Straight answers about managed IT

Managed IT is a fixed-fee arrangement where a provider takes ongoing responsibility for your technology: monitoring systems, handling support requests, applying patches, managing vendors, and keeping your environment documented and secure.

Most businesses we talk to are either using a break-fix shop (they call someone when something breaks), relying on one in-house generalist, or doing it themselves. Managed IT shifts from reactive to proactive. Problems are often caught and resolved before your team notices them.

Unlimited remote support means your team can submit tickets without worrying about per-hour charges. There is no meter running every time someone calls for help.

Like any "unlimited" service, it is governed by a Fair Use Policy. This means the support is intended for normal day-to-day business IT needs, not for project work, custom development, or use levels that would require dedicated staffing. Project work is scoped and quoted separately.

An MSP (Managed Service Provider) handles general IT operations: support, monitoring, patching, backups, and cloud management. An MSSP (managed security service provider) adds a security operations layer on top: threat detection, incident response, 24/7 SOC coverage, and compliance support.

Hexafusion provides both. Every plan includes endpoint detection and response (EDR) with 24/7 managed detection and response (MDR), the capabilities typically associated with MSSP services.

We support businesses across British Columbia, from five-person offices to organizations with hundreds of users, from single-location offices to multi-site organizations with hundreds of users. Our plans scale with you. Whether you are a small team that has outgrown break-fix IT, a mid-market firm that wants a local partner with enterprise-grade processes and standards, or a larger operation looking for managed IT augmentation, we can scope a plan that fits.

We work across professional services, healthcare-adjacent offices, legal, accounting, construction, and growing tech companies. If you are not sure whether you are a good fit, get in touch and we will tell you honestly.

Most issues are resolved remotely and faster that way. Onsite visits are included in Managed Pro and Enterprise plans for issues that genuinely require physical presence. On Foundation and Managed, onsite work is billed hourly plus travel time and mileage. For emergencies in the City of Vancouver we aim to be on site within one hour of your call; emergency rates apply on Foundation, Managed and Managed Pro, and emergency response in business hours is included on Enterprise. Meetings, such as technology reviews, are held online; a meeting at your office is billed.

Our IT support staff are local to Metro Vancouver. The 24/7 MDR (managed detection and response) security operations centre is run by our security partner; its analysts' location depends on that partner's staffing, which we do not control.

We serve Metro Vancouver and surrounding areas. If you are outside the Lower Mainland, talk to us about what makes sense for your location.

Our plans are priced per unit per month: we count your people, your computer units and your licensed email accounts, and bill the highest of the three (never added together). A Windows computer is one unit and a Mac is two. Shared mailboxes without a licence are free, and a computer shared by several people counts as one unit plus half a unit for each additional person. Minimums: Foundation has none, Managed 10 units, Managed Pro 25, Enterprise 50. The minimum is always billed: if your unit count falls below your plan's minimum, you keep the plan at its minimum or move to the plan whose minimum you meet. The monthly invoice covers all the services included in your plan tier. You know the number before the month starts.

Some items are not part of the plan price. Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace licences can be your own, or bought through us at Microsoft's or Google's price. On Managed and higher plans we administer them for you; on Foundation, administration is billed by the hour. Project work outside day-to-day support is quoted separately.

See the full breakdown on our plans page.

No. There is no onboarding fee. If a security or backup tool needs a one-time set-up fee, it is shown on your quote before you sign.

Not included in the monthly rate:

• Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace licences (your own, or bought through us at Microsoft's or Google's price)
• Server, SAN and NAS support and backup, virtual machines, and network devices (firewalls, switches, Wi-Fi access points): add-ons on every plan
• Anything new: setting up a new staff member is billed hourly, and new computers, network devices and servers are project work
• Other third-party software and subscriptions not listed in your plan
• Hardware (computers, servers, networking equipment)
• Project work, on every plan: a new server, a new system or application roll-out, a new office or network set-up, a migration, and any mass change or mass deployment that affects a group of users or devices. Projects are quoted and approved in writing before they start
• New systems your business adopts that are not on your plan's list of supported systems, until we review them and add them to your plan in writing
• After-hours emergency support on Managed and Managed Pro (billed at after-hours rates); after-hours onsite visits on Enterprise
• Penetration testing and formal compliance audits

We are clear about this before you sign. There are no hidden fees that appear six months in.

Your monthly fee follows the highest of your people, computer units and licensed email accounts. If you hire five people in March, they are added to your invoice starting that month, and setting each of them up is billed. If your count drops, your fee drops from the next invoice.

There is no penalty for normal business growth or contraction. Significant changes (like an acquisition or a major layoff) are handled on a case-by-case basis to make sure your service coverage stays right-sized.

No, on Foundation, Managed and Managed Pro. They are month-to-month with 30 days' notice, and our service fee comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee (licences excluded). Enterprise has a 12-month minimum, then 30 days' notice.

We have done this many times. The process is straightforward when both parties are professional about it. Here is how it typically works:

• We do an initial discovery call and scoping session
• Once you sign with us, we manage the transition timeline with you
• We request documentation and access from your outgoing provider
• We run parallel monitoring during the handover period
• Your team has a working support line throughout the transition

If your previous provider is difficult about the handover, we manage that process for you. You own your environment.

