FAQ

This page contains some of the more Frequently Asked Questions related to our Service Offerings

Managed Services (MS) is the practice of outsourcing day-to-day IT management and support responsibilities as a strategic method for improving your business operations. It is a proactive approach to handling your IT needs. MS can range from a small portion of a business’s IT needs such as managing the security / firewall to complete outsourcing of all IT to make sure your employees are efficient and not interrupted by IT problems. In short, an MS company takes responsibility for your IT services for a fixed fee.

There are two basic areas of distinction:

  1. The support approach of proactive vs. reactive: In a reactive model, many company’s setup their systems, get them to a functional state and then leave them alone until a crisis occurs. They tend to avoid their IT technology until there is a major issue and business operations are impacted. Then, when there is a crisis, they call in help. The help then charges an hourly rate to work on the problem. A proactive approach is about consistently doing the things that help keep systems performing well. Routine maintenance, patches, updates and system work are performed to keep things in shape. Systems are monitored and when resources or problems start indicating a problem it is reported prior to a major event and service is dispatched to address the concern before it impedes the business.
  2. Financial Alignment: In the reactive model, the MS vendor makes their money when you are in crisis. They are really incentivized when there is a problem. They feed when you bleed. If there were no problems, they would go out of business. Their focus is on recovering from issues not avoiding them. In short, they gain when you are in pain.

Managed service is different because there should be a performance guarantee. That way the MSP loses money (just like you do) when there is a significant IT problem. MS focuses on avoidance of problems vs. recovery from problems.

MS agreements have several different levels which are related to the scope of the agreement. A reputable MSP should be able to demonstrate an ROI (Return on Investment) for their services. With MS there can be a large cost savings, as some MSPs have raised their efficiency using best practices and standards to a level where they can provide the hardware and services for less than a company can hire an employee.

All things considered, you need to make sure an agreement provides value for your company. If you are knowledgeable about the average costs in your industry for IT technology, you should be able to make a good value assessment.

Some managed services are month-to-month, while others are multi-year commitments. It all depends on what is involved with the setup process and cost of service. Some will have a very high startup cost, and then a lower long-term cost. Others spread out the startup costs across a longer period to mitigate the overall monthly cost.

Many businesses rely on IT technology, but technology support and networking is not their core business focus. In that case, you need to ask yourself if spending time away from your core business is really cost effective.

You can go the “wait till it breaks” route, but you need to understand what lower performance and reliability is really costing your company in lost productivity and lost opportunity costs.

  • Security
    Security provides a managed firewall, security policies, managed antivirus/malware suite and core services to align with the MA Privacy law for all Massachusetts based businesses.
  • Backup and Business Continuity
    Instead of dealing with changing tapes, tracking backups, dealing with online backup targets, a business continuity service provides data backup along with a full business continuity plan
  • Infrastructure / Network Monitoring
    Management and monitoring of internet, phone circuits, VPNs, switches, wireless access points and network room components such as servers, storage, network printers and key network devices.

"But I already have internal IT, I already have a computer guy, now what?"

An MSP can act as an extension of your IT department. It can take care of routine IT tasks, to free up your staff to focus on the strategic IT initiatives that will improve your business.

An area that you may need help in is IT management. Some MSPs offer a managed service to oversee your IT staff. It's difficult to hold someone accountable in areas that we do not understand. IT personnel tell management they are busy and they appear to be occupied, but deep down we have to question if they are doing their job in an efficient manner.

MSPs can handle the recruiting, interviewing, managing, training, proper planning and budgeting, and providing task management systems to hold your staff accountable to your business.

If you relate to 4 or more of these categories, you can benefit from a managed services approach:

  • You just want it all to work!
  • You did not choose your career to monkey with IT issues.
  • You understand what it costs your company for you to not focus on your top priorities.
  • You do not want to be in the IT business.
  • You do not want to deal with IT.
  • You are done trying to get techies to understand what you really need.
  • You realize the hourly cost of downtime and business interruption is so much more than a technician’s hourly rate.
  • You are finished with trying to manage depreciating assets.
  • You are done with finding, hiring, and managing IT staff.
  • You realize that like death and taxes, your business depends on IT technology and IT technology cannot be avoided.
  • You never want to deal with Technology vendors blaming each other while you pay their bills.
  • You realize that many support engineers are not incentivized to your problems while they make money from your problems.
  • You put up with IT support issues because you do not want the trouble of changing to another support provider.

