Two process changes are being introduced in the coming weeks as part of your managed service contract. Our goal is to minimize disruption and downtime. The first change being made is a new remote assistance tool and the other is additional scheduled maintenance time. We have outlined the information you need to know and hope to answer any questions you may have.
New Remote Assistance Tool
GadellNet is in the process to replace our long-time remote assistance utility, TeamViewer. The current version of our monitoring software now includes a built-in remote assistance utility which offers several advantages over the existing tool.
Over the next few weeks, our Managed Services team will begin to rollout the new tool called ScreenConnect. You will notice the icon below in your taskbar. TeamViewer will be uninstalled automatically after the new tool has been validated.
Scheduling of additional Maintenance Windows
A standard process will be put into place beginning July 2nd for you to do the following: schedule changes and upgrades. This new scheduled maintenance time will take place on Thursday evenings when needed.
Our goal is to complete maintenance as promptly and efficiently as possible while being predictable for you and your team. With our new process, we will be able to aggregate, prioritize, and deploy changes quickly.
What to expect?
Each week our team will notify affected clients by Tuesday at 12 Noon of anticipated changes on Thursday evening. Similar to our existing Maintenance messages, it will inform clients of the expected times and impacts of the maintenance
Tuesday Morning – First Notification of Maintenance Window
Thursday Morning – Second Notification of Maintenance Window
Thursday Evening – Closure of Maintenance Window
Who receives notices?
Notices will continue to be sent to same distribution as the other maintenance notifications. We are refreshing our maintenance notifications always be sent to “itmaintenance@clientdomain.com”. If you would like us to review this distribution group, please let us know.
How is this different than regular maintenance already occurring?
Current maintenance windows focus almost exclusively on planned patches and security upgrades from software vendors. These additional maintenance windows will be focused on project work, hardware and software upgrades, and other enhancements.
What happens if a change to our environment needs to happen sooner than a Thursday?
Changes that are required immediately will continue the Emergency Maintenance Process and will occur as needed.
What happens if the scheduled maintenance will interfere with a major event of our business?
If you perceive the scheduled window to be harmful to your operations and need the changes delayed a week, please reach out to me to discuss. Depending on the nature of the changes, it may still be recommended to continue with this maintenance, but we will always work with you on the scheduling.
Should I expect downtime every Thursday evening?
Absolutely not. It is our intention to never affect a single client more than two times a month. Realistically, we expect clients to be affected by one of these windows each month, and some months may not require an extra window as all.
We hope this brings clarity to the changes you can expect to roll out within the next few weeks. If you have any questions or concerns, do not hesitate to reach out to a member of the team.
