May 2007 - Small Business News

Is your business suffering because you are struggling to solve IT issues? If so you are not alone; two thirds of the UK’s SMEs are still utterly perplexed by routine IT problems, according to a recent survey conducted by PC World Business (PCWB).

PCWB’s annual questionnaire on IT issues, which surveyed 254 SMEs across the country, found the biggest IT issues most businesses expect to face this year are also the most common. More than a quarter of respondents (26%) say security and viruses are the biggest threat to the smooth-running of their IT. Other basic IT issues about which many SMEs remain in the dark include software upgrades (15%), adding new PCs (13%) and other “routine problems” (13%).

Moreover, a third of respondents said they were ill-equipped to handle any IT problems arising from their lack of knowledge - with 34% not having (or not sure if they will have) enough budget to address their business’s IT needs in 2007.

As well as having inadequate finances available to deal with IT problems, a third of UK businesses questioned in the survey (35%) by PCWB also doubted whether they had sufficient levels of other resources available to meet their business’s IT requirements.

This widespread lack of dedicated IT resources among the UK’s SMEs perhaps goes some way towards explaining another finding of the survey - one in five (20 %) respondents spend at least three hours a week dealing with basic IT problems, with nearly one in ten (7%) forced to extend their average working week by an entire day, or more, to deal with IT matters.

In terms of where their time is spent, the research revealed – once again – it was the simplest IT problems which were also the most time-consuming and costly for small and medium-sized businesses - with Internet access (23%) and email (21%) accounting for nearly half of all time spent on IT.

David Gould of PC World Business said, “The results of our survey show many small businesses are confused about what should be, in reality, essentially very straightforward and unproblematic IT issues. So commonplace computer and IT matters are becoming a much bigger issue for business owners and managers than they should - and, ultimately, distracting them from spending time on more important aspects of their business.

“The most startling thing about the findings is that the vast majority of these problems could be avoided altogether if the businesses got better IT knowledge and advice in the first place.”

Reg Williams, managing director of Williams & Co., a small estate agency in Reading, says: “We started our business two years ago, but really didn’t have a clue about what technology we needed to service an office with three staff.  Our first technology advisor recommended too much IT equipment, and as a result we bought IT hardware and software that considerably exceeded our needs.  Our business has grown since, and we are at a stage now where we require further investment in IT, however it is difficult for us to gauge what we really need.”

Gould adds: “The bottom line is, small businesses should seek more and better advice before buying IT equipment – buying the right IT equipment at the outset will save a lot of time and money, certainly in the longer term and often in the shorter term as well – many SMEs wrongly believe the more expensive the equipment the more efficient it will be, which is simply not the case.”