As in all things, there are different levels of service and service providers. Some are new to the business whereas others have documented standards, best practices, and clearly defined service level agreements. Just because a company says they provide a managed service does not mean you will get what you expect.

You need to check references and understand what is fully covered and what is an additional charge.

What are the benefits of the traditional route?

You control the IT costs by virtue of your pain threshold. You only pay when the pain is unbearable. You have no real financial commitment.

  • Focus on Business Activities
    Time spent on your business vs. time spent on tech support adds to your bottom line.
  • Reduced Stress
    Dealing with non expertise areas is stressful, which adds to the fact that problems in these areas may cost thousands of dollars.
  • Controlled Cost
    You can budget expenses and hold the MSP accountable to the results.
  • Reliable Performance
    The service level agreement should guarantee performance or you do not pay.
  • Efficiency of Scale
    MSPs have the experience and knowledge from supporting many networks. This experience cannot be gained by supporting one network
  • Increased Security
    Managed Service vendors generally have resources that proactively manage and maintain business critical components such as firewalls, employee usage and virus/malware suites.
  • Full Back-up and Business Continuity
    You no longer have to remember to backup media and tapes, MSPs provide automated systems that provide back-up and business continuity services to return your business to operational within minutes.

IT Accountability

Have you ever wished you could have more control over your IT results? Without an MSP agreement, you are trading hourly IT help for money, and often you do not get what you desire. A MS level agreement is based upon a performance guarantee.

The Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now service is designed to minimize the amount of work that you and your staff need to do. We find that the person(s) providing the information to us, so that we can perform the risk assessment, will need about 2.5 hours of time to complete the information. The time can be spread over a few days and does not have to be done all at once.

Employees will need to take the HIPAA Security Training which is an online training class. Once they complete the class, they will take a short compliance quiz. Employee training and compliance testing takes about 1 hour. Training and testing can be started and stopped and spread over a couple of days.

In order to use the Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now service the following steps must be completed.

    1. Create a user id and password to access the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal
    2. Login into the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal
    3. Complete the organizational profile. The organizational profile helps us understand your environment so we can perform a thorough risk assessment. Some of the information that you will fill out includes:
      • Amount of offices and locations
      • Server and network information including the amount of servers, desktops, laptops, tablets, etc
      • Details of your EMR / EHR
      • Details on systems that contain patient data
    4. Complete the risk assessment questionnaire
      • There are around 50 questions that need to be answered
      • The questions are clearly explained and most require a Yes/No answer
      • You may need input from some of your staff, IT staff, etc.
    5. Upload any existing policies and procedures that you already have in place
      • Using the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal, you can upload existing policies and procedures. These may include: termination procedures, data backup procedures, etc.
      • Uploading existing policies and procedures is completely optional and helps us with performing the risk assessment
    6. Once you have completed steps 1-5 we will perform the risk assessment for you. If we need additional information we will contact you. Upon completion of the risk assessment we will notify you that the risk assessment is complete
    7. You will be able to access the risk assessment reports as well as the 18 HIPAA Security policies and procedures by logging into the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal. The documents can be viewed or downloaded from the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal
    8. The next step is to provide a link and access information for the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal to all your employees. We provide you the information which you can forward or give to your employees
    9. Each of your employees will create user ids and passwords to the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal (just like you did in step one). Employees will only be given a subset of the information that you (the administrator) has access to
    10. Employees will access the HIPAA Security Training and complete the compliance testing

No, the Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now service is designed so there is no need to come to your office(s). The HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal is encrypted and secure and will allow for us to work together to get the necessary information to create the policies and procedures, perform the risk assessment and provide training to your employees.

One of the requirements for the HIPAA Security Rule is to select an individual to have the overall responsibility for ensuring that the Security Rule is implemented and enforced. The person in your organization that will have this role should be involved with the HIPAA Secure Now process. This person along with others, if necessary, will provide the information for us to perform the risk assessment. They will also need to review the HIPAA Security Rule policies and procedures and ensure that they understand them and are prepared to implement them within the organization.

Additionally all employees of the organization will need to take the HIPAA Security training and compliance testing.

No, the Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now training and compliance testing utilizes an interactive online training platform. All employees will access the online training through the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal.

