This piece is by Gavin Miller, CEO, Asurion Europe, who reflects on the role of insurance and tech support in the home office.
The connected home is going from strength to strength, underpinned by the rapid rise in hybrid working since the pandemic. In the UK, four out of five previously office-based professionals now work from home at least one or two days a week, for example, despite only 2% saying they have always worked remotely 1.
This huge shift is increasingly driving convergence of home and office digital technology, although levels of support from employers for home-working technology varies; larger organisations are more likely than small companies to supply employees with the appropriate equipment for working from home.
Allowing employees to use their own devices to access work emails, systems and files can be a practical approach for many firms – and some employees prefer to have all their work and personal communications and apps on one single device. But this kind of ‘bring your own device’ (BYOD) approach can pose a serious security risk if appropriate measures are not in place. Personal information, as well as confidential or commercially sensitive business information, can be at risk.
Minimising downtime
These kinds of challenges are on the increase alongside our growing digital dependency. A BYOD policy and robust security measures are required on the part of organisations, along with appropriate measures to protect personal data. And reliable operation of devices and systems is business critical – there is no room for technical issues at home or at work.
Research by Asurion Europe has revealed that worries over technical reliability and uptime are preventing almost half of UK consumers – young and old – making further investments in digital devices and platforms. And 60% of respondents said insurance and tech support for the electronic devices in their home was an essential service to help them manage accidents, breakdowns, failures, IT issues and software problems.
Everyone understands that technical issues will occur. These might be set-up challenges, connection problems, device malfunction, software glitches or even being unaware how to perform a given digital task or process. The message from the survey was that consumers want to avoid the administrative nightmare of dealing with multiple tech support connections or hotlines – two-thirds of respondents expressed a desire for a single point of technical support and cover, wherever and whenever they bought their digital devices.
The frequency of failures
Adoption of some form of smart, connected device across all age groups averages at around 80%. 2
When analysing multi-device ownership, however, there is a clear skew towards young adults. Those aged 16-34 are more likely to own over three devices – at 44%. 3
And it’s not just smartphones, laptops and gaming consoles – the whole of our home environment is becoming inexorably digitised and connected, with the number of smart homes in Europe expected to rise to almost 180 million by 2028 4.
A third of respondents in the Asurion Europe survey said the issue of electronic device problems and failures in their home was wasting increasing amounts of their time. Almost half associated growing digitalisation with increasing technical issues and problems.
Around a third of respondents said they experienced a significant issue with one of their electronic devices in the home every three months – a hardware failure, software failure or connection outage, for example. And almost a quarter of respondents had a major problem at least once a month. More than half of younger respondents said they experienced a tech meltdown at least four times a year – possibly because their device ownership is greater than their older counterparts. Yet the same feelings of frustration were also reported by half of the older cohort.
Full restoration
Because they work at home at least some of the week, a third of survey respondents said they felt they now have much greater need of tech support in case of problems and failures. When asked what good tech support and recovery should look like, respondents focused mainly on response times – which had emerged in various qualitative research groups as the primary consideration when tech problems occur.
But the quality of home tech service and support was also vital – respondents were looking for most problems to be resolved within 24-48 hours. There are now many ‘sticking plaster’ solutions to digital tech problems – connectivity issues can be temporarily managed by going to a local café, for example. And a mobile SIM can be moved to an alternative emergency device for a short while. However, most people would not want to continue with such measures for much longer than an emergency period. Full restoration is crucial.
As well as providing ongoing emergency support, an effective technical support service should also be able to help manage issues such as multiple device co-ordination, cyber security and collaborative applications. Setting up synchronisation safely and securely can be challenging. The main device for working from home, for example, will first need its software effectively installed, observing a distinction between work, personal and leisure applications.
Collaboration applications require security protocols across multiple devices, particularly laptops and mobiles – as does cloud email. Employers may demand levels of data protection and security which are more rigorous than those employees would install for personal applications. As well as supporting the initial set-up, an effective technical support service should also cover the inevitable adaptations which are needed over time as requirements change.
2. https://www.techuk.org/resource/state-of-the-connected-home-2023.html
3. https://www.techuk.org/resource/state-of-the-connected-home-2023.html
4. https://www.statista.com/forecasts/1283780/smart-home-users-in-europe
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