A long-established business with a client focus
Wessex Translations is an award-winning language services company with over five decades of experience. With their main office in Hampshire and a global network of trusted translators and interpreters, they serve clients ranging from private individuals to government bodies and multi-national businesses. The team combines professionalism with a personal touch, going above and beyond for their clients. Over the course of more than 50 years in business, they have witnessed dramatic changes in working practices and technology but have always remained committed to providing excellent service and building strong relationships with their clients.
An IT system with room for improvement
As Wessex Translations evolved and grew as a business, so did the technology it required. From its early days when communication was via post, phone and later fax through to modern ways of working with email and USB flash drives.
Over time, Wessex Translations had upgraded their computers as and when required, but there were still ways that their IT could be improved to benefit their business.
Jonathan Nater, director of Wessex Translations, explains how their computer systems evolved, “We started off with a small PC and Mac system that we sort of Daisy chained around the office. And we’ve grown and grown.”
They were working on Windows computers but did not have a central server or comprehensive IT policy, so passwords and policies had to be managed individually on each computer. This was time consuming and made it difficult to achieve a consistent approach.
Email services were handled by a local machine (a Mac), making that computer a single point of failure and risking bringing down the business’s entire email system if anything happened to it. As with many organisations, email is a critical component of the business, so it was essential to use something reliable and well protected.
The IT system enabled people to work at the office, but it was difficult for them to work remotely if necessary.
Unlocking potential by modernising and streamlining the IT system
Wessex Translations engaged HBTech to standardise and modernise their IT infrastructure. This gave them a more cohesive system which provides a better experience for users, as well as greater functionality and improved cyber security.
Improvements included upgrading the broadband connection (to provide increased bandwidth and speeds), installing a central server to manage business information and files, and migrating the email service to a highly-available cloud-based service (which minimised the risk of downtime or failure). Cyber security was also enhanced, partly due to these upgrades, and partly due to improvements made to firewalls, passwords and authentication.
With all workstations connected to a central server, computers could be managed consistently with each other rather than having to be individually managed, saving time and reducing the chance of a machine missing out on a security update or software upgrade.
Moving to cloud-based email protected that key service from component failure and enabled frequent regular backups.
These changes laid the preliminary groundwork for efficient remote working, which would soon prove essential.
A quick pivot to remote working
Within a couple of years of the upgrades, it suddenly became vital for businesses to embrace remote working when the country went into lockdown due to COVID-19.
“HBTech almost overnight managed to get us together and up to speed to allow us to work from home when we had to with the pandemic” Robin Weber, director of Wessex Translations.
Although Wessex Translations had not previously operated with a home working setup, the upgrades that they already had in place made it easier to transition to remote working (with a few more changes). Building on the existing combination of onsite hardware and cloud-based services, HBTech worked quickly to provide a much-needed work-from-home solution.
Robin Weber explains “HBTech made us flexible enough to allow people to work remotely when we weren’t in a position to offer it. Literally within a week we had a different setup, even if we thought at the time that it was only temporary… As it lasted longer and longer, the solution was something better, which was the virtual desktop which HBTech came up with. We implemented that and we continue to use it within the office as well as remotely.”
Jonathan Nater agrees “It would have been impossible, but we managed thanks to them”
The enhanced flexibility continues to be useful post-pandemic, enabling hybrid working. Robin Weber comments that “the remote working structure is something which we continue with, even though we’re more office based now than we were then”
An ongoing relationship
HBTech continue to support Wessex Translations, whether by helping them achieve their Cyber Essentials Certification, fixing IT issues or identifying and implementing upgrades.
It’s one less thing to worry about. Jonathan Nater says, “The guys from HBTech tell us they recommend this piece of kit or that, and they look after us. We don’t even think about it.”
Robin Weber concurs, “We’re very lucky to have found them… It definitely fits how we work and what we want from an IT partner”
“We’ve got good contacts in the HBTech office who understand what we need doing and that is a crucial thing. It’s just nice to be able to speak to someone who immediately knows what we’re on about. We know each other, and that trust that exists between them and us, I think they feel that as well,” Jonathan Nater
Robin Weber explains, “with John and his team at HBTech, I’d like to think that they’re embedded in our company in a way. They don’t make themselves any more important than they need to, which is really important, but I think of them as part of our company and that’s really important to us.”
Jonathan Nater sums it up like this, “I’d give them the keys.”
To find out more
If you need an IT partner you can trust as if they were part of your business, Contact us.