      1. Employees need to create a user id and password to access the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal
      2. Employees will log into the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal and click on the HIPAA Security Training link
      3. Employees will do the following 3 steps to complete the training:
        • Take the online HIPAA Security Training class
        • Take a brief HIPAA Security compliance test
        • Print out their HIPAA Security training certificate upon successful completion of the HIPAA Security compliance test. Employees will need to achieve an 80% or better to pass the compliance test. If employees fail to achieve an 80% they can retake the test until they achieve an 80% score

The Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now service provides you with the following:

      1. HIPAA Security and Privacy Rule policies and procedures in Microsoft Word format. These are completed policies and procedures. They can be implemented as is or can be modified if required. You can download them or access them on the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal.
      2. A thorough security risk assessment of all the systems that create, modify or maintain electronic protected health information (ePHI or better known as patient information). The output of the risk assessment is a risk assessment report and work plan to help implement additional security.
      3. HIPAA Security and Privacy training and compliance testing for all employees of the organization.
      4. 12 months use of the HIPAA Security Compliance Portal that helps organizations manage their compliance with the HIPAA Security and Privacy Rules.

There are no additional costs associated with the Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now service. For the price listed based on the size of your organization, you get the following:

      1. HIPAA Security and Privacy policies and procedures
      2. A thorough HIPAA Security risk assessment
      3. HIPAA Security and Privacy training for all employees

Good question! HIPAA Secure Now! helps organizations implement and comply with the HIPAA Security, Privacy and Omnibus Rules. Simply put, we do most of the hard work for you. Other services provide you with templates and tools to help implement the HIPAA Regulations. These tools require that you do a lot of the work. The HIPAA Secure Now service does the hard work for you. In addition, if you were to purchase each of the items that are included in the HIPAA Secure Now service, you could spend much more than the price of HIPAA Secure Now. Finally, HIPAA Secure Now was developed by experts knowledgeable with the HIPAA Security and Privacy Rules, computer and network security, and security training. The combination of these skills is apparent in the level of detail and knowledge that the service provides.

The Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now service does not guarantee that you are compliant with the HIPAA Security Rule. The service provides education and tools to help you implement the HIPAA Security Rule. The HIPAA Security policies and procedures are a foundation for implementing the Security Rule. It is the organization’s responsibility to ensure that all employees comply with the policies and procedures. In addition, the HIPAA Security risk assessment identifies areas that the organization needs to concentrate on to further protect electronic protected health information (ePHI or better known as patient information). It is the organization’s responsibility to use the risk assessment and implement the recommendations to further protect ePHI.

It should also be noted that Voltkix HIPAA Secure Now is not legal advice. You should consult with legal counsel to ensure a full legal interpretation of the law.

Within 48 hours of checkout, an email will be sent to the the email address provided that details the next steps. The email will contain the registration ID that the administrator will use to create an ID and password to access the HIPAA Secure Compliance Portal. From there the steps detailed in the “What do I need to do?” question above will be taken.

When the Internet is down, business usually stops. And fair or not, many customers blame their ISP. Presenting the Voltkix Networking Appliance, a cloud-managed Internet failover device purpose-built for customers that cannot afford to be offline in this connected world.

The device is FREE with our monthly managed service offering. For standalone purchases please contact our sales office for customized pricing.

  1. Device cost is a one-time fee paid at time of purchase and Service is a recurring monthly fee for each Voltkix Networking hardware device.
  2. Service fees are billed monthly (if purchased as a standalone device) for continued use of the Voltkix Networking devices.
  3. Service can be purchased on a month to month basis or for a Committed Service Term of 1, 2 or 3 years as determined at initial purchase.
  4. Committed Service Terms require consecutive monthly service payments for the entire committed service term agreed at purchase, commencing within forty-five (45) days of the invoice, or discount will be forfeited. If service is cancelled prior to end of Committed Service Term, a lump sum payment for remaining service term will be due immediately. A Committed Service Term cannot be transferred apart from the Networking Device to which it applies.
  5. Voltkix Networking Appliance WAN port must be connected to a full time primary internet connection. 4G LTE failover wireless service is supplied on the Verizon or AT&T 4G LTE network and is subject to limitations and interruptions from location, atmospheric, topographical or environmental conditions or activities affecting wireless service operations. Wireless service and/or features may not be available in all areas.

BENEFITS FOR END USERS

With all these features and functions, the Voltkix Networking Appliance can be deployed in virtually any SMB environment. Here are some examples of SMB use cases where the appliance is best suited.

