A lot of diligence should go into selecting a Managed Service Provider. Start by asking the following questions of the providers you’re considering:
- What percentage of your team is in dedicated proactive versus reactive roles?
- Does your service include onsite/offsite backups and disaster recovery?
- What security software are included in your fees?
- Do you offer after-hour user support?
- Do you offer onsite support?
- How much insurance do you carry and does it include E&O and Cyber?
- How do you measure client satisfaction?
- What is your same-day response rate?
- Are you formally certified by the vendors of the applications you offer?
- How do you measure, report on and reduce the amount of reactive tickets?
- Do you offer 24/7 monitoring?
Yes, because it’s an important security measure to protect against password-related breaches. Multi-factor authentication is very easy to use and just provides a code on your phone to enter when logging in remotely. MFA comes bundled with our cloud offering.
Cybercrime is now a multi-billion-dollar industry that in many countries is financially backed by governments. They are targeting small and mid-sized businesses to extort money, steal information and money, and are being extremely successful at it. Cyber security is a conversation you should be having with your IT on an ongoing basis as it is a shared responsibility and tremendous threat to your business.
Start by asking all of the questions outlined in our FAQ about selecting a Managed Services Provider:
- Where is their cloud located?
- What redundancy do they have in their equipment?
- Do they have a secondary cloud location in case there is a failure to their primary?
- What software licensing is included?
- What backups and disaster recovery is included?
- What are their fees for adding additional resources (e.g., RAM, vCPU, Storage)?
- Do they provide a virtual desktop for you to access your applications in the cloud (e.g., RDS, Citrix)?
Yes, PCLaw can be hosted in a custom-built cloud environment. Be sure to select a cloud provider that has extensive experience with this type of PCLaw setup as it is not a straightforward installation.
This is dependent on the number of users, applications and data. Average ranges are between 30 and 90 days.
One of our big differentiators is our focus on reducing reactive problems, security risks and downtime. We do this with proactivity. People in reactive roles (e.g., Help Desk) are too busy solving problems to reduce the number of potential problems. That’s why over 50% of our workforce are in proactive roles.
We spent years researching the most effective technologies, processes and standards to secure and protect our clients’ businesses. We don’t want to compromise our clients by not including all of the necessary components and expertise to deliver on this. So we bundle all of this into our affordable fixed-fee price.
The vCIO (a.k.a., Virtual Chief Information Officer) is your dedicated technology consultant. They’re available to you as needed, and they also perform quarterly and annual technology meetings to help make your firm more productive, understand and reduce risk, create long and short-term IT budgets and ensure technology is aligned with the direction and growth of your business. This role combined with NetAdmin are the two most important roles to ensure technology is not a risk or hindrance to your business.
The NetAdmin (a.k.a., Technology Alignment Analysist) is your dedicated proactive resource responsible for reducing IT problems in your environment and security risks. They are continuously aligning your IT against Vertex and industry best practices to ensure maximum uptime and productivity. This role combined with vCIO are the two most important roles to ensure technology is not a risk or hindrance to your business.
Yes. We understand people work outside of normal business hours so we include high-priority after-hour support in our fixed-fee pricing.
Yes, and it’s included in our fixed fee. While we are very effective and timely at supporting most common issues remotely, we know there will be times when we need to send a technician out to you.
Yes, because it’s an important security measure to protect against password-related breaches. Multi-factor authentication is very easy to use and just provides a code on your phone to enter when logging in remotely. MFA comes bundled with our cloud offering.
Yes. Many of our clients have these strict requirements and we work closely with them to get them into compliance and keep them in compliance along with completing questionnaires and audits.
While our head office is located in Vaughan, many of our team members are downtown every day to support our clients.
Yes, both our primary and secondary Data Centres are located in Canada.
We have redundancy within every piece of equipment (e.g., power supplies, network cards, fans, etc.) and with all equipment (e.g., redundant firewalls, network switches, clustered servers and storage). We have dual-power feeds from different grids, battery backup units and diesel generators. Additionally, we have a secondary data centre to protect in case there was ever an issue with the primary site).
Testimonials
Your success is important to us—that’s why we dedicate ourselves to optimizing your IT experience.
There are a lot of other vendors on the market that can offer similar services as Vertex, but they don’t have the same level of customer service.
Sharon Hibbert
Dale Streiman Law LLP
Vertex’s consistent response times and resources to deal with multiple requests at the same time made us feel confident we partnered with the right provider.
Adam Morke
Stern Cohen Accountants
I was tremendously impressed with Vertex’s Service Desk team. Every person I worked with was friendly, knowledgeable, and fast. I cannot say this enough – but I am so happy that our firm made the switch when we could.
Benson Percival Brown LLP (BPB)
Our experience to date gives us confidence that we can count on Vertex to keep our systems running 24/7.
Larry Cabaltera
IT Administrator, AUM Law
We are very happy that someone outside of our company is keeping an eye on our IT maintenance and being proactive with potential future issues.
