From planned third-party maintenance contracts to emergency break-fix, Servnet covers every scenario across your entire hardware estate.
Replace OEM support contracts with independent third-party maintenance. NBD, 4-hour and same-day SLAs, certified spare parts, and per-device pricing quoted against your OEM renewal, for Dell, HPE, Cisco, NetApp and more.
When hardware fails, every minute counts. Our UK-wide field service network provides same-day, 4-hour and next-business-day response for servers, storage, networking and UPS equipment.
Don't let an OEM end-of-service-life date force a costly refresh. Servnet supports hardware years beyond vendor EOL — maintaining Dell PowerEdge, HPE ProLiant, Cisco UCS and more.
Consolidate fragmented OEM contracts into a single Servnet agreement covering your entire mixed-vendor estate — Dell, HPE, Cisco, Fortinet, NetApp, Lenovo and 20+ more brands.
Certified engineers dispatched to your data centre or server room across the UK. Racking, cabling, hardware swap-out, smart-hands and full data centre engineering services.
Independent Dell PowerEdge support — match any ProSupport SLA, keep spares in UK stock, and keep 13G–16G servers covered after their Dell support ends (Dell sets that date per Service Tag, not per model), priced per device against your ProSupport renewal.
Independent HPE ProLiant support — an alternative to HPE Tech Care (formerly Pointnext) covering Gen9–Gen11 with UK spares and post-EOSL coverage.
Independent Cisco network hardware maintenance — advance spares, 4-hour SLAs and coverage past Cisco LDoS, with honest hardware-vs-software scoping.
Independent maintenance for SAN & NAS arrays — controllers, drives, cache, power and shelves — one contract across your whole storage estate, years past EOSL.
Managed data centre moves and secure decommissioning — chain-of-custody, NIST 800-88 / ADISA data erasure, WEEE recycling and asset buyback.
Renewal quote from your OEM looking steep? We provide an honest, independent alternative to each vendor’s hardware-support programme — hardware break-fix and spares priced per device against your OEM renewal, with the software split spelled out. (Gartner’s 2019 market guide put third-party maintenance savings at 50–70% off OEM support net prices.)
Search for break-fix support — or breakfix, or break fix; the spelling varies more than the meaning — and you will find two quite different services described with the same word.
In IT support, break-fix is a way of paying: you call someone when something breaks and pay for that call, rather than a fixed monthly fee for a managed service that looks after everything. In hardware maintenance, break-fix is what gets repaired: a contract that puts diagnosis, the replacement part and, where needed, an engineer behind your servers, storage arrays and network switches, against an agreed response time.
This page is about the second. Hardware break-fix support is the part of a maintenance contract that replaces what the manufacturer’s post-warranty programme provides on the hardware side, and it is usually bought from an independent provider. The table sets the three side by side.
| Hardware break-fix | Break-fix IT support | Manufacturer support | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What “break-fix” refers to | A hardware repair contract: parts, diagnosis and engineers for servers, storage and network equipment | A way of buying IT support: pay per incident instead of a fixed monthly fee | Manufacturers use it too, for the hardware-repair part of their warranty and support contracts |
| How you pay | Usually a fixed annual fee per device, set by the service level | Per call-out or per hour, as and when something breaks | An annual renewal per device, priced by the manufacturer |
| Who fixes it | An independent maintenance provider | An IT support company or managed service provider | The manufacturer or its authorised partner |
| Software and firmware updates | Not included — these stay with the manufacturer | Depends entirely on the engagement | Usually included; for Cisco, Juniper and NetApp kit the contract is what unlocks software downloads, while Dell and Lenovo publish server firmware free without one |
| Kit past end-of-life | Yes — this is a main reason to buy it | Best-effort; parts are the constraint | Ends at the manufacturer’s last date of support |
| Good fit for | Stable data-centre hardware, mixed-vendor estates, equipment the manufacturer no longer supports | Small estates with few incidents, where a retainer would cost more than the call-outs | Equipment that still needs the manufacturer’s software and firmware entitlement |
Every break-fix call runs through the same six stages. The detail that varies between providers is not the stages but which one starts the clock and which ones the service level actually measures — so read a contract against this list.
By phone, email or portal — and, on monitored kit, sometimes by the hardware itself raising an alert. This is the moment worth pinning down in any contract, because it is where the response clock should start.
Logs, controller event records and health reports are read to establish what has actually failed. On a failed drive this takes minutes; on an intermittent memory, backplane or power fault it is most of the job.
Down to the field-replaceable unit and its part number, because a 1.2 TB drive from the wrong firmware family or a PSU of the wrong wattage is not a fix.
Depending on the service level, the part is shipped for your own staff to fit or an engineer attends to fit it. A parts-only arrangement is often both cheaper and faster where you have people on site.
The system is brought back to a known-good state and its logs are checked again, so the call closes on evidence rather than on the absence of a new alert.
The faulty unit goes back for test or disposal and the incident is recorded against the asset, which is what makes a recurring fault visible.
Break-fix contracts are written in a shorthand that is rarely explained, and the order of the numbers is not consistent between suppliers. Manufacturers’ own documents read it as coverage hours, then days, then response — Cisco’s 8x5x4 is a four-hour response in an eight-hour business-day window — while many providers write the same window the other way round. Only the last number is reliable: the response target is always last. Have the coverage window written out in words.
| Notation | Coverage window | Response target |
|---|---|---|
| 24x7x4 | Every day, around the clock | Four hours |
| 24x7xNBD | Every day, around the clock | Next business day |
| 9x5x4 (also written 5x9x4) | Business days, a nine-hour window | Four hours |
| 9x5xNBD (also written 5x9xNBD) | Business days, a nine-hour window | Next business day |
Three questions decide whether a four-hour target means anything: what event starts the clock, whether the target measures a response, a diagnosis, parts on site or a restored system, and what pauses it. There is more on each in our guide to third-party maintenance.
