Switching to an RDS model turned out to be a seamless and efficient process from Pro-Networks, and has certainly paid dividends, plus provided many benefits to the business and staff alike. In short, its one of the best business continuity decisions we have ever made.
Neil Jay, General Operations Manager
West Cheshire Credit Union is a local financial co-operative run and controlled by its members who share the common bond of either living, working studying or volunteering within Cheshire West and Chester, Cheshire East or Flintshire. Formed in 2004, WCCU are a local, not for profit community based organisation that prides itself in offering their members a professional and caring service.
An additional factor was the building was prone to electrical faults, so the solution needed to take this into account also.
Background
WCCU has been a customer of Pro-Networks since early 2019 and engaged with us to discuss the options when replacing their aging server. WCCU has a client / server application that will not run in the cloud so a solution was required to allow this application to run while giving remote users access to files and shares along with the application itself.
An additional factor was the building was prone to electrical faults, so the solution needed to take this into account also.
Solution
The agreed solution was a remote server hosted in Pro-Networks Data Centre. This gives WCCU the benefit of a physical server and removes the potential electrical issues in the existing building as all users can access this server from the office or their homes.
Consideration was giving to fully hosting the server in the cloud but the cost benefits of purchasing and remotely hosting the equipment, as opposed to the ongoing rental of a hosted solution helped shaped the decision.
In The Customers Words
As our business has grown rapidly, in particular customer interaction online. We recently worked with Geoff and his team at Pro-Networks to look at how we best mitigate any risks relating to a total loss of data, along with business continuity. Once we scoped out options and solutions there was little doubt that we needed to move toward a Remote Desktop Services model.
Our business is based on a Community Banking model, and the critical element of transactions (inward and outward) is something our members expect daily, hourly, or even by the minute. This leaves little room for interruptions in our information technology systems, and should there be any outages, then the customer would feel the impact.
Switching to an RDS model turned out to be a seamless and efficient process from Pro- Networks, and has certainly paid dividends, plus provided many benefits to the business and staff alike. The ability for staff to work remotely at any location has shown its worth, with many using hybrid working as part of their weekly pattern. However, the true saviour of the RDS has come into play with recent total power outages at our Head Office building. Should this have happened prior to our RDS application then the potential for loss of data and impact on our service to customers and staff would have been disastrous!
Instead, we were confident no loss of data, and staff at satellite offices would not be impacted upon as they could still access the RDS and maintain continuity. Head office staff could also be deployed to work from home should power outages cover a substantial period. In short, its one of the best business continuity decisions we have ever made and something I would urge any business to consider, against having an onsite server to provide network connectivity.”