Michael Mulgrew
HART-WELL Electrical Company
Vertex allows our staff to focus on their work thereby not wasting time with IT concerns.
Watters Environmental Group Inc.
I know that the security hardening is working. They’ve shown me what wasn’t secure. They’re very good at explaining where we were and where we are now. I can see that they’ve reduced our risk.
Colleen McHugh
Director of Operations
We have upgraded our security without compromising ease of use and ensured we didn’t impact our staff’s ability to operate.
Jason Spetter
Lipman Zener & Waxman
Increasingly we work remotely whether from home or from a client’s office. The cloud desktop is an amazing solution and operates a lot smoother than when we needed to access our files on a local server using a VPN.
Adam Morke
Stern Cohen Accountants
Increasingly we work remotely whether from home or from a client’s office. The cloud desktop is an amazing solution and operates a lot smoother than when we needed to access our files on a local server using a VPN.
Adam Morke
Partner, Stern Cohen Accountants
Vertex has been proactive in offering long term solutions based on our evolving needs. With their 24/7 monitoring of our systems they have alerted us to issues even on weekends.
Watters Environmental Group Inc.
We needed to cover all of our IT solutions in a one-stop-shop that had a scalable service structure, so we turned to Vertex.
Michael Mulgrew
HART-WELL Electrical Company
The most significant benefit of migrating to the cloud was that we changed the way we practiced. Our lawyers can work from home and remotely, which is so important for work-life balance.
Linda Matthews
Partner, Matthews Abogado LLP
We have practically no IT related downtime and our IT queries are always dealt with in a timely manner.
Adam Morke
Stern Cohen Accountants
Since working with Vertex, we have been able to concentrate on our core business and not worry about IT issues.
Michael Mulgrew
HART-WELL Electrical Company
We are extremely happy with the team of people we have worked with at Vertex. From Tyler to Mark down to their support desk, they all take pride in the work they do with the utmost professionalism.
Watters Environmental Group Inc.
We are completely satisfied with the responsiveness and willingness to accommodate our requests and once again, reassured us, that we have made the right decision in choosing Vertex as our IT Managed service provider.
Crystal O’Donnell
Heuristica Discovery Counsel LLP
I love Vertex because of the increased work-life balance. As a managing partner, I am able to do a lot of work that no longer needs to be done in office.
Linda Matthews
Partner, Matthews Abogado LLP
We were looking for a firm with more experience that could offer us proactive solutions. Vertex has delivered this.
Hilary Goldstein
Buchli Goldstein
Migrating to cloud computing with Vertex has been a seamless, painless exercise with minimal disruption to our organization.
Jason Ward
Wards Lawyers PC
As Director of Operations, Vertex makes my job easier. Our old provider was reactionary. Vertex is responsive and preventative.
Colleen McHugh
Mcleish Orlando LLP
We’re very happy with Vertex. ALL of your people have been great to deal with. Very much appreciate the patience, thoughtfulness and professionalism of everyone.
Jonathon Baker
The Law Studio
We wanted the security of working with a bigger company like Vertex as our firm was growing, and their understanding of the legal business was a key factor in making our decision.
Madeline Barnes
Will Davidson LLP
Vertex is approachable and responsive, and I know that I can turn to them any hour of the day. They understand the urgency of the issues and are always there for us.
Mary Hope
BYLD Barristers
Our day-to-day operations are more stable and down time has been reduced. We have a much better comfort level in terms of data security and data integrity, and as a result, we sleep better at night.
Max Cohen
Cohen Barristers & Solicitors LLP
Before Vertex, we were receiving staff complaints that IT issues were not being resolved in a timely manner, if at all. We don’t hear complaints from staff anymore.
Max Cohen
Cohen Barristers & Solicitors LLP
Not only are we now realizing markedly better productivity and profitability, but Vertex’s solutions for enhanced security, disaster recovery, remote access and business applications make us far more confident in our own operations and competitive generally, not to mention the enhanced benefts to those we serve.
Jason Ward
Wards Lawyers PC
Vertex has been consistently responsive and reliable, and they deal with our issues immediately. They have a large number of clients but make us feel like we are the most important. Even though Vertex is an external company, it feels like they are a part of our team.
Jason Spetter
Lipman Zener & Waxman
Since partnering with Vertex, not only have we saved approximately $48,000/year in reduced downtime costs with their managed service plan, they have also given us the competitive advantage we need, thanks to their innovative technology solutions.
Greg Neinstein
Neinstein Personal Injury Lawyers
The Vertex team is very professional, pro-active and provide solution options, and are the best group of IT professionals I’ve worked with.
Tracy Ross
Fox Vanounou Porcelli LLP
Since working with Vertex, I’ve retrieved 50% of my workday back, and my frustration dealing with IT issues has been reduced to zero.
Tracy Ross
Fox Vanounou Porcelli LLP
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