The mechanics are the same across vendors; what differs is the manufacturer contract being replaced and what that manufacturer still provides once support ends. Each page below covers one vendor, and the end-of-life checkers give the support dates model by model for servers and network equipment and for storage arrays.
How independent, UK-coordinated support compares with buying support direct from the hardware manufacturer.
| Feature | Servnet ✓ | OEM Direct |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Per device, quoted against your OEM renewal | OEM renewal price |
| UK-native support team | Yes — Surrey HQ | Varies by vendor |
| Multi-vendor single contract | Yes — 26+ brands | Mainly own-brand hardware |
| End-of-life hardware support | Yes — all major EOL | Ends at the OEM’s end-of-service-life date |
| Response SLA flexibility | NBD · 4hr · Same-day | Set by contract tier |
| Dedicated account manager | Yes — named contact | Depends on contract tier |
| On-site field service | UK-wide partner network | Partner-dependent |
Source: Uptime Institute, Annual Outage Analysis 2026 (press release, 13 May 2026), reporting its 2025 annual survey
From initial audit to live contract coverage in as little as two weeks.
We survey your hardware inventory — make, model, serial number, current support status, and OEM contract expiry dates. Completed remotely in 1–2 days via our secure asset discovery tool at no charge.
You receive a full like-for-like comparison: your current OEM costs vs Servnet pricing, recommended SLA tiers per device, and a projected 3-year saving. Fully itemised, no obligation.
Our onboarding team manages the switch — notifying existing vendors, mapping assets to your new Servnet agreement, and ensuring zero coverage gap. Typical go-live in 5–10 business days.
A named UK account manager owns your relationship. Quarterly reviews, proactive renewal planning, and a single point of escalation for any support issues across your entire estate.
Headquartered in Surrey since 2003. Your account manager, service desk and escalation contacts are all UK-based. Field services are delivered through our vetted UK service partner network — no overseas call centres, no overnight ticket queues.
One Servnet agreement replaces multiple fragmented OEM contracts. Unified billing, one renewal date, one point of contact for 26+ hardware brands.
We maintain a UK spare-parts inventory for all supported platforms, including EOL hardware. Parts are sourced from certified channels and tested before dispatch.
SLAs are contractually guaranteed — not best-effort targets. Choose Next Business Day, 4-Hour or Same-Day response based on your criticality profile.
Each device is priced against your current OEM renewal, so you can see the difference line by line before you decide to switch.
Our onboarding team handles the contract transition from your existing OEM or TPM provider — asset auditing, inventory mapping and go-live in as little as 2 weeks.
Hardware maintenance covers scheduled, proactive servicing and monitoring of IT equipment to prevent failures. Break-fix support is reactive: when a hardware fault occurs, engineers diagnose and repair or replace the faulty component. Servnet provides both services under a single contract.
It depends on the hardware, its age and the SLA, so we price each device against your current OEM contract (such as Dell ProSupport, HPE Tech Care or Cisco SNTC) and show the difference line by line. As an independent benchmark, Gartner’s 2019 Market Guide for Data Center and Network Third-Party Hardware Maintenance put TPM savings at 50–70% off OEM support net prices.
Servnet supports 26+ major hardware and software brands including Dell, HPE, Cisco, Fortinet, NetApp, Lenovo, IBM, Fujitsu, Arista, Nutanix, Juniper, Palo Alto, Check Point, F5, Brocade, Extreme Networks, Hitachi Vantara, Riverbed, Nvidia, Veritas and more. All brands are covered under a single unified contract.
Yes. One of our core service strengths is supporting hardware past its OEM end-of-service-life date. We maintain a UK spare-parts inventory and certified engineering expertise for Dell PowerEdge 12G/13G, HPE ProLiant Gen9/Gen10, Cisco UCS M4/M5 and many other discontinued platforms, whether or not the manufacturer still supports them — so you refresh on your timeline, not the vendor's.
Servnet offers three response tiers: Next Business Day (NBD), 4-Hour on-site response, and Same-Day emergency dispatch. The appropriate SLA is agreed at contract stage based on your criticality requirements and geographic location across the UK.
For most organisations, the transition from signing an agreement to live Servnet coverage takes 5–10 business days. We handle the entire process — asset auditing, vendor notifications and contract mapping — so your team experiences no disruption and zero coverage gaps during the switch.
Yes. This is one of the primary reasons UK organisations choose Servnet. A single Servnet agreement can cover Dell, HPE, Cisco, Lenovo, IBM, Fujitsu, Fortinet, NetApp, Arista, Juniper, Check Point, F5, Brocade, Extreme Networks and 10+ more brands — replacing multiple fragmented OEM contracts with one invoice, one renewal date and one support line.
Servnet focuses on enterprise servers, storage, networking and security hardware matching the vendor matrix we cover. For UPS and power infrastructure queries, speak to your account manager who can advise on the best approach for your estate.
Talk to a Servnet specialist about a maintenance contract tailored to your estate. Free audit, transparent pricing, no lock-in.
Last reviewed 7 October 2026. Manufacturer programme names, lifecycle dates and every cited figure on this page are re-checked against the manufacturers’ own published material at each review.
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