Financial Case Studies – US Cloud Microsoft Support

FINANCIAL CASE STUDIES

Read case studies from Fortune 500 financial services organizations, multi-national banks and global insurance companies who have switched from Microsoft Unified support to US Cloud for 30-50% cost reduction, faster response times and all USA engineering teams.

Financial services, banking, insurance case studies - US Cloud Microsoft support

What’s Inside the US Cloud Financial Case Studies

  • 60+ Financial, banking, and insurance companies
  • Fortune 500 financial, national banks, global insurers
  • Rescued IT budgets with 52% average industry savings
  • Microsoft Unified to US Cloud key decision drivers

Why Financial Organizations Should Read the Case Studies

US Cloud’s primary mission is to help companies get the most out of their Microsoft software. And for some, Microsoft support is still the right fit.
Financial Case Studies - US Cloud Microsoft SupportBut with Unified Support increases straining Financial IT budgets, many organizations are finding themselves needlessly wasting IT dollars on MSFT support and seeking an alternative.  By moving to US Cloud for Microsoft support, large financial services organizations, banks and insurance companies are able to save millions of dollars per year (30-50% in year 1) in cost reduction and future cost avoidance (average 3x savings over the next 5 years).
This Microsoft support savings can be reinvested in innovation to drive growth and better serve their investors and customer base.

US Cloud was great to work with throughout the sales process. They provided invaluable information to help counter misinformation being fed to our senior IT leaders by Microsoft that could have blown our cost-saving opportunity.

John T., VP Strategic Sourcing - Fortune 500 Bank

We were shocked to see our 2nd year increase in Unified jump 150%+.  Our Azure adoption was driving the pricing formula and our roadmap has more Azure to come.  After 2 years of talking with US Cloud, we finally made the jump and haven’t looked back.

Anthony W., IT Sourcing - Global Financial Services Enterprise

Unified Support 3 Year Forecast for Financial Organizations

Microsoft Unified Support 3 Year Forecast for Financial Services IndustryAs financial services, banking and insurance organizations continue their digital transformation, many are accelerating their Microsoft 365 or Azure adoption. As a result, most are seeing significant Unified cost increases in year two and beyond.
Get the case studies for more details but the big takeaway is all financial industry enterprises should do a 3 year forecast to fully understand their Microsoft Unified costs and avoid surprises.

US Cloud Financial Case Study #1

EU Bank Deposits Trust in Independent MSFT Support Partner

Client: Large European Bank

Industry: Financial

Annual Revenue: $2.1 B

Key Drivers: Cost reduction

Client Profile: A large western European Bank with over 35,000 employees, the Client maintains a complex hybrid Microsoft environment that powers their main corporate operations, but also a large number of semi-autonomous retail storefronts.

Why Leave Microsoft Support: A year or two behind Microsoft’s efforts to convert US companies over to Unified, larger institutions in Europe are now feeling the pinch. Negotiating its master Microsoft EA went normally but they were shocked by an almost 200% increase under Unified Support. After briefly considering totally in-sourcing MSFT support, it became clear they could not provide the level of expertise needed across their entire Microsoft ecosystem.

Switching to US Cloud: The Bank’s Procurement team was tasked with finding a viable alternative and after an international RFP it was established that only Microsoft and US Cloud could reliably support their Microsoft infrastructure. Following detailed evaluation and vetting by the Bank’s IT leadership, the Client opted to take the risk of moving to a third-party and save the money on support costs.

Bank Case Study #1 - US Cloud Microsoft Support

Budget Dollars Saved
Year 1: $560,000
Cost Reduction
Year 1: 51%
Cost Avoidance
Years 2-5: 312%
Benefit
By saving over half a million in hard costs, the Bank was able to continue with their vital digital transformation efforts as planned. This modernization of their consumer-facing systems was seen as a strategic imperative, but not mission critical to ongoing operations. The effort would have likely been curtailed and the Bank would have fallen farther behind newer, more nimble competitors.
In addition, there had been significant dissatisfaction with responsiveness under Microsoft. There was concern that a smaller US-centric company like US Cloud would not be able to support them well in their time zone. However, a year in, IT has been extremely pleased with responsiveness and the Bank is now a regular reference client for US Cloud.
Banking Case Study #2 - US Cloud Microsoft Support Services
Budget Dollars Saved
Year 1: $1,125,000
Cost Reduction
Year 1: 61%
Cost Avoidance
Years 2-5: 257%
Benefit
The Bank worked through the initial trial period with US Cloud and were able to let their Microsoft Unified contract expire, resulting in over a million in savings for IT.
The IT Team and Procurement were recognized specifically by the C-Suite for capturing seven-figure savings without sacrificing capabilities.
US Cloud was also able to provide expert DSE’s for Azure and M365 from its substantial elite MSFT Partner network.

