Burger King Franchisee Taps PