Tech to help you work from home

Get a fast and reliable broadband connection. Whether it is via ADSL or cable doesn’t really matter. If you are struggling with a poor broadband connection, our IT experts can recommend you a reliable broadband provider in your area.

Whilst many people focus on download speed when choosing their home broadband provider, it is also important to consider your upload speed. If you’re sending or uploading a lot of large files, a poor upload speed will affect your work rate immensely.

Ensure you have a WI-FI enabled router, otherwise you will be literally stuck to your desk. Although you can easily connect your laptop to WI-FI, you may need to get a USB WI-FI dongle and plug into your desktop computer if you use one.

An obvious one but you need a machine that is powerful enough to run your business applications. If you don’t have a good enough machine, it is the company’s responsibility to provide you with one. A laptop with a decent processor such as Core i5 / i7 processor is recommended by our experts.

You will also want at least 4GB of RAM to run Office applications. 8GB of RAM is recommended to run demanding applications.

Software such as Skype, Whatsapp, etc. will enable you to speak to other users all over the world for free. However, dedicated VoIP phones will allow you to search and find any of your work colleagues and make calls over the company’s internal and much secure network.

When you are working from home, you may have to backup your work to a portable hard-drive or even easier, back it up to an online service such as Dropbox, Google Drive or Sharepoint.

Public health experts have been giving out lots of advice to stop the spread of Covid-19.

• Wash hands for about 20 seconds with soap and hot water
• Use a sanitiser gel
• Use a tissue for coughs and sneezes
• Avoid touching your eyes, nose and mouth with unwashed hands
• Avoid close contact with people who are unwell
• If you are unwell, ring 111