How Free Advice at the Local Office Supply Warehouse Cost One Business Owner $2399.88!

Dear Business Owner,

In the Information Technology world, free will cost you money! 

Last month I was approached by a business owner who wanted me to evaluate his existing network for a potential upgrade.  I explained to him what I would do in the consultation and what my fees were.  Afterwards, I would provide him with a written report with my recommendations.

Apparently he thought that I pay my bills by providing free professional network evaluations and balked at the idea of having to pay my fee.

Come to find out the business owner ordered a brand new Dell fileserver running Windows Server 2003.  His mistake was purchasing 12 brand new computers based on the advice of the local office supply warehouse salesperson.

The 12 brand new computers came pre-installed with Windows XP Home edition.  Here is where the business owner got his big surprise of the day!  When he tried on his own to join the new computers to the new Windows 2003 server, he found out that Windows XP Home edition was never intended by Microsoft to join a Windows 2003 Server domain. Uh-oh!

Now the business owner is faced with a hard decision.  Return 12 machines (15% restocking fee) plus the lost time un-boxing and setting them up, or pay and additional $199.99 per machine for the Windows XP Professional edition.  He ate the bullet, purchased the upgrades, and had me install them.

Lessons learned:

• Office supply warehouse employees do not really know much about technology.  If they did, they wouldn’t be working in an office supply warehouse.
• Windows XP Home is for home users.
• Windows XP Professional is for business users.
• Leave Information Technology projects to Information Technology professionals, not the brother-in-law/”guy down the street who knows everything there is to know about computers”/etc.

If you need help with your Information Technology needs, feel free to contact us!

NOW! Technical Solutions

862 Goodman Road East

Southaven, MS 38671

662.349.1717

www.desotocomputers.com

Contact:  Paul B. Miller  pbmiller@desotocomputers.com