How To Keep Your Legacy Systems Running Reliably

According to one stat, 31% of a company's IT is made up of legacy systems. Furthermore, three-quarters (75%) of manufacturing companies are dependent on legacy systems and spreadsheets for their business operations. While there are warning signs surrounding the use of legacy systems, we speak to dozens of companies each year who are not in a position (or desire) to undergo a major legacy system modernisation or replacement project.

There are multiple reasons why companies speak to us about legacy system support. Some of the most common reasons are:

• Free up time for their developers: 42% of developer's time spent on legacy maintenance. a quarter of developers’ time is spent maintaining legacy systems. They come to PSP to help free up their internal resources
• Lack of knowledge: Whether it's because their developer leaves, or they're tying to hire, finding knowledge of legacy technology can be a challenge
• Extract Value: as well as providing reliable support, an experienced support vendor like PSP can suggest ways to optimise and streamline the system
• Affordable and Reliable: our reliable legacy system support means the client has access to instant support and takes the burden away from their IT team

Research shows that companies with legacy technology are paying 10-15% more per year on IT maintenance; with an average of 60-80% of their IT budget allocated to keeping them running. By outsourcing your legacy system support, you are only paying for the resource you need at a substantially lower rate.

Outsource To Improve Developer Productivity

As mentioned, 42% of a developer’s time is spent maintaining legacy systems. That means your developers are spending 2 days per week just keeping your legacy system running.

That’s 104 days per year!

As well as having a big impact on their morale and productivity, it’s taking away skilled resources for non-value-added tasks.

One of the major benefits of outsourcing legacy system support is that you only pay for the resource you need. Do you just need 65 days per year worth of support? That is what you can pay for. It’s a perfect alternative to having a full-time developer in-house whose skills aren’t effectively utilised.

Bridging Skills Gap

When operating your business through a legacy system, everything seems to go swimmingly until your main developer hands in their notice (or is off unexpectedly). It’s not until you start asking other members of the IT team about the system that you realise nobody has the knowledge of your legacy that your lead developer had.

We’ve encountered several businesses that have been in this same situation. They’ve come to us with an urgent need for support to keep their critical systems running efficiently.

At PSP, we have developed an internal online academy with a full library of videos, how-to guides and user documents for every client, so there is always a developer ready to fix your issue as soon as it’s raised.

Mitigates Scalability Challenges

One of the biggest challenges you may face with your legacy system is the inability (or lack of ability) to adapt and scale up the system to meet your business growth and changes.

As well as providing major support and maintenance, we can optimise the data within your legacy system and enable integration with modern third-party applications and technology.

An optimised legacy system that can sustain high usage and incorporate new functions will directly improve your staff’s productivity and performance levels. Automation or streamlining of tasks means staff can focus on value-added tasks, rather than non-value added such as data entry and administration tasks.

Reliable Support for Critical Systems

Are you told by IT managers and internal stakeholders that your legacy system is affecting the company and it needs to be replaced, even though there is no budget to replace it?

Outsourcing your legacy system support means you can keep your critical systems running, without having to take skilled technical resources away from your development team for 1.25 days of the week.

The process of optimising a legacy system can be straightforward for an experienced legacy system support vendor. It costs a fraction of the cost of completely replacing a system and in some cases even yields better results and a higher ROI.

Speak To Our Consultants

Does your business run a legacy system that impacts your company’s operations?

Have you considered the impact your unsupported legacy system might have on your business?

Now is the time to book a consultation with one of our legacy system experts for some impartial advice on where you should go next.

If you’d like to find out more about legacy system support and modernisation, get in touch and speak to one of our experts.

Email letstalk@psp-it.co.uk or phone 01775 722377.