Sale of Watchdog Business

After nearly seventeen years of operation Watchdog will be closing down during July 2016 as our managed internet services contract with the Ministry of Education comes to an end.

A well-established local company named Our School Ltd will be taking over the majority of our other services (see details below), with migration scheduled for the June/July timeframe.  Our School is a leading provider of IT services to schools and businesses, with Rohan Meuli, formerly Managing Director here at Watchdog, now heading up their company.  For our filtered broadband customers, we have an arrangement with Maxnet who will continue to provide filtered internet services.  Maxnet’s broadband charges are lower than ours so you will benefit from moving and they also have the advantage of being part of the M2 Group of companies that includes Orcon, Call Plus and Slingshot.

Customers with MoE-Funded Web Filtering, Email Filtering and Firewall Services

As Watchdog’s contract with the MoE is ending on the 30th of June you will shortly receive communication from the Ministry informing you of your options.  The Network for Learning (N4L) has some services available and we will work with them to ensure a seamless transition for you.

Customers with Chargeable Web Filtering and Firewall Services (separate from filtered broadband)

These services will be coming to an end on the 30th of June.  We are currently working with Our School on how these services can best be maintained for you so we will be in contact about these in the next few weeks.

Customers with Domain Names, MailWatch Email Filtering, TxtStream, Web Hosting and Fortinet Support Services

Our School is able to take over these services for the same monthly cost as you are paying now.  Unless you instruct us otherwise we will automatically hand the services over to them and they will continue to provide them to you as before.   To this end, our Senior Engineer, James Meuli, will be contracted by Our School to assist their existing support team with ongoing technical requirements.

Customers with Mailboxes

Our School can help you migrate your mail to other services such as Gmail or to another POP mail provider such as Maxnet.  We will contact you shortly to give you more information about this.  Watchdog will be able to forward email from your current address to your new address until the end of June.

Customers on Broadband

Maxnet is able to provide broadband services with web filtering (called Net Guardian) similar to those that Watchdog currently provides.  Unless you instruct us otherwise we will automatically set you up with an equivalent Maxnet account based on your current usage on the 20th of June and Maxnet are able to give you assistance to reconfigure your modem/router if required. Maxnet’s broadband prices are as follows (including Net Guardian that is $5.00 per month):

40GB Broadband                                            $56 per month      Excess $5.00 per 2GB
40GB Naked Broadband (no phone)           $85 per month      Excess $5.00 per 2GB
80Gb Broadband                                            $73 per month      Excess $5.00 per 2GB
80GB Naked Broadband (no phone)           $102 per month      Excess $5.00 per 2GB
Unlimited Broadband                                    $104.95 per month
Unlimited Naked Broadband                     $129.95 per month

All prices include GST

More information on Our School is at www.ourschool.co.nz and Maxnet at www.maxnet.co.nz

Thank you to all of customers for your support over the years