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Frequently Asked Questions

If the whole point of owning a Mac is to spend less on support, why should we hire you?

Actually, we think the whole point of owning a Mac is increased productivity. Lower support costs are just an extra bonus.

But, we understand your question, so let's look at an example: Suppose you're a desktop publishing professional. Due to some little problem you can't identify or eliminate, your machine freezes or bombs once a day. Each time it happens, you spend 15 minutes (sometimes more) restarting and getting everything back to normal.

Over the course of a year, that one little problem is going to waste 62.5 hours (not including the hours spent recreating any lost or damaged files). Even if your company bills only $75 per hour for your time (a fairly low professional rate), that one daily freeze or bomb is going to cost your company $4,700 per year! By comparison, paying us a few hundred dollars to eliminate the problem is a real bargain.

Don't most Mac users do their own tech support?

Macs are often purchased by smaller companies that can't justify the expense of a full-time computer support technician. As a result, Mac users are often expected to service their own machines, or that responsibility falls on the shoulders of the resident "guru."

That's fine, so long as those employees have the time, the experience, and the tools necessary to do it right. Remember, being able to USE a Mac doesn't automatically qualify you to maintain or repair the machine itself. Those are two completely different skill sets.

Look at it this way: If you gave each employee a company car, would you expect them to do their own oil changes, tune-ups and repairs, simply because they know how to drive? Probably not.

Can't our PC technician handle the Macs, too.

Although Macintosh and Wintel computers have similarities, we know very few PC support technicians (actually, we know TWO) who are knowledgeable and experienced enough to handle both platforms. Ask your PC technician what she thinks. Most will admit they aren't very comfortable working on Macs. And, think about this. Even though our three largest clients each have at least two full-time PC support people, they still prefer to have us handle their Macs.

So they end up paying more for support, right?

Absolutely not! Let's suppose you contract with us for a Bimonthly Maintenance Agreement on a typical office machine. Those services, including an annual Clean Sweep, will cost about $600 per year.

By comparison, one company we know (we don't work for them) employs three full-time support technicians - a manager and two assistants - to handle 56 PCs and 5 Macs. (They admit they don't really understand the Macs at all.) Not counting their taxes and benefits, nor any repair equipment or training they require, let's guess their salaries alone total $90,000 per year. Divide that by the 61 machines they handle and you get an average annual support cost of $1,475 per machine. We could do a better job with their Macs for less than half that price.

What's the most common problem you deal with?

For the most part, a Mac that is setup correctly and receives some regular maintenance is completely problem-free. For example, the workhorse Performa 6400 in our offices hasn't crashed, bombed or frozen in eleven months. (Except for one or two rare freezes caused by web browsers choking on badly-created web sites.) Did you catch that? Not a single problem in almost a year!!! And, remember, we push this machine hard. It handles all of our business operations, graphics production, web site authoring, and literally thousands of hours of software downloads.

But we know many people who "expect" their Mac to freeze or bomb on a regular basis. Rest assured, it's not supposed to be that way! Apple has gone to great lengths to make their systems rock-solid and stable. When users finally realize this, and understand that they don't need to endure problems, frustrations and lost working hours, they call us. Most of the time we find that their problems are caused by three things.

Which are...?

Overall, poor purchasing decisions, installations and user configuations are the largest problem. The machines were never setup correctly in the first place. The system folder and applications are a mess. The user configurations are screwed up. Or, the system they purchased simply wasn't appropriate for their requirements.

The second problem is lack of maintenance. We'll find hard drive, PRAM and desktop database corruptions or severely fragmented files. Or, worse yet, the user has applied dozens of software upgrades without checking for compatibility issues. This is really a factor for people who upgrade system software, but don't bring hardware drivers up to date!

Finally, and there's no tactful way to phrase this, is the problem of user error. The users are simply doing something they shouldn't be doing. Often these problems are easy to fix by showing them a better, more productive way of doing things, or by telling them the dangers of their bad habits. But it's much harder to fix problems caused by self-titled "computer buffs." You know, the people who THINK they know much more than they really do. We've seen these people trash essential files, permanently ruin RAM chips and processors, and generally make their machines useless. Of course, when we identify the problems, it's never their fault because "they know all about Macs." ;-)

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Copyright 1998, 5-Minute Mac Consulting, Wampum, Pennsylvania, USA

Services: 6 of 7
Frequently Asked Questions If the whole point of owning a Mac is to spend less on support, why should we hire you? Actually, we think the whole point of owning a Mac is increased productivity. Lower support costs are just an extra bonus. But, we understand your question, so let's look at an example: Suppose you're a desktop publishing professional. Due to some little problem you can't identify or eliminate, your machine freezes or bombs once a day. Each time it happens, you spend 15 minutes (sometimes more) restarting and getting everything back to normal. Over the course of a year, that one little problem is going to waste 62.5 hours (not including the hours spent recreating any lost or damaged files). Even if your company bills only $75 per hour for your time (a fairly low professional rate), that one daily freeze or bomb is going to cost your company $4,700 per year! By comparison, paying us a few hundred dollars to eliminate the problem is a real bargain. Don't most Mac users do their own tech support? Macs are often purchased by smaller companies that can't justify the expense of a full-time computer support technician. As a result, Mac users are often expected to service their own machines, or that responsibility falls on the shoulders of the resident "guru." That's fine, so long as those employees have the time, the experience, and the tools necessary to do it right. Remember, being able to USE a Mac doesn't automatically qualify you to maintain or repair the machine itself. Those are two completely different skill sets. Look at it this way: If you gave each employee a company car, would you expect them to do their own oil changes, tune-ups and repairs, simply because they know how to drive? Probably not. Can't our PC technician handle the Macs, too. Although Macintosh and Wintel computers have similarities, we know very few PC support technicians (actually, we know TWO) who are knowledgeable and experienced enough to handle both platforms. Ask your PC technician what she thinks. Most will admit they aren't very comfortable working on Macs. And, think about this. Even though our three largest clients each have at least two full-time PC support people, they still prefer to have us handle their Macs. So they end up paying more for support, right? Absolutely not! Let's suppose you contract with us for a Bimonthly Maintenance Agreement on a typical office machine. Those services, including an annual Clean Sweep, will cost about $600 per year. By comparison, one company we know (we don't work for them) employs three full-time support technicians - a manager and two assistants - to handle 56 PCs and 5 Macs. (They admit they don't really understand the Macs at all.) Not counting their taxes and benefits, nor any repair equipment or training they require, let's guess their salaries alone total $90,000 per year. Divide that by the 61 machines they handle and you get an average annual support cost of $1,475 per machine. We could do a better job with their Macs for less than half that price. What's the most common problem you deal with? For the most part, a Mac that is setup correctly and receives some regular maintenance is completely problem-free. For example, the workhorse Performa 6400 in our offices hasn't crashed, bombed or frozen in eleven months. (Except for one or two rare freezes caused by web browsers choking on badly-created web sites.) Did you catch that? Not a single problem in almost a year!!! And, remember, we push this machine hard. It handles all of our business operations, graphics production, web site authoring, and literally thousands of hours of software downloads. But we know many people who "expect" their Mac to freeze or bomb on a regular basis. Rest assured, it's not supposed to be that way! Apple has gone to great lengths to make their systems rock-solid and stable. When users finally realize this, and understand that they don't need to endure problems, frustrations and lost working hours, they call us. Most of the time we find that their problems are caused by three things. Which are...? Overall, poor purchasing decisions, installations and user configuations are the largest problem. The machines were never setup correctly in the first place. The system folder and applications are a mess. The user configurations are screwed up. Or, the system they purchased simply wasn't appropriate for their requirements. The second problem is lack of maintenance. We'll find hard drive, PRAM and desktop database corruptions or severely fragmented files. Or, worse yet, the user has applied dozens of software upgrades without checking for compatibility issues. This is really a factor for people who upgrade system software, but don't bring hardware drivers up to date! Finally, and there's no tactful way to phrase this, is the problem of user error. The users are simply doing something they shouldn't be doing. Often these problems are easy to fix by showing them a better, more productive way of doing things, or by telling them the dangers of their bad habits. But it's much harder to fix problems caused by self-titled "computer buffs." You know, the people who THINK they know much more than they really do. We've seen these people trash essential files, permanently ruin RAM chips and processors, and generally make their machines useless. Of course, when we identify the problems, it's never their fault because "they know all about Macs." ;-)
BACK		NEXT

HOME . SERVICES . HELP DESK . RESOURCES . WHY MAC . CREDENTIALS
Copyright 1998, 5-Minute Mac Consulting, Wampum, Pennsylvania, USA