What does the current energy crisis mean for your business?
Keeping a business running smoothly in the current climate is tough. With an energy crisis affecting a large proportion of the world, inflation continuing to rise and supply chains feeling the strain, it’s no wonder that businesses are grasping at money-saving techniques and solutions to help them navigate through the storm.
What happened?
We’ve really been through it these past couple of years! When you think about past events such as COVID-19, Brexit, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, soaring oil and fuel prices – the list goes on – each of these things has had a knock-on effect on the economy which has plunged us into an energy and cost of living crisis. The price of running a business has increased significantly, making it incredibly hard for new businesses to make an impact, while existing ones have had to find ways to survive and ride it out or, sadly, bow out.
There is no sector safe from the current climate either, from manufacturing, construction and education to government, finance and healthcare – everyone is feeling the heat.
What help is available?
Since October 2022, eligible domestic and non-domestic customers have benefitted from some kind of discount or grant. With the end of the tax year steamrolling towards us, it’s time for these to be reviewed.
A good place to start when it comes to seeing what help is available to your business is the gov.uk website. One section to highlight is the guidance on the Energy Bills Discount Scheme (EDBS). This new scheme, set to take over from the Energy Bill Relief Scheme that will draw to an end this month, strikes a balance between supporting businesses whilst also limiting taxpayers’ exposure to unpredictable energy markets.
The new EBDS will run for 12 months from 1st April 2023 to 31st March 2024. You can check your organisation’s eligibility and find out more information here.
So, what can you do to lessen the sting?
Find out where your weaknesses lie. Most businesses will know how much they’re spending each month, quarter and year on energy, but how do you know what of that energy is being wasted or inefficiently used?
It’s much easier to decide where to concentrate your savings tactics when you know exactly where the leak is located.
Let your technology help you
We don’t expect you to assign a member of staff to go round each office and department ensuring devices are switched off at the end of the day! NetSupport DNA has a plethora of tools to help you stay ahead of your energy usage. Its Energy Monitoring features will check the status of your computers and whether they’re powered on or off, while its local monitoring component keeps an accurate record of each time a computer is powered on, off or hibernates.
Once NetSupport DNA has a record of the times of day each computer is being used, it will calculate an average “power consumption per device” to work out a baseline rate of energy use for all of the computers across your business.
Now that you have this information, you can turn your attention to the Power Management features and begin to set policies that will power on or shut down your PCs at specific times of the day to suit your business’s needs. Additionally, you can also apply rules for PCs to go to sleep, log out or power off systems as a result of them being inactive for a specified length of time – plus, you can even apply different policies to different departments.
Stay in the know
By being aware of your business’s energy use patterns and putting Power Management features to good use, you’ll quickly begin to see the benefits and savings.
So if you’re an existing customer of NetSupport DNA, make sure you are using its energy monitoring and power management tools to become aware of your pattern of use and help tackle rising costs. And if you haven’t yet joined our NetSupport DNA club but are considering implementing an ITAM solution shortly, check out the evidence that reveals why so many companies love it.