  1. You require Internet connectivity to do business.
  2. You have recurring Internet connectivity issues.
  3. You have satellite offices that always need connection to the main office through some site to site/VPN connection.
  4. Your current end user router does not have Internet failover or internet failover is very costly.
  5. You maintains site-to-site tunnels through LTE failover/failback.
  6. Your business relies on SaaS applications

The Voltkix Networking Appliance is so much more than just an Internet failover device. Here are a few examples of capabilities:

  1. Always Connected Internet - 4G LTE failover and failback, no contract, no overage charges, no need to manage multiple cobbled together failover options, no need to track data usage.
  2. All-in-one Networking - Network edge router (VPN, Client, Site to site, NATing, QoS), Firewall, intrusion detection and prevention, 4 LAN ports, 802.11ac Wi-Fi, 2 WAN ports, external antennas
  3. High Performance Routing - Throughput speeds up to 1.7Gbps, Client VPN, Site to Site VPN, NATing rules, QoS, VLAN Tagging, in normal and LTE failover modes.
  4. Integrated Firewall and Security - stateful firewall, intrusion detection and prevention, Web filtering, whitelisting, blacklisting and deep packet inspection.
  5. Born in the Cloud - fully cloud-managed, single portal used for remote updates.
  6. Every Voltkix Networking Appliance has a 3-year warranty along with our award winning 24/7/365 technician support.

The design, planning, information gathering and development of your web site content. An effective solution to fit your budget by providing development and hosting in the same package.

The cost will vary from quick start packages to complete web design. Usually from $450 up to $6000.

We offer a detailed design services agreement for the development of the services described in our proposals that includes client content, copyrights, final deliverables, preliminary work and services.

This solution will put together planning, design, content creation, testing, launch and hosting. All these elements will bring results that make your site visible to your clients and search engines.

We lead you through the entire process of designing your site and manage the team that uses many elements that must work together efficiently.

Companies and businesses that need to focus on your business needs, not on your website design.

No, every provider offers different types of services depending on your needs, like design/Development or SEO/Copywriting or Maintenance/Security or Hosting/Domains.

We can put together different type of services in packages to fit your budget.

A platform to manage video monitoring services over the Internet.

This depends on the type of CCTV cloud solution that is being deployed. This can range from a couple hundred to a couple thousand dollars.

We offer a comprehensive CCTV / Cloud Security Solutions agreement for the hosting and management of the services described in our proposals that includes Availability, Performance, Security, Disaster Recovery expectations and remote access to the data.

  1. Turnkey or bespoke camera design
  2. Professional Installation and Fully managed remotely
  3. Widest range of products in the industry to match all budgets and deployment scenarios.
  4. 24/7 Online monitoring by a team of seasoned engineers

Who is a Good Candidate for CCTV / Cloud Security Solutions?

Companies and businesses that need a fully hands off scalable and managed cloud hosted security solution.

No, in today’s world where security is at the outermost of importance. You need a solution provider that can be an extension of your business and team. Choosing the right partner is a crucial step in securing not only your business but peace of mind that it is done with the highest level of security and privacy.

  • View live and recorded video from each camera
  • No need for a PC or DVR on-site
  • Easy setup with no software installation required
  • Plug & Play installation, which means no NAT/Portforwardings, no DynDNS, no need to lower the firewall
  • 24/7 access via web-based interface and mobile apps
  • Event notifications and alerts
  • Compatibility with any IP-based network and most modern Smartphones
  • Responsive technical support and customer service
  • Monthly service with no minimum term contracts

The designing or the build of software components or application for a specific user or business owner to address their specific needs.

The agreement doesn’t have any monetary cost after the deal to develop the solution has been accorded. The cost of a custom software development project varies depending on the business needs, but the project cost range for a moderate business class goes from $5,000 to $200,000.

The agreement defines the identification of the parties and location, Purpose of the agreement, development plan, payment terms, how to deal with changes in project scope, acceptance testing agreement, ownership of the final product, warranties, confidentiality terms, termination terms, general provisions, and signatures.

Because is the most appropriate way of providing to the specific needs of your organization based on your business model and clients.

Because we need to manage a team of software engineers, identify and eliminate risks that prevent the team from achieving their goals. Ensure high-level information sharing and communication between product owners and software engineers.

Companies looking for competitive advantages to their competitors to increase productivity and companies with dynamic goals that need to adapt and expand to and with the market needs.

No, depending on your business needs there are custom software development providers that use different types of programming languages, frameworks, and technologies to do projects for various purposes.

24 x 7 support and maintenance, Effective pricing, Personalization and Better Results in Less Time, Boost Performance of the company, Flexible core technologies.

