If you searched for something like “IT support near me,” “computer help for my business in Richmond” or “local IT company,” you probably don’t care what the industry calls itself. You have a business in the Richmond area, the technology is getting in the way, and you want someone local who’ll fix it and keep it fixed. This article is the plain-English version of what that looks like: what a managed IT provider actually does, what it costs compared with hiring someone, and how to tell a good one from a bad one. It also happens to be the introduction to this blog and to us.
First, who we are
Circuit VA is a small IT company based in Richmond, Virginia. We handle technology for small businesses across the metro: Richmond city, Henrico (Glen Allen, Short Pump, West End), Chesterfield (Midlothian, Chester, Brandermill), Hanover (Mechanicsville, Ashland), Goochland, Powhatan, New Kent, Charles City, and the Tri-Cities of Petersburg, Colonial Heights and Hopewell. If you’re within about 45 minutes of downtown, we come to you; if you’re further out, most of what we do works remotely anyway.
Our clients are the businesses that are too big to have the owner’s nephew do IT and too small to hire an IT department: dental and medical practices, law and accounting firms, contractors, nonprofits, churches, manufacturers and professional offices with roughly 5 to 100 people.
What “managed IT” means (the term you didn’t know to search for)
The industry word is MSP, for managed service provider. All it means is an outside IT company that takes care of your technology on a monthly plan instead of billing you by the hour when something breaks. The difference matters more than it sounds:
- Break-fix (the old way): something dies, you call, someone shows up, you get a bill. Nobody is watching the systems between calls, and the IT company makes more money the more things go wrong.
- Managed IT: one flat monthly price covers the help desk, monitoring of every computer and server, updates and patching, security software, backups, and planning. The IT company makes money when things don’t go wrong, which is the incentive you want.
In practice, managed IT for a Richmond small business includes:
- Help desk and on-site support: a real person answers, usually fixes it remotely in minutes, and drives over when hands are needed.
- Monitoring and maintenance: every PC, Mac and server reports in; failing drives, full disks and missed updates get handled before anyone notices.
- Cybersecurity: multi-factor authentication, endpoint protection, email filtering, staff phishing training, and the documentation your cyber-insurance renewal and HIPAA or client audits ask for.
- Cloud and Microsoft 365: email, files and Teams set up and supported, licensing handled, Azure for the server that still has to exist.
- Backups and recovery: tested backups of servers, PCs and Microsoft 365, with a written plan for the day something gets encrypted or a building floods.
- Network and Wi-Fi: business-grade firewall, switches and access points, installed cleanly and monitored.
- Projects: office moves, server replacements, phone systems, new-hire setups, quoted fixed.
- Websites: because the same team that runs your IT can also build and host the site, and you get one number to call.
Managed IT vs. hiring an IT person: the actual numbers
This is the question every owner is really asking. Here is how it pencils out for a 15-person office in the Richmond market in 2026, using typical local salaries.
| In-house IT employee | Managed IT (Circuit VA) | |
|---|---|---|
| Base cost | $65,000–85,000 salary for one generalist | $125–175 per user per month: about $1,900–2,600 per month for 15 people |
| Hidden costs | Payroll taxes, health insurance and PTO add 25–35%; plus monitoring, backup and security tools they’ll ask you to buy ($300–600/mo) | Tools, monitoring and security stack included |
| Realistic annual total | $95,000–120,000 | $23,000–31,000 |
| Coverage | One person. Out sick, on vacation, or gone to a bigger company after 18 months. | A team, documented systems, and an after-hours emergency line |
| Breadth | One generalist can’t be a security specialist, a network engineer and a Microsoft 365 admin at once | Each of those is somebody’s day job |
| When it’s the right call | 40+ staff, heavy in-house systems, or a need for someone physically present all day | 5 to 100 staff with ordinary business technology |
For most offices under 40 people, the managed route costs a quarter to a third of a hire, and you get a bench instead of a single point of failure. Above that size, the math shifts and many businesses do both: an in-house coordinator with an MSP behind them. We’re happy to tell you when you’ve reached that point.
How to choose a local IT company in Richmond
Whoever you talk to, including us, ask these:
- What happens when I call at 4:45 on a Friday? You want a specific answer with a name, a number and a response time, not “we’ll get back to you.”
- What’s included in the monthly price, and what’s extra? Security tools and backups should be in, not upsells. Hardware and licensing should be itemized so you can see them.
- Who owns the passwords and documentation? You do. Ask to see how they’re stored and how you’d get them if you parted ways.
- Do you actually come on site? Remote fixes most things, but a company that’s never seen your server closet will miss what’s about to fail in it.
- Can you talk to my insurance carrier, my dental software vendor, my accountant’s remote-access tool? Small-business IT is mostly coordination. The provider should be comfortable being the one who makes the calls.
What we’ll publish here
This blog is for owners and office managers, not engineers. Expect plain-English answers to the questions we get every week: what a cyber-insurance form is really asking for, whether you still need a server, which small-office router to buy, how to get rid of the ISP’s equipment fee, what to do in the first hour after someone clicks the wrong link. Most posts will name specific products and prices, because that’s what’s useful, and we’ll keep them updated. Ask anything in the comments; we answer, and the answers help the next Richmond business owner who searches for the same thing.
Want to talk about your office?
A 30-minute call, no slides. Tell us what’s frustrating, we’ll tell you what we’d do and what it would cost, in one flat monthly number. Serving Richmond, Henrico, Chesterfield, Hanover and the surrounding counties.
Frequently asked questions
Do you work with businesses outside Richmond city?
Yes. Most of our clients are in the suburbs: Glen Allen, Short Pump, Midlothian, Mechanicsville, Chester, Ashland, Goochland and Powhatan. We travel across the metro and the Tri-Cities for on-site work, and support anyone in Virginia remotely.
Is managed IT only for big companies?
No. Our smallest plans are for offices of about five people, starting at $750 a month. The point of managed IT is that a five-person law firm gets the same monitoring, security and backups a fifty-person firm does, priced per person.
Do you fix home computers or do one-off repairs?
Not as a rule. We focus on businesses on a monthly plan, because that’s how we can promise response times. One-time projects for businesses, such as an office move or a server replacement, are quoted fixed up front.
Do you support Macs as well as Windows?
Yes. Most offices are Windows with a few Macs; design, marketing and some medical practices are the other way round. Both are covered under the same plan.
What does it cost to switch from our current IT company?
Usually nothing beyond the first month. We handle the handover: collecting documentation and passwords, moving monitoring and backup to our tools, and reviewing security settings. Most switches take two to three weeks with no downtime for staff.
How fast do you respond?
During business hours (Monday to Friday, 8:30 to 5:00) most tickets get a human reply within 30 minutes and outages are worked immediately. Managed clients have an after-hours emergency line for anything that stops the business.
