Equipment warranties and service contracts can cost up to 30 percent of a product’s purchase price, representing a significant investment for IT organizations that may have hundreds of such agreements with dozens of manufacturers and vendors. However, many organizations significantly overspend on warranties and contracts due to haphazard management practices.
Research shows that more than half of companies use manual, spreadsheet-based processes to track the current status of warranties and service contracts. Another quarter have no management process in place at all. Such practices make it incredibly difficult to manage an array of agreements with different terms, conditions and coverages.
Inefficient management has very real costs. The right coverage helps ensure prompt support and replacement of failed equipment. If contracts are inadvertently allowed to lapse, companies may experience unplanned downtime and unexpected repair or replacement costs. Manual processes also increase the risk of costly errors such as maintaining active maintenance contracts for equipment no longer in service.
A Better Way
Technologent’s contract renewal services relieve the burden of managing IT equipment warranties and reduce the risk of lapsed coverage or contract errors. Our experienced team will track all of an organization’s service contract and warranty information in a searchable database that can be accessed via our web-based OnePoint portal. Organizations can see at a glance which contracts are due to expire and quickly check the status of a specific asset.
We begin by auditing the customer’s IT infrastructure to gather contract information from the various manufacturers. Very often, there’s no central repository for warranty, service contract and software license information because equipment has been ordered by different departments. In some cases, organizations don’t know what they have, what their coverages are or when the coverage is due to expire.
Through our audit process, we can also identify any instances in which the manufacturer’s records don’t match what the customer has purchased. We will work with vendors to resolve such issues and ensure the proper level of protection for each piece of equipment.
Single Pane of Glass
The OnePoint portal features an intuitive user interface and searchable database that allow customers to quickly find a specific asset and check its status. The portal is password-protected and uses privileged access management features to limit access based on governance policies. Once authenticated, users can configure fields and reports to create customized views.
Within the portal, the customer’s IT team can add or remove assets, manage vendor credits and make changes and adjustments to contracts. Such changes are automatically sent directly to the vendor or manufacturer involved.
Having all contract information aggregated into a single repository makes it much easier to track the status of existing contracts. Additionally, the OnePoint system will automatically generate email reminders 30, 60 and 90 days before a warranty or contract is set to expire. This reduces the risk of lapses that could leave an organization vulnerable should equipment fail.
Multivendor Solution
When a warranty or service contract is nearing expiration, users can request a renewal quote with the click of a button. Through our relationships with Dell, Cisco, HPE, Oracle and many other technology vendors, Technologent can offer competitive pricing for solutions covering the entire IT infrastructure.
Our renewal services are not vendor-specific and can be used across an organization’s entire installed base. The renewal services team has decades of experience in maintenance contract management, and expertise with vendors that have complex support plans.
Effective warranty management is critical for managing costs and reducing risk. Contact us to learn more about using our contract renewal services to streamline and improve your management processes.
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