Calls have dropped to zero...

[katz]

Since this pandemic started, the repair calls have abruptly dropped to zero. Haven't had a call in three weeks, not even remote jobs. I know it is a different scenario in different areas, of course. We are mostly break/fix here, rural, blue collar area. All but the essential businesses have closed. I service roughly 75% residential, 25% business. A few of the businesses are churches, and even those are closed at the moment.

I would have thought that I would have seen an increase in remote calls since many people are stuck at home, but that hasn't been the case. I canvassed the local areas as I usually do with flyers advertising remote assistance, a round of three adverts. Fortunately for me, I have an essential delivery job to fall back on, otherwise I would be hurtin' at the moment.

I know break/fix is largely dead, especially residential, but I did think that with everyone being at home would have generated some business. I guess folks are simply running scared and holding on to their money, not certain if they will even have a job in the future.

 

[Mike McCall]

Same thing here. A few misc. tasks for existing clients, but otherwise nothing but crickets.

 

[thecomputerguy]

When this pandemic first started I was completely buried in work, getting everyone setup remotely. For the last couple weeks I've been getting about 1 call a day, aside from today where I've actually been able to fill out almost a full day of work.

But yeah, for the most part it's been dead as a door nail. I'm very glad that I'm in a position where I'm not living day to day or week to week like some people are but to be honest, the change of pace has been really REALLY nice. Makes me realize how stressed I was with how much I was working.

I'm not saying by any means that this has been a welcome break, especially with so many sick people out there but man, I was really really stressed for a really really long time.

 

[phaZed]

You're not alone. We've dropped to 1 call every 4-5 days. Ugh. Now, it looks like our stimulus money is going to be cut by a 10th of what we were expecting. Double Ugh. Not sure how this is going to all pan out for us at this rate.

 

[thecomputerguy]

You're not alone. We've dropped to 1 call every 4-5 days. Ugh. Now, it looks like our stimulus money is going to be cut by a 10th of what we were expecting. Double Ugh. Not sure how this is going to all pan out for us at this rate.

Clients ask me how things are going and are baffled when I tell them that things are slow. They think with people working from home I'd be just as busy as ever. I guess they don't realize that the people working from home are probably working less than 50% than they were before. It's just a snowball effect. It's hard to justify calling me in when you aren't working at capacity, not making as much, creating less issues. Well that and I'm sure there are lots of people out there that are drunk on a Tuesday at 1pm now.

You can also tell just how dead TN is, I check it every couple of hours when I have some downtime and new posts are becoming few and far between.

 

[Mike McCall]

17+ million unemployed has a chilling effect as well.

 

[pcpete]

We do residential mainly with some small business. We are down a bit, but not a ton. I think we have lost on some clients, but others who need computers for remote school and work have offset it. it has been steady.

 

[Porthos]

I guess folks are simply running scared and holding on to their money, not certain if they will even have a job in the future.

Good guess. Unless all of a sudden it is needed work or school at home. Then they scramble.

 

[mlcomputers]

Same here in France - I was incredibly busy Jan, Feb and the beginning of March and it has really cooled off now. Most of my customers are in the high risk category and with all the issues with Brexit the exchange rate has not helped. They have less to spend and right now do not want to spend anything!!

 

[GTP]

Since this pandemic started, the repair calls have abruptly dropped to zero. Haven't had a call in three weeks, not even remote jobs. I know it is a different scenario in different areas, of course. We are mostly break/fix here, rural, blue collar area. All but the essential businesses have closed. I service roughly 75% residential, 25% business. A few of the businesses are churches, and even those are closed at the moment.

I would have thought that I would have seen an increase in remote calls since many people are stuck at home, but that hasn't been the case. I canvassed the local areas as I usually do with flyers advertising remote assistance, a round of three adverts. Fortunately for me, I have an essential delivery job to fall back on, otherwise I would be hurtin' at the moment.

I know break/fix is largely dead, especially residential, but I did think that with everyone being at home would have generated some business. I guess folks are simply running scared and holding on to their money, not certain if they will even have a job in the future.

