Business email and collaboration
Buying licences is the easy part. What decides success is whether the migration is clean, whether accounts stay under control, and whether the backup can actually be restored. We deliver an email environment that runs, not just a set of credentials.
Email is one of the systems a company can least afford to lose. It carries external identity, internal communication and a large share of business records. The sequence below is: choose platform → migrate → control accounts → secure → be able to restore → maintain.
1. Choosing a platform
| Platform | Best fit | Strengths | Consider |
|---|---|---|---|
| Microsoft 365 | Companies already on Windows, Office and Teams; need desktop Office | Familiar Office experience, mature compliance and admin tooling, AD integration | Many licence tiers — easy to over- or under-buy |
| Google Workspace | Browser-first, mobile, collaboration-heavy | Strong real-time collaboration and search, simple deployment | Test Office file compatibility; different admin mindset |
| Others (on-prem / regional) | Specific compliance or cost constraints, existing on-prem | Cost control, data location choice | Maintenance, backup and security are your responsibility |
We are not tied to one vendor. If you have an existing investment we design around it; if either would work, we advise on headcount, working style and budget.
2. Migration in five steps
Risk concentrates in three places: when the domain is switched, whether history is complete, and mail flow in the days after. The process below exists to close those three gaps.
Inventory
Count accounts, mailbox sizes, shared mailboxes, aliases, distribution groups, calendars, contacts and existing DNS records.
Design
Decide migration order (by department or account), cutover window, parallel running period, and mobile configuration method.
Pre-build
Create accounts, aliases and groups; configure SPF / DKIM / DMARC; run a small pilot.
Migrate
Move mail, calendars and contacts in batches; reconcile counts and spot-check content; resolve failures.
Cutover and verify
Switch MX in a low-traffic window; verify send/receive, mobile, signatures and auto-replies; keep the old system 7–30 days for rollback.
3. Domain and account setup
- Domain and DNS: MX, SPF, DKIM, DMARC, autodiscover and verification records configured together.
- Account structure: a department-based naming convention; avoid nicknames or job titles that cannot be handed over.
- Aliases and shared mailboxes: info@, sales@ etc. owned by a shared mailbox or group, not an individual.
- Distribution groups: department and project groups, to reduce mass emails to dozens of recipients.
- Signatures: a standard template (name, title, phone, address) deployed centrally.
4. Security: four things first
Multi-factor authentication
Admins, finance and executives first, then everyone. This is the single most effective control against account takeover.
Spam and phishing filtering
Enable built-in filtering and attachment sandboxing, then tune policy against real false positives — not just set everything to strict.
DMARC in three stages
Monitor with p=none, then move to quarantine and reject, to stop others sending as your domain.
Permissions and conditional access
Restrict admin accounts by location and device; remove unused licences at offboarding.
Email security is not a product you install. What works is MFA + DMARC + phishing awareness + a fast process for removing a compromised account — all four.
5. Backup and restore
Cloud retention is not backup. Accidental deletion, ransomware encryption or a compromised account deleting mail can all destroy data within the retention window. Business email needs a backup independent of the platform.
- Scope: mail, attachments, calendars, contacts and shared mailboxes — omit one and the restore will be incomplete.
- Retention: daily / weekly / monthly restore points matched to business needs, plus restore drills.
- Granularity: restore a single message, a single mailbox or an entire account — not only a full rollback.
- Access control: backup administrators separate from day-to-day administrators.
6. Offboarding and role changes
Departed-user accounts are the most common email vulnerability: still enabled, password unchanged, mail auto-forwarding to a personal address. The standard pattern is three steps.
| When | Action | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Departure day | Disable sign-in, revoke devices and sessions, remove licence | Cut access immediately |
| T+1 to T+30 | Convert to shared mailbox or set auto-reply and forward to the manager | Business continuity, external replies |
| After T+30 | Export archive, transfer file ownership, delete account | Retain what is needed, stop billing |
7. Ongoing management and support for partners
Once live, the work is routine but constant: joiners, leavers, moves, group changes, licence adjustments and suspicious sign-in investigations. It has to be done, and it has to be recorded.
Managed administration
Account changes, groups and aliases, licence management, sign-in investigation, with a monthly activity record.
Migration and support for IT partners
We run migrations and second-line support under your name, with documentation and handover records, without touching your client relationship.
8. Support hours and scope
Support for email is not "call someone when it breaks". It starts with plain answers: who is available, how fast we respond, and what is out of scope. The figures below are our standard terms; the signed quotation states the numbers for your tier.
| Item | What we do | What you should know |
|---|---|---|
| Support hours | Mon-Fri 09:00-18:00 HKT, excluding public holidays; out-of-hours by arrangement | If you need 24x7 cover, say so at quotation stage so it can be tiered |
| Response time | General enquiries within 1 business day; mailbox or login faults begin within 4 hours | Response means we start work, not that the issue is resolved |
| Resolution time | Assessed per case; upstream Microsoft or Google queues can add delay | We give progress and workarounds - we do not close a ticket by saying "escalated" |
| Excluded | Personal device repair, private mailboxes, unauthorised data recovery, domains we do not manage | Anything outside scope is quoted in writing before work starts |
9. FAQ
Will mail be lost during migration?
No, if the process is right. We build accounts and DNS records first, change only the MX at cutover, and keep the old system running in parallel. After cutover we test external and internal delivery and check junk folders.
Can all historical mail be moved?
Generally yes, subject to source system and volume. IMAP, Exchange and Google Workspace migrations are usually complete; very old or damaged mailboxes are assessed first.
Do we have to use Microsoft 365?
No. If your team works mainly in a browser and collaborates on shared documents, Google Workspace may fit better. We recommend based on actual working style.
Can you read our email?
No. Day-to-day administration requires account and configuration rights, not access to message content. Restores are performed only on the accounts you authorise, with a record kept.
Which licence tier should we buy?
Three questions: do you need desktop Office, do you need Teams or advanced meetings, do you need advanced compliance and security. Most SMEs start with a basic business tier; we explain the differences in the quotation.
Can you migrate only, and we take over afterwards?
Yes. We hand over the account list, DNS settings, administrator guide and caveats. Ad-hoc support remains available.
Have a project in hand? Start with the requirements.
Tell us the purpose, location and timing. We will come back with what is feasible, what it depends on, and an indicative price range.