“Uh oh!” to “Aha!” – An Interview with Dennis Povloski of DF Pensions, Inc.
When catastrophe struck, Dennis Povloski found his business dead in the water—for two full weeks.
A ransomware attack ground operations to a halt for DF Pensions, Inc.’s online provider. DF Pensions had recently moved its office to a cloud-based virtual server. When the office’s online provider was hit hard by ransomware, Dennis’s business suffered.
“Fortunately, no data was compromised, but our provider had to rebuild and restore desktops for all of their clients,” he remembers. “We were out of commission for over two weeks, waiting for our desktops to come back online. That was when we realized that in a catastrophic emergency, all of our eggs were in one basket.”
DF Pensions, Inc. is a third-party administrator of employer-sponsored retirement plans. They help businesses set up, monitor, and protect retirement plans like 401ks, profit sharing, defined benefit, and cash balance plans.
“We work with almost 300 employers with plans covering thousands of employees,” Dennis says. When it comes to qualified retirement plans, employers and employees alike can take advantage of tax benefits and other incentives. “The rules and regulations span thousands of pages. Most businesses are very good at doing what they do, but they are not experts in the rules governing retirement plans.”
Dennis’s team helps businesses navigate the complicated and confusing waters of government regulations. Their business keeps other businesses afloat when it comes to pension plans. And according to Dennis, every part of his business is linked to critical technology.
“Everything we do relies on software,” he explains. From elaborate calculation databases to cloud-based software that generates plan documents, the technology involved in DF Pensions’ day-to-day work—and the security procedures in place to protect it—is absolutely critical for maintaining privacy and keeping the business running.
So when their IT provider’s ransomware attack shut down the business’s technology for more than two weeks, the effect was truly disastrous.
This “Uh oh!” moment led Dennis and his team to Grand Technology Solutions.
“GTS was on a list of professional partners that I got from Office 365,” Dennis says. “I called them up, and talked to Paul, the owner. As we discussed my situation, I found out very quickly that he would be a great partner for my business. He is knowledgeable, friendly, and immediately took action to help me in my time of need, even though I wasn’t an established client yet.”
Dennis’s “Aha!” moment came when his team got control back over their systems. The GTS team got Dennis’s systems back online within two hours, and set up new procedures to keep DF Pensions safe from disastrous crashes in the future.
“I’m not the most technically savvy person, but I know enough to be dangerous,” Dennis says. “After we discussed my needs, GTS was able to confirm a lot of what I thought would make sense us, and he made some very good, cost effective recommendations. We now have a local environment that we can remote into, redundant backups, enhanced security and monitoring by an outside professional (GTS, of course!).”
“The speed at which GTS was able to get us set up was fantastic,” he adds. “I’m very much more at ease now that our solutions are in place, and I know GTS is monitoring our network.”
According to Dennis, the new peace of mind isn’t even the best part.
“The good news is that even though our set up is new, my office has not been disrupted by the change,” Dennis says. “I would say that the biggest impact is that my employees made it through this transition without having to change their routines and procedures.”
Now that the routine is back to normal, the team at DF Pensions, Inc. can get back to doing what they do best: helping other businesses strike the right balance between employee benefits and government regulations.
“It’s very satisfying to know that we are helping employers operate successful retirement plans that provide benefits for the employer (saving taxes and improving employee morale) and help support the retirement security of their employees,” Dennis says. “I have three employees, and having been through a catastrophic scenario where my business was essentially shut down due to a cyber-attack, there is no question that professional IT services are a necessity.”
To learn more about Dennis Povloski and DF Pensions, Inc., visit their website at www.dfpensions.com.
To learn more about Grand Technology Solutions and our Remote Monitoring & Management (RMM) packages, visit our website, email info@helpgts.com, or give us a call at (904) 606-6011. We’re here to help!
