include is a full penetration test, a formal security audit or government-standard cyber assessment - those are separate pieces of work and would be quoted on request.

Keeping Windows up to date and backups tested is the single most effective thing a small business can do to reduce its exposure to ransomware and data loss. It is not glamorous, but it is where most real-world damage is prevented.

Managed email service

A managed email service is available in addition to the support plans above. Pricing is quoted on request, as it depends on the number of mailboxes and the level of management required.

Which option suits Cambridge businesses best?

For a Cambridge office with four or more Windows computers and at least one member of staff who cannot work without their machine, Business Premium is usually the more practical choice. The cost difference over Business Essentials is modest at that computer count, and not having to authorise a call-out each time something physical needs attention removes friction when a problem is time-sensitive.

For a very small office - one or two computers - or a business where IT problems are genuinely rare, Essentials or a time block may be the more honest fit. Call us and we will tell you which one makes sense for your situation, not the one with the higher margin.