When it comes to supporting collaboration technology, most organizations will at some point face the same question: should we pay for support when something breaks, or invest in a program that keeps things from breaking in the first place?
Both approaches are legitimate. Both have a place. And the right answer depends less on which model sounds better in theory and more on the specific realities of your environment — how many rooms you're managing, how critical uptime is, and how much visibility you want into the health of your systems.
Here's a clear-eyed look at how both models work and what to consider when choosing between them.
BREAK-FIX SUPPORT: WHAT IT IS AND WHEN IT WORKS
Break-fix is exactly what it sounds like. When something stops working, you open a support ticket, a technician diagnoses the issue, and the problem gets resolved. You pay for service when you need it. When everything is running smoothly, there's no ongoing cost.
For many organizations, this is a more than reasonable approach. The model works well when:
- You have a small number of meeting rooms that see moderate use
- Your AV environment is relatively simple and stable
- Internal IT has the capacity to handle initial triage before escalating to a specialist
- Occasional downtime is an inconvenience but not a significant business impact
Break-fix support also gives organizations flexibility — there's no long-term commitment, no minimum spend, and no ongoing obligation. For organizations that are early in their AV journey or managing a limited footprint, that simplicity has real value.
The trade-off is response time and predictability. Break-fix support is reactive by nature. The trigger for getting help is something going wrong — which means some amount of downtime is built into the model. How much that matters depends on how your organization uses the technology.
For example, Vivo Care is Vivo's break-fix support offering. It provides 4-hour response times during business hours, advanced technical support and troubleshooting, advanced parts replacement, and optional on-site support for eligible systems. It's available as an add-on at the time of hardware purchase and can be structured in one, two, or three-year terms.
MANAGED AV SERVICES: WHAT THEY ARE AND WHEN THEY MAKE SENSE
Managed AV services take a different approach. Rather than responding to problems after they surface, a managed services program focuses on monitoring system health, identifying issues before they become outages, and maintaining systems proactively throughout their lifecycle.
A managed AV program typically includes:
- Remote system monitoring
- Preventative maintenance
- Firmware and software updates
- Help desk support
- Device health reporting
- Performance analytics
- Scheduled onsite service
- Asset lifecycle planning
The core difference from break-fix is the posture: managed services are designed to reduce the number of failures, not just respond to them.
This model tends to make the most sense when:
- You're managing many meeting rooms — across one location or many
- Your rooms are used often, and downtime has a measurable impact on operations
- You want visibility into system health without relying on employees to report problems
- Your IT team has limited bandwidth to manage AV-specific issues alongside other responsibilities
- You're deploying standardized environments across multiple offices and need consistent performance across all of them
HOW TO CHOOSE
Neither model is universally better. The right choice comes down to how your organization uses its collaboration technology and what level of reliability you need to maintain.
A few questions that help frame the decision:
How many rooms are you supporting? A single conference room or a small handful is well-served by break-fix. As the footprint grows, the complexity of managing individual incidents grows with it — and a proactive model starts to deliver more value.
How business-critical is uptime? If a conference room going offline means a missed internal standup, break-fix is probably fine. If it means a failed client presentation, a delayed executive meeting, or a disrupted care team in a clinical setting, the calculus changes.
How much IT bandwidth do you have? Break-fix support requires someone internally to identify the problem, open the ticket, and coordinate the resolution. If your IT team is stretched, managed services reduce that burden significantly by catching issues before they require escalation.
How much visibility do you need? Break-fix support tells you what broke and when it gets fixed. Managed services tell you what's trending toward failure before it happens — and give you utilization data that helps inform future technology decisions.
Are you managing one location or many? Multi-site environments benefit significantly from centralized monitoring and management. Consistent visibility across every room in every office is difficult to achieve with a reactive model alone.
THE HONEST ANSWER
For smaller environments with limited room counts and moderate usage, break-fix support through a program like Vivo Care delivers expert assistance at a cost-effective price point — without committing to an ongoing program that may exceed what the environment needs.
For organizations with larger footprints, heavy room utilization, or meaningful operational exposure when technology fails, managed services deliver a level of proactive coverage that break-fix support wasn't designed to provide.
Some organizations use both — break-fix support for lower-priority spaces and managed services for mission-critical rooms where reliability is non-negotiable.
The goal in either case is the same: collaboration technology that works when your team needs it, supported by a structure that matches the demands of the environment.
If you're evaluating support options for your AV environment and want to talk through which model makes sense for your situation, get in touch with the Vivo team today.
