As an established business, Nicholas Ashley were initially looking for small business IT support assistance to simplify and manage their business processes. Once that had been acheived, they wanted to take advantage of the available opportunity to use their IT to expand and develop their customer base.
Residential Lettings and Management
Nicholas Ashley is an established independent lettings agency which has a reputation for being honest, courteous and efficient. With over 15 years experience managing and letting property in South East London, they are true experts in their field.
As an established company without any IT support, NA needed to find a technology partner that could provide it with the right solution to resolve their primary issues, which were:
• No current server based infrastructure
• Company data not centralised or permission based
• No way of sharing emails / appointments
• No reliable backup system
• No remote access to company data
NPIT proposed a server based solution based on Microsoft Small Business Server 2003. On the server, Microsoft Exchange provided valuable collaboration of email, calendars, contacts and tasks, while data files and folders were configured with the relevant user permissions to maximise security. The 6 PC’s connecting to the network were protected by Trend Micros’ antivirus solution and the Softscan antispam service, while the secure backup was taken care of by the Attix5 online backup service.
In addition to this, employees wishing to work from home were given remote access to work on their office PC’s via the secure online Small Business Server 2003 gateway. This meant that no-one needing to work from home had to take information away with them, increasing the level of company security.
NA now has a reliable, secure and scalable infrastructure that allows staff to work from anywhere in the world. Its systems are fully managed and supported by NPIT, and both companies have grown as a result of their 5 year partnership.

• 2 x Dell Poweredge Servers
• Microsoft Small Business Server 2003 R2
• Microsoft Terminal Services
• Trend Micro Anti-Virus
• Softscan Antispam
• Attix 5 Online Backup
We have used NPIT for over 5 years and throughout that time, they have listened to our needs, suggested suitable improvements and made sure that our business functioned smoothly.
N Benady- Director -Nicholas Ashley Residential Lettings Ltd
www.nicholasashley.com

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