US Cloud Financial Case Study #2

Banking on US Cloud for Big Microsoft Support Savings

Client: Ultra Large Bank in USA

Industry: Banking

Annual Revenue: $20+ B

Key Drivers: Cost reduction

Client Profile: One of the top ten commercial and retail banks in the USA with with more than 70,000 employees and over $350 billion in assets. Extremely complex hybrid Microsoft environments.

Why Leave Microsoft Support: The Client first explored alternatives after being pushed to switch to Unified Support in 2019. Even with significant SAB credits to soften the blow, the increase in year one was significant. Although the Bank came close to switching to US Cloud that year, conservative members of leadership were concerned with the risk of moving to a third-party to support critical systems. In year two, it became an imperative. After using most of their SAB credits, the second year brought another Unified Support cost increase that more than doubled their already exorbitant Microsoft Support bill.

Switching to US Cloud: The Bank’s IT Team had continued its discussions with US Cloud from the previous year, gaining more confidence that the company could handle their support needs. The bank made the decision to sign with US Cloud, but started their support agreement several months earlier than their Microsoft Support renewal date to overlap programs and hedge their bets on whether US Cloud would work for the Bank.

US Cloud Financial Case Study #3

Investment in US Cloud Support Services Pays Dividends

Client: Large Multinational Investment Bank

Industry: Wealth Management

Annual Revenue: $8 B

Key Drivers: Cost avoidance

Client Profile: A Northeastern US-based multinational investment bank with over 18,000 employees that had migrated a majority of key Microsoft systems to the cloud.

Why Leave Microsoft Support: This sophisticated NYC wealth management firm was being forced from Microsoft Premier Support into Unified Support. Traditionally the Client’s high- caliber internal IT staff solved the majority of Microsoft break-fix tickets. Only ultra-complex issues or ones that required code or tenant access were submitted to Microsoft Support. With the “all-or- nothing” pricing of Unified Support, the Client’s traditional approach of buying just the support hours they would need became impossible. Forced into the new pricing formula the Client immediately started to search for a replacement for Unified Support that more closely matched the Premier Support model they had tailored their internal resources to.

Switching to US Cloud:After searching for multiple alternatives in late 2019, the Client admitted that only US Cloud had a service capable of replacing their Microsoft Support.

Wealth Management Firm Case Study - US Cloud Microsoft Support
Budget Dollars Saved
Year 1: $222,000
Cost Reduction
Year 1: 63%
Cost Avoidance
Years 2-5: 151%
Benefit
Plan B if the Bank had to stay with Microsoft was a significant layoff in the IT group. By reducing FTE headcount and leaning into Microsoft’s unlimited support hours model, they could largely offset the cost increase of Unified Support. However, by doing so they would sacrificed significant institutional knowledge and expertise specific to their environments – familiarity that would have been lost by solely relying on generic support from Microsoft.
US Cloud was able to both save enough budget that all IT staff were retained, as well as creating a ”support pod” that leveraged the same engineering teams on the Bank’s tickets – increasing vs. decreasing engineering resources intimately familiar with their company and systems.

US Cloud Microsoft Support for Financial Example

USERS SEEING DOUBLE WHEN BOOKING CALENDAR EVENTS

Issue: Users were reporting sporadic instances of O365 Outlook calendar events doubling when entered or changed. The client had tried to identify the commonalities in the sporadic events but was unable to pinpoint the problem.

This ticket wasn’t a major emergency, but it was a very annoying and visible issue for many users. US Cloud was able to come in and close the ticket the same day after Microsoft had done nothing on it for a month.

Thomas B,., IT Manager - National Insurance Company

Microsoft Escalation: As this was a new US Cloud client, there had also been a previous ticket escalated to Microsoft, but no resolution had been offered in the four weeks the ticket was open. In addition, it had been over 10 days since the Client was able to get any update at all from Microsoft.

Solution: A US Cloud ticket was opened and worked that same day. This was a problem that US Cloud engineers have seen multiple times, so the client was instructed to investigate the users and instances where the problem occurred, looking for a common thread of multi- device access.

When the client confirmed the hypothesis, US Cloud informed the end user that typically this happens when there are multiple devices synced with the mailbox – especially if there are other delegated users for the mailboxes. The client was given instructions on how to reconfigure the problematic mailboxes / user accounts and the ticket was resolved and closed within a day of submittal.

Microsoft finally simply closed the original ticket without any update or communication with the Client a week after it had been solved.

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