Build the scope around your business
List employees, computers, locations, business applications, internet connections, and critical vendors. Include remote workers and shared equipment. A proposal priced only by laptop count can miss the network, identity system, or application that actually stops work when it fails.
The FTC’s personal-information guide can help identify devices, locations, and service-provider access that belong in a review of sensitive business records.
Separate the recurring service from projects. A new office, major migration, or unsupported application may need separate planning and approval. Ask how these exceptions are identified and priced before signing.
Define a useful support commitment
Response time is the time to acknowledge or begin handling a request. Resolution time depends on diagnosis, parts, vendor access, and other factors. Ask for separate targets and an escalation route for an office-wide outage. Clarify business hours, after-hours arrangements, and who can authorize urgent work.
A ticket should leave a readable record: what failed, what changed, what was tested, and what remains open. Repeated incidents should trigger a review of the underlying cause, rather than disappearing into a monthly ticket count.
Include maintenance and recovery
Agree on update windows, device inventory, access reviews, and backup responsibilities. Ask who checks failures and who tests restoration. A successful backup report does not establish that an employee can recover the files and applications needed for work.
The NCSC’s backup guidance provides a practical reference for the recovery portion of the agreement, including checking that backed-up files can be restored.
Keep ownership of domains, subscriptions, and business accounts with the business. Document the exit process and the information a replacement provider would receive. This makes the relationship easier to manage throughout its life.
Use the backup checklist when reviewing recovery coverage. Your Expert Tech’s managed-IT page explains how to start a conversation about your environment.