HOPKINS SOLICITORS FIND PERFECT IT PARTNER.

Finding a trusted IT partner who can help find technical efficiencies whilst allowing a business to strengthen what they do best isn’t easy. Hopkins are a firm that likes to establish long term relationships with both clients and suppliers. So when it came time to review an IT partnership with a supplier that had been in place for over 15 years, it was going to take something special to encourage a change.

Reformed IT ticked all the boxes.

Hopkins Solicitors have been helping Clients in Nottinghamshire and the surrounding areas for over 100 years!

Established in Sutton-in-Ashfield back in 1913, Hopkins has grown throughout Nottinghamshire with a sense of local community at their heart. They now have 5 offices throughout the county, 2 in Mansfield which is also home to their head office, as well as Nottingham, Kirkby-in-Ashfield and where it all started, Sutton-in-Ashfield.

The growth of the business through word of mouth and strategic acquisitions has led to a strong team of over 90 people across the 5 sites.

Amongst the team are specialists in Conveyancing, Employment Law, Personal Injury, Wills & Probate, Business Acquisition and many other services. To find out more about Hopkins, take a look at their website here.

The Challenge

Although Hopkins had a long and successful relationship with their existing IT partner, they were looking for fresh and creative ideas on how to really push the business’ technology forward. They needed a partner who could work strongly and collaboratively with the in-house IT team, developing a strategy for the future.

The modern workplace is so reliant on IT, when systems fail or aren’t working as efficiently as they could be, this hurts productivity.

Applications used by the team were starting to go slow and at times systems would crash. The growth in the business in recent years had started to put a strain on things.

A recent migration to Office 365 had also been initiated by the existing IT partner but Hopkins were yet to see any benefit from this change.

It was decided by the partners to look at the options available locally to provide IT Consultancy and Support which would take the firm to the next level.

Choosing Reformed IT

As part of the IT review process, Reformed IT were one of 3 local companies being considered alongside the existing supplier. Having performed a full audit on the IT systems & network whilst gaining an understanding of any issues and desires from the teams at each office, Reformed were then equipped to provide a report to the partners on their findings.

Not only were the team at Reformed able to find easy to implement improvements within the IT infrastructure, but they also identified considerable cost savings which could be exploited. With a detailed plan of attack with a phased approach to tackling all aspects of the business technology, Hopkins could clearly see the benefits in working with Reformed IT.

The Solution

Reformed IT now work closely with the internal IT management team providing a collaborative IT support service which has significantly enhanced the perception of dealing with IT issues for all of the partners and employees at Hopkins.

Early improvement projects have included:

  • Upgraded Servers providing a huge performance increase for users.
  • Additional security implemented for Office 365, reducing the risk of breach from hackers.
  • Full Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity solution implemented.
  • Complete network overhaul, improving performance & security of systems.
  • WiFi Upgraded throughout all offices allowing for seamless movement of devices between all Hopkins offices.
  • Collaboration with third party telecoms provider to resolve ongoing issues with phones.

As part of the IT support agreement, Hopkins also have the following services as standard:

  • Backups for Office 365 mailboxes, OneDrive, SharePoint.
  • Exclaimer managed signatures for Office 365, meaning that all outbound emails include a centrally managed signature and disclaimer.
  • Cyber Security awareness training from KnowBe4 with simulated phishing testing.
  • Dark Web monitoring for exposed personal information or passwords from the business so that they can act quickly to reduce risks.
  • Device management & anti-virus. All PC’s laptops and servers are maintained and updated proactively by Reformed IT’s management systems.

The team at Hopkins have an extended IT helpdesk with a member of the Reformed technical support team only a phone call away. All support requests are logged and with typical response times less than 15 minutes, it has been a revelation.

The Outcome

As well as significant improvements to the business through better adoption of technology, Hopkins have also managed to offset some of the improvement costs with efficiencies and cost savings in other areas which Reformed IT had discovered. Issues with IT are no longer a daily recurrence as they once were and the team feel confident when picking up the phone to the helpdesk. The IT plan and strategy is being implemented and the benefits of each phase is being immediately felt by the business.

Changing IT suppliers is daunting to say the least. As we are so reliant on technology within our business to ensure we can provide the best possible service to our clients, it’s imperative that it works seamlessly.

Reformed IT spent the time to really understand our business requirements which gave us confidence to make the switch to them.

We’ve been really pleased with everything they’ve done for us so far and I’ve had countless members of my team singing their praises.

Because they have experience working with other law firms they also understood the particular issues we faced and how to resolve them. We would be happy to recommend Reformed IT to any other business requiring IT Support.

Martyn Knox

Managing Partner, Hopkins Solicitors LLP