There are two common scenarios. In the first, your internal person handles day-to-day requests and we provide the tooling, security stack, monitoring, backup, and strategic guidance they do not have time or expertise to manage alone. This is sometimes called co-managed IT.

In the second, your internal person is leaving or moving to a different role, and you want to fully hand IT over. We handle the full transition in that case.

Either way works. Tell us your situation and we will propose the right fit.

The first 30 days are the most intensive. We deploy our tooling, document your environment, and establish the baseline. By day 30, your team is submitting tickets and getting responses through our system, and we have a clear picture of your setup.

The 30-to-90 day period is stabilization: we address any gaps found during onboarding, run your first patch cycle, and prepare for your first Technology Business Review. After 90 days, you are in regular managed service operations.

We assess your existing equipment during onboarding and give you a clear recommendation of what to keep, what to plan to replace, and on what timeline. We do not require you to replace everything immediately.

Hardware procurement can go through us (we handle vendor relationships and procurement) or through your existing suppliers. We are flexible here. Our priority is that your environment is well-documented, monitored, and supported, regardless of who supplied the equipment.

Your team can reach us by phone, email, or through the client portal we set up during onboarding. All three create a ticket in our system and get triaged based on priority.

We also deploy a tray icon or client app on managed devices that gives your team a one-click path to support. Most clients settle into whatever method works for their culture.

Support hours are tiered by plan:

• Foundation and Managed: Monday to Friday, 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM Pacific, excluding BC statutory holidays
• Managed Pro: Monday to Friday, 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM Pacific, excluding BC statutory holidays
• Enterprise: 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year

After-hours emergency support is always available on Managed, Managed Pro and Enterprise. On Managed and Managed Pro it is billed at our after-hours rates; on Enterprise, remote support is included around the clock and only after-hours onsite visits are billable. On Foundation, after-hours help is available at our after-hours rates. Full response time targets by priority level are documented in our Service Level Agreement.

Our monitoring runs 24/7 regardless of plan. If a critical system alert fires at 2 AM, we see it. For Enterprise clients, we respond immediately. For Managed and Managed Pro clients, emergency after-hours support is always available at our after-hours rates, and our monitoring flags the issue so we are already aware when business hours begin. Foundation clients can ask for after-hours help at our after-hours rates; otherwise we pick it up at the start of the next business day.

We recommend Enterprise for organizations where any after-hours downtime has direct revenue or regulatory impact.

Yes. We support Mac, Windows, and mixed environments. Mac support is included from the Managed plan and billed hourly on Foundation. Each Mac counts as two units, because Macs need different tools and more time to manage.

Our primary focus is Microsoft 365 and Azure, which is where the majority of our BC clients operate. We also support Google Workspace environments and have experience with hybrid setups.

For AWS or other cloud infrastructure, support scope depends on what is being managed. Describe your environment and we will tell you what is included and what falls outside scope.

Security is built into every plan, not sold as an add-on:

• Every plan: endpoint detection and response (EDR) with 24/7 managed detection and response (MDR) and a security operations centre (SOC), threat hunting, email filtering, monitoring and patching
• Managed: adds AI email protection, daily automated security checks and a monthly manual security health check
• Managed Pro: adds advanced email protection, dark web and email breach monitoring, a password manager, security awareness training and phishing tests
• Enterprise: adds a dedicated threat response team, a dedicated security log system (SIEM) in our data centre, single sign-on from approved locations and a yearly software-based penetration test

See the full comparison on our plans page or the detail on our cybersecurity page.

Yes. Cyber insurers are increasingly requiring specific technical controls: MFA on all accounts, EDR on endpoints, documented backup and recovery, and security awareness training. We help you meet those requirements as part of your managed services engagement.

If you are applying for cyber insurance or renewing a policy, we can provide documentation of the controls we manage on your behalf. Many clients find that our security stack satisfies the technical requirements their insurer asks for.

This is why we take backup and security seriously from day one. Our response depends on your plan and what was in place at the time of the incident.

With proper backups and a good security posture, ransomware recovery is painful but survivable. Without them, it can be catastrophic. We document your recovery time and recovery point objectives during onboarding so everyone understands what the realistic outcome is if something goes wrong.

Every plan includes MDR, with active threat detection that catches many ransomware attacks before encryption begins. All clients can add our incident response service. Read more about our security approach.

We help you meet the technical controls that support PIPEDA and BC PIPA compliance: access controls, encryption, audit logging, breach detection, and documented policies. We are not a law firm and cannot provide legal compliance advice.

If you operate in healthcare, we understand BC healthcare privacy obligations and have experience supporting clinics and healthcare-adjacent organizations. For formal compliance audits, we work alongside your legal or compliance consultant.

Vulnerability scanning runs on every plan; the written report is billed hourly on Foundation and included from Managed. Software-based penetration testing is an add-on, included yearly on Enterprise. Human-led penetration tests are quoted separately on every plan.

We coordinate the engagement, brief the testers on your environment, and review the findings with you so the results are actionable, not just a report that sits on a shelf.