Help Desk Outsourcing: A Practical Guide to an Outsourced Help Desk

Short answer: help desk outsourcing hands your users' everyday IT requests to an outside team that works in your tools and follows your rules. With TechSupport One, an outsourced help desk seat on one 8-hour shift is US$999 per month, and a seat covered 24/7 is US$3,999 per month (excluding VAT, 3-month minimum, paid in advance). Behind each seat is an IT company in the Philippines operating since 2002, not a lone freelancer.

What help desk outsourcing is

An IT help desk is the first stop for your users when something breaks or they need access to something. Help desk outsourcing means a specialist provider runs that first stop for you. Users still email, chat or call for help. The difference is who picks up, logs the ticket, fixes the issue or escalates it.

Most companies outsource their help desk for one of three reasons:

1. They have no IT team, and the founder or office manager has become the help desk.
2. They have a small IT team that is buried in tickets and cannot get to projects.
3. They need hours they cannot staff, such as nights, weekends or another continent's business day.

An outsourced help desk solves all three by turning IT support into a fixed monthly service with defined coverage hours.

What an outsourced help desk covers

A good outsourced help desk handles the everyday L1 and L2 work that keeps people productive:

• User and device support: laptops, desktops, printers, peripherals and mobile devices.
• Account, email and access requests: new starters and leavers, password resets, mailbox and group changes, permissions.
• Remote troubleshooting: software installs and updates, application errors, VPN and connectivity issues.
• Ticket handling: logging, triage, prioritising, updating users and closing tickets.
• Documentation: procedures and known fixes recorded in your tools, so knowledge stays with your business.
• Escalation: anything beyond the help desk goes to engineers, either the provider's or your own.

At TechSupport One, escalations go directly to our engineers, who handle networks, servers and systems as part of our managed IT services. If you also need your networks and servers watched overnight, see NOC outsourcing.

Help desk outsourcing models

There is no single way to outsource a help desk. The common models are:

Shared pool (per ticket or per user)

A large team answers tickets for many clients. It is often priced per ticket or per user. It can work for very simple, high-volume requests, but the people answering rarely learn your environment in depth.

Covered seat (per seat, per shift)

You pay for a seat that is staffed for an agreed shift or around the clock. The team learns your tools, users and runbooks. This is how TechSupport One works: you buy coverage, and our team makes sure the seat is always covered, including absences and turnover.

Fully managed IT

The provider runs the help desk and the IT behind it, such as networks, servers and security. This suits companies that want to hand over IT entirely. See our managed IT services.

White-label for MSPs

A managed service provider uses an outside help desk under its own brand, often for after-hours or overflow tickets. See our white-label help desk for MSPs.

What it costs

Pricing varies a lot between providers. Some publish prices; many large providers quote only after a long sales process. TechSupport One publishes its prices:

Simple monthly pricing

A full IT company behind every seat, priced close to a virtual assistant. All prices in US dollars per month, excluding VAT. Minimum term 3 months, paid in advance.

One seat, one shift

US$999 per month

One seat covered for one 8-hour shift in your time zone, backed by our team and engineers.

One seat covered 24/7

US$3,999 per month

Your seat is covered around the clock, every day, with shift handovers and team backup handled by us.

Book a 15-min call

What the price includes: your covered seat, team backup for absences, supervision by a team lead and escalation to our engineers. Projects such as migrations or new systems are quoted separately before any work starts.

When you compare quotes, compare like with like:

• Coverage hours: is the quote for one shift, business hours only, or 24/7?
• Scope: L1 only, or L1 and L2 with escalation to engineers?
• Continuity: who covers sick days, leave and resignations?
• Minimum term and payment: our minimum is 3 months, paid in advance.
• Hidden extras: overtime, after-hours surcharges or per-ticket fees. Our fees are fixed, with no hidden costs.

24/7 coverage and time zones

A help desk is only useful when your users are working. A Philippine team working nights covers the US business day, and our team works 24/7, so we can match the US, Canada, the UK, Europe or Australia.

