Held back by open-source

Home care provides support services for the elderly. The company employs 220 staff, 24 administrative staff based at two sites with a total of 22 PC’s.

Senior management use Microsoft Office and staff use Open Source Office suite.

Theory suggests different application formats can be opened, edited, saved and shared. In practice many end users lack the knowledge, they simple not interested in technical wizardry. They simply want to do their job. The result one out of four email attachments has to be converted and sent again. Most users will happily learn to use one application and will tolerate incremental upgrades as software evolves. The benefits of adopting a Microsoft solution

(1) customer support

(2) a reduced learning curve and

(3) reduced need for training.

Solution – SBS server to run email, central file storage and specialist staff rota software.

Using Microsoft Terminal server. House Call staff can securely access and use Microsoft Office applications from their satellite offices or from home. On the road staff are able to access their email, contacts, calendar and more from virtually anywhere, at any time using their Windows Mobile smart phones.