Advantages and disadvantages of an external IT support

Outsourcing: Businessmen of the 21st century can not avoid this catchword. The outsourcing of the customer service or the accounting is a common concept in today’s business world, which helps a company to concentrate itself on its core business. Especially, the high engineered IT departments are popular business units, who are often taken over by external service providers. Instead of sending support inquires to internal departments, they get assigned to an external support team. Also in the IT support for Atlassian products like Jira and Confluence, outsourcing is a regular process.

The IT outsourcing is a common concept, but it is by far not suitable for every company. Cost and benefit aspects have to be evaluated carefully when it comes to an outsourcing decision. In this article we will present you the advantages and disadvantages of an outsourced IT support and give you recommendations about your personal outsourcing decision.

Reasons for an internal IT department

The advantages of an internal IT department should not be underestimated. The costs of a support department and cost per single request is lower for specific company sizes with a lot of support requests. Furthermore, it can be an advantage to have employees in the company, who have a high level of knowledge about the characteristic needs and common IT problems of the company. Many problems can get resolved without a big amount of time for communication by them. Also, internal departments can be contacted easily and questions can be cleared quickly.

Another benefit of an internal IT department is the saved knowledge base inside the company, which will be lost once an external support company is not engaged anymore. The experiences the external service has collected will be lost in case of a finished collaboration and have to get achieved by a following support company.

You see: In specific cases it can be useful to build up an internal IT department in your company. This could especially be true for enterprises. In the following we will thematize for which companies outsourcing is an advantage.

Summary: Reasons for an internal IT department

1. Decreasing single support costs through a high number of support requests
   
2. High level of knowledge of company specific problems in internal support
3. Effective communication with internal employees
4. Loss of knowledge through the change of the external support

Reasons for outsourcing your IT support

IT support companies work with multiple customers, who have similar needs and problems to solve. Many IT support service providers specialize themselves thereby in specific IT areas like the Atlassian support and build a high level of knowledge in these fields. You, as the customer, will profit from these gained experiences. You can be sure that they can answer even the most unique question you might have because they already have been working with other clients. These external service providers will fix your problems in the blink of an eye. Get the overview of IT Support Company Rankings & Reviews here.

Another big advantage of outsourcing the IT support is its flexibility. If necessary, the cooperation with external service providers can be adjusted or canceled very quickly. You as the customer can react to external influences, like economic fluctuations or changes in the support requirements, comparatively easy. An internal solution is therefore missing this flexibility and adjustments are harder to make because of rigid employment contracts. Internal departments are causing recurring fix labor costs, that are often times too high in comparison to the not constant work demand.

But the main reason for outsourcing your IT support is the saving of costs. As mentioned before, the internal support just pays over, if a specific company size and a high amount of support requests is reached. Especially for small and medium-sized companies the internal support isn’t beneficial, simply because of less IT requests. To train your own employees in IT specific topics requires a lot of time and opportunity costs, that result in losing focus on the main tasks. In these cases, an external IT support can help: It delivers flexible solutions and works exactly as much as you need. High quality and high knowledge level are thereby guaranteed.

Summary: Reasons for the external support

1. High knowledge level of external support through its specialization on specific IT areas
2. High flexibility in collaborations with external service providers
3. Saving costs in case of lower support needs
4. Employees can focus on their daily business

Conclusion

The decision to outsource your IT support needs an exact assessment of costs and benefits. The amount of support requirement plays a big role. If requests do not come in regularly and thereby do not justify the employment of a team, outsourcing would be the best way for your company. Through this process you’ll get high quality solutions for flexible and appropriate prices.

Our IT support in the Atlassian world

One part of IT, which solves challenges for many companies, is our Atlassian support. Problems with Jira or Confluence occur regularly, but not in the magnitude for that an inhouse support would be worthwhile. External service providers can easily answer questions about migrations, installations and system adaptations. Our Atlassian support is also the perfect point of contact for questions about the Atlassian toolstack, installation or login problems and for individual development needs. Support inquiries connected to Atlassian’s tools are submitted to Actonic consultants through a ticket system and get thereby processed very effectively.

Benefits of an Atlassian support by Actonic:

• High Atlassian knowledge
• Proactive support for the entire Atlassian toolstack

• German and English language
• Consulting background of our employees

• Client specific support contracts
• Individual solutions and developments

We are the reliable partner at your side, that looks at the bigger picture and tries to solve the problems in the most beneficial, long term way, starting with only 700 € monthly.