You can start with one seat on the 8-hour shift that matters most, for example your business day or your overnight window, and add shifts later. If your users work around the clock, a seat covered 24/7 is US$3,999 per month. Compare that with hiring enough local staff to cover every hour of every day, including holidays and sick days.

Outsourced help desk vs in-house vs virtual assistant

	In-house hire	Virtual assistant	TechSupport One outsourced help desk
Focus	IT, if you hire well	General admin, some IT	IT help desk and IT support
Cover for sick days and turnover	Gaps	None	Seat stays covered by our team
24/7	Several hires	Rarely	Yes, US$3,999 per seat per month
Escalation	Depends on the person	Limited	Direct to our engineers
Price	Salary, benefits and overhead	Low	From US$999 per seat per month

A virtual assistant is one person with general skills. An in-house hire can be excellent but leaves you exposed when that person is away or leaves. A covered seat from an IT company sits between them: IT specialists, backed by a team, priced close to a VA.

When help desk outsourcing makes sense

• Tickets are waiting overnight or over weekends.
• Your IT person spends the day on password resets instead of projects.
• You are growing faster than you can hire.
• You are an MSP turning away clients because you cannot staff after-hours support.
• You have users across several time zones.

It may not fit if your help desk work is mostly hands-on in a location we do not serve. We provide onsite support in the Philippines through our teams in Manila, Cebu, Iloilo and Davao; see onsite support in the Philippines.

How to choose a help desk outsourcing provider

Use this checklist when you talk to providers:

1. Do they do IT work themselves, or only answer calls and pass tickets on?
2. Can you start with one seat and grow, or is there a large minimum?
3. Are prices published and fixed?
4. Who covers absences, and who replaces staff who leave?
5. Can you reach an engineer directly when an issue needs one?
6. Will they work in your tools and follow your escalation rules?
7. Will they sign an NDA and work within your access controls?
8. How long have they been in business, and how many clients have they served?

For a wider look at outsourcing to the Philippines, including how an IT specialist compares with a large BPO, read our offshore IT support guide.

How onboarding works

1. Book a 15-minute call. Tell us your users, hours, tools and common ticket types.
2. Scope and proposal. We agree the scope, coverage hours and service levels up front, on a fixed monthly fee.
3. Access and setup. You grant access to your ticketing and remote tools under your own access controls, and we document procedures and escalation rules.
4. Go live. Your seat starts answering on the agreed shift or 24/7.
5. Review and grow. We review ticket trends with you and adjust shifts or seats.

See the full service on our outsourced help desk page, or read how it works.

Security and privacy

• We sign NDAs before onboarding.
• We work inside your tools under your access controls, so you grant and revoke access.
• We comply with the Philippine Data Privacy Act of 2012.
• Our personnel are constantly trained and kept up to date.

Frequently asked questions

What is help desk outsourcing?

Help desk outsourcing means an outside team answers your users' IT requests, such as password resets, account changes, device problems and software issues, usually in your own ticketing system and under agreed service levels.

How much does an outsourced help desk cost?

With TechSupport One, one seat on one 8-hour shift is US$999 per month and one seat covered 24/7 is US$3,999 per month, excluding VAT, with a 3-month minimum paid in advance.

Can an outsourced help desk cover 24/7?

Yes. Our team works 24/7, so we can cover a single shift that matches your time zone, or cover a seat around the clock.

Will the same person answer every ticket?

Not necessarily. You buy a covered seat, not a named individual. Our team covers the seat across shifts, absences and turnover, with a team lead overseeing quality.

Can MSPs outsource their help desk white-label?

Yes. We answer under your brand, work in your ticketing and remote tools and escalate the way you define, as after-hours or overflow cover.

Will you sign an NDA?

Yes. We sign NDAs before onboarding, work within your access controls and tools, and comply with the Philippine Data Privacy Act of 2012.