Buyer's guide
Top questions to ask an MSP in Dubai and Sharjah.
Ask an MSP how fast it replies and escalates, how it proves your backups restore, who owns your admin accounts, and what it costs to leave. A good provider answers each with a document, a date or a named example; a weak one answers with adjectives. The twelve questions below are the ones UAE buyers most often skip.
Service and response
- What is your first-response target, in writing? Ask for the contract clause, not the brochure line. Check business hours, the Saturday position and what counts as a response.
- How and when does a ticket escalate? You want a named path from the service desk to an engineer, with a time limit at each step.
- Who comes on site, and how quickly? Ask which emirates are covered on site and which are remote-first, and whether visits cost extra.
- What do you report every month? Ask to see a real, redacted monthly report: tickets, patching, backup results and open risks.
Security and recovery
- When did you last restore one of our backups, and can we see the result? Backups that are never test-restored are a guess. Ask for a monthly restore test with the date and the outcome.
- Which security controls are included, and which are extras? Endpoint protection, email filtering, MFA, patching and monitoring should be listed per user or per device.
- Will you complete our security questionnaire? Regulated firms, banks and government buyers ask this. A capable MSP has standard answers ready.
- What happens in the first hour of a ransomware incident? Ask for the incident plan, who calls whom, and whether forensics or recovery work is billed separately.
Contract, ownership and price
- Is the Microsoft 365 tenant and every admin account in our company name? It should be, from day one. Shared or provider-owned admin accounts make leaving hard.
- What is the pricing basis? Per user, per device or a fixed AMC fee. Ask for inclusions and exclusions on one page.
- What does exit look like? Notice period, handover documentation, credential transfer and any exit fee should be written down before you sign.
- Which credentials can we check ourselves? Microsoft lists its Solutions Partners publicly. Ask for the partner ID and look it up.
Questions
Common questions.
What should an MSP contract in the UAE include?
A first-response target per priority, an escalation path, the on-site coverage area, the list of included services, the pricing basis, data and account ownership, and exit terms with a handover checklist.
Is a per-user or a per-device price better?
Per user suits offices where each person has a laptop and Microsoft 365. Per device suits sites with shared PCs, servers and network gear. Many UAE contracts mix the two.
How do I check an MSP’s Microsoft partner status?
Ask for its Microsoft partner ID and search the Microsoft partner directory. A Solutions Partner designation is shown there; the old Gold and Silver tiers no longer exist.
Where Missan fits
Missan's honest fit.
Missan Global is a managed IT provider with its head office in Sharjah, serving Dubai and the other emirates on site. We answer all twelve questions in writing before you sign: we reply within one business day, the tenant and admin accounts stay in your name, and exit terms are in the contract. We suit organisations of roughly 20 to several hundred users that want one provider for support, security, Microsoft 365 and backup. If you only need occasional break-fix help, a smaller local technician may be better value.
Find out where your IT stands.
The free IT health check (AED 1,800 value) is a one-session review of your support, security, Microsoft 365 and backups. You get a written list of what to fix first.