An API is an Application Programming Interface. It allows to separate systems to “talk” to each other, allowing the easy interchange of data without any user interaction.

It depends on how many systems are involved, what the level of integration is, and how complicated each system’s API is.

A typical term is 36 months.

Keeping your separate business systems in sync is important as it allows you to focus on delivering a high level of service to your customers, without worrying about having to double entry data into different places. It also removes the possibility of your customer data being wrong in one of the systems.

Businesses who understand that a great way to grow is to invest in the process efficiencies that API integration gives you.

No. A good integration partner will understand your business processes, and recommend the best way to connect the separate systems together, and the most optimal schedule to do this on.

  • Efficiency. You are able to use a variety of different products, and easily have your customer data, whether it’s their contact details or financial details, shared across them. When you change the information in one system, this is synced across to the other systems.
  • Competitive advantage. You aren’t limited to one product – you can choose the products that best suit your business, and use these to your advantage.
  • Time saving. You don’t need to have employees keying

Is a software program that can be accessed over an internal network, or via the internet through a web browser.

The agreement doesn’t have any monetary cost after the deal to develop the solution has been accorded. The cost of a Web application development project varies depending on the business needs, but the project cost range for a moderate business class goes from $3,000 to $100,000.

The agreement defines the identification of the parties and location, Purpose of the agreement, development plan, payment terms, how to deal with changes in project scope, acceptance testing agreement, ownership of the final product, warranties, confidentiality terms, termination terms, general provisions, and signatures.

Users can easily access the application from any computer connected to the internet using standard browsers. This contrasts with traditional desktop applications, which are installed on a local machine.

Because we need to manage a team of web-based software engineers, identify and eliminate risks that prevent the team from achieving their goals. Ensure high-level information sharing and communication between product owners and software engineers.

Companies that need their users to easily access the application from any computer connected to the internet. Companies that need the user interface to be highly customizable.

No, depending on your business needs there are web-based development providers that use different types of programming languages, frameworks, and technologies to do projects for various purposes.

Cost effective development, accessible anywhere, easily customizable, Accessible for a range of devices, Easier installation, and maintenance, Increased Security, easier to develop.

Is the process of building an application software for handheld devices.

The agreement doesn’t have any monetary cost after the deal to develop the solution has been accorded. The cost of a Mobile application development project varies depending on the business needs, but the project cost range for a moderate business class goes from $10,000 to $200,000.

The agreement defines the identification of the parties and location, Purpose of the agreement, development plan, payment terms, how to deal with changes in project scope, acceptance testing agreement, ownership of the final product, warranties, confidentiality terms, termination terms, general provisions, and signatures.

Mobile solutions allow you to have your application on multiple platforms and devices, Increase user interaction and data capture, better integration with phone functions.

Because we need to manage a team of Mobile-based software engineers, identify and eliminate risks that prevent the team from achieving their goals. Ensure high-level information sharing and communication between product owners and software engineers. To control different mindset and new design skills in the development team.

Companies looking for high mobility, usability and device integration to growth their businesses.

No, depending on your business needs there are web-based development providers that uses different types of programming languages, frameworks, and technologies to making projects for various purposes.

24 x 7 support and maintenance, easy upgrades, updates, availability, scalability, and performance.

It is a high-scale business application used to satisfy the needs of an organization rather than individual users.

The agreement doesn’t have any monetary cost after the deal to develop the solution has been accorded. The cost of an Enterprise application development project varies depending on the business needs, but the project cost range for a moderate business class goes from $80,000 to $1’000,000.

The enterprise term agreement should contain the scope of work, scope of deliverables, payment terms, assumptions and dependencies, project management, testing and acceptance, intellectual property rights and ownership, maintenance and support, the term of the agreement, termination, governing law and jurisdiction and signatures.

Enterprise applications enhance efficiency and productivity through business level support and functionality for companies with enterprise architecture.

Because we need to manage a large team of software engineers, identify and eliminate risks that prevent the team from achieving their goals. Ensure high-level information sharing and communication between product owners and software engineers. To control different mindset and new design skills in the development team.

Midsize companies and corporations that are complex, scalable, component-based, distributed and mission-critical with enterprise architecture.

No, depending on your business needs there are web-based development providers that use different types of programming languages, frameworks, and technologies to do projects for various purposes.

The flow of information is simplified, and the business process enforces better functionality better control to increase the efficiency of the organization. Process automation, Reduced IT Complexity and application integration.