Scottish Maintenance Experts Launch New Business Assist Scheme

Online, January 25, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Businesses across Scotland are being offered an innovative new emergency maintenance service that could help them save thousands of pounds in repair bills.

The innovative service - called One Call Business Assist - is designed to provide emergency repair work for small and medial sized businesses in order to keep them up and running in the event of a disaster.

For a fixed fee of just £15 per month, companies will be able to receive 24/7 cover for six of the most common emergencies that could force them to close: electrical breakdowns, pest infestations, heating emergencies, gas leaks, plumbing emergencies and broken drains.

The new service has been launched by the experts behind One Call Home Assist - one of the Scotland's most successful start-up firms, which provides similar fixed-price maintenance contracts for landlords and property managers. Launched in April 2009, the Edinburgh-based firm currently provides maintenance contracts for hundreds of landlords across the whole of Scotland.

Paul Greaves, managing director of One Call Business Assist, said: "We have been providing maintenance deals for residential properties in Scotland for some time now but, in recent months, we've been taking more and more calls from businesses in the commercial sector.

"We soon realised that there is no-one in the UK that offers this kind of all-in-one emergency service for commercial buildings and shops. There's a huge demand for an affordable monthly contract that allows businesses to deal with the problems that insurance companies don't want to know about until it's too late.

"A cracked pipe or a broken drain can put a business completely out of action, and you then have all the hassle and expense of organising for a plumber to come out and fix the problem. If there's a long wait to get the fault repaired, it can also cause further damage to the property, which will have to be covered by your insurers.

"However, with our service, there is no waiting and the problems are dealt with swiftly. We guarantee to have approved engineers and qualified tradesmen on the premises within two hours of the call being received, and this emergency response is available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

"Whether the electrics go out, the boiler breaks or you have a gas leak, One Call Business Assist will have you covered. We're even working with dedicated pest controllers to ensure that, if you are signed up to the service, we will also get rid of any infestation problems that could close your business down.

"No-one else offers this type of cover in the commercial sector, and at just £15 a month it's affordable for any business. We envisage that One Call Business Assist will become a vital emergency service for UK businesses for years to come."

As well as receiving 24-hour-a-day emergency coverage, companies who sign up for the service will be able to access a special members section on the Business Assist website - which will allow them to manage their accounts online and will feature detailed information about dealing with emergencies. The members section will also feature a series of dedicated "how to" video guides showing the best way to perform general property maintenance and minor repairs.

Under the scheme, Business Assist customers will not be charged any excess fees or face any bills to pay - as call out, labour and parts will be covered in the monthly contract fee.

The innovative service will be trialled across Edinburgh and the Lothians during early 2010, before being rolled out across the rest of Scotland by the beginning of summer. The firm expects the service to generate turnover figures of £5 million by the end of the year, as well as achieving further expansion across the rest of the UK over the coming years.

More information can be found at the website http://bit.ly/6e5XmX or by calling 0800 121 4837.