Same here.
Starting to worry about the future....

 

[Kitten Kong]

I've had the very rare call to see if I repair phones.

Other than that I'm ringing my own phones to check they are still working!.

Last year was slow for me. Upto now its like a graveyard..

I'm extremely hesitant about opening my doors again after it's all over.

 

[symbatech]

I've experienced the same issue. My business is mostly residential with a few small business customers. January, February and the first three weeks of March were super busy, then BAM - nothing. I've gotten a couple of inquiries from existing customers since then, but nothing that generates income. I'm seriously concerned that this may be the nail in the coffin for my business if things don't improve dramatically once the pandemic is over.

 

[jonman]

I think its the same all over the world. Most business customers stopped the payments, too. We can't be contact them because they are closed, and stopped every activity. I think we will be waiting for months, after quarantine, to be paid and to be back to normal.

 

[Kitten Kong]

I think its the same all over the world. Most business customers stopped the payments, too. We can't be contact them because they are closed, and stopped every activity. I think we will be waiting for months, after quarantine, to be paid and to be back to normal.

And even worse than that, I have suppliers chasing me for money I simply don't have, and are threatening to remove my clients from my dashboard, so they will have zero decent protection.

One client owes me close to £800 which will more than cover what I owe out. but i just cant get paid because they are closed.

 

[HFultzjr]

Calls way down.
Seems even the telemarketers don't call as much.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

This is the month I figure things will slow down...they aren't for us. But when this began, I figured we'd have a huge rush of "set me up to work from home" calls...which we did. And some rush migrations to "the cloud"...for the businesses that could do that model which we had been nudging to do for a couple of years (like...move their file server to O365 Teams).

You can pretty much predict which clients can "weather the storm" and they'll come out the other side of this fine. Healthcare, financial/accounting, insurance, certain industry types, non-profit clients who finance themselves from state grants, etc. And you can sort of predict which types of clients may not be as lucky...and those...I figured we'd start seeing them drop off after the second month of this ordeal began. Most businesses can "live off their fat" for a month, but after that first month passes...now it's difficult for many to keep their head above water.

After a record setting March, and a busy first week of April..we're starting to see a slowdown. Most of the calls now are clients still using older types of remoting in...issues relating to those like VPNs and such. People we have on more modern easier remote work setups...working great. As part of our RMM change...we purchased SOS Splashtop Business...a big subscription, as it can integrate into SyncroMSP (we're getting rid of Solarwinds N-Central and their helpdesk). Reselling the Splashtop Business has been a big thing.

Which brings up another point...as we were entertaining the idea of switching to another RMM....we dreaded...absolutely DREADED...the thought of that. The sheer amount of time involved was daunting. So...this is one "good thing" I can say about this slowdown that's starting to happen...as we can dedicated more time to cutting over over 2,500 computers.

 

[HCHTech]

Similar here. Our April is on target to be down 42% from March, not unexpected, of course. We'll weather that ok as long it doesn't extend out too far. Time will tell.

 

[Philippe]

In lockdown since March the 17th. The 2 first weeks were slow. Last week was super-slow / almost empty. But this week is back to work!
(Only residential).

 

[Metanis]

Also very slow with me. That's not completely unusual since I consider myself "retired", but not a single call asking for help except my son trying to scan from his printer for the first time!

I charged him double!

He said he'd pay me by sending the grandchildren over to stay...

 

[Markverhyden]

I knew that moving would significantly impact my revenues. So they're next to nothing. Just a handful of remote sessions. Do have one O365 migration in process. Of course there's always surprises. Got a call from a lawyer customer I haven't heard from in years. Yapoop email problems! LOL! So his remote's tomorrow but it'll one hour prepaid. Because he's a lawyer!

But what I'm really worried about is the future, as in the next year or two. All this talk by politicians about a V shaped recovery is complete bull. But no surprise since they are politicians and it's an election cycle as well. The recovery from '08 was pretty long and painful. This one will probably be much worse.

Just trying to figure out which direction I should work at developing to replace revenue that won't come back.