IT support for shops and retailers
Managed IT for independent shops, small chains and hospitality across London and Essex. We look after the computers, network and connectivity your shop depends on.
We support companies remotely worldwide. Site visits — in London and within the M25, further afield by arrangement.
What we usually find in a shop
Retail IT is unforgiving in a way office IT is not. There is no workaround for a broken till and no rescheduling a Saturday afternoon.
- Everything depends on one connection. Card payments, the EPOS system, stock and the guest Wi-Fi usually share a single broadband line with no fallback. When it drops, you are taking cash or taking nothing.
- Card data is not optional to protect. PCI DSS is a contractual requirement from your payment processor, not a suggestion. The current standard expects real controls rather than a checklist once a year.
- The customer Wi-Fi and the till are on the same network. It is the most common thing we find, and it means a guest device sits alongside the machine that takes payments.
- Back-office kit is forgotten. The stock computer, the CCTV recorder and the machine that prints labels are rarely patched and often still on a password someone set years ago.
- Staff turnover is high. Shared logins on the till and on email, and access that stays live long after someone has left.
- Trading peaks are the worst time to discover anything. Christmas, sale weekends and school holidays are when the equipment is under the most load and the least attention.
What we look after
Day to day
- The computers, networks and connections your EPOS and card terminals depend on. We look after the agreed computers, network equipment and connectivity. The till software and card terminal stay with their own suppliers.
- Shop broadband with a mobile fallback, so a cut line need not close the till
- Back-office computers, printers, label and receipt hardware, scanners and stock machines
- Wi-Fi that covers the shop floor and the stock room, with customers kept on a separate network from the till
- Microsoft 365 email and files for the office; access closed on an agreed working day after you tell us
- More than one site kept working the same way, rather than each shop doing its own thing
Where the risk sits
- Payment and till equipment separated from guest and general use networks
- We set up multi-factor authentication, access restrictions and device management where the system supports them. Any licences and limitations needed are agreed in advance.
- Individual logins for staff, so the till log means something when stock or cash goes missing
- Router, CCTV and back-office kit taken off default passwords and kept updated
- Backups of stock, sales and business records, kept apart from the shop. We monitor that backups run. Restore testing is part of the With servers plan; otherwise it is agreed separately.
- The technical groundwork for PCI DSS, set up so your annual questionnaire describes something that is actually true
We agree the scope of service in the proposal. Equipment, connectivity, licences (for example for antivirus, email security and backup software), site visits and project work are charged separately.
Practical advice for staff on suspicious emails, attachments and payment requests is part of the service. Separate training sessions are agreed in advance and charged separately.
Worth saying plainly
We are responsible for the agreed IT services and help you prepare evidence of the technical security measures. This does not replace a legal compliance assessment or industry certification.
We are not a payment processor, a PCI assessor or your EPOS vendor; your merchant agreement and self-assessment questionnaire stay yours. We maintain the technical side underneath: segregated networks, controlled access and updated equipment.
Start before the next busy weekend
Our free IT health check reviews your shop setup and returns a written summary — what is solid, what is exposed, and what would stop you trading. No obligation afterwards. We agree the scope of the check in advance.
On a 12-month agreement: £50 per user per month without your own servers, or £75 with servers. The minimum is £300 a month. Month-to-month service and full terms are on the pricing page.
A single small shop is often better served by one-off remote support during support hours: £45 for 30 minutes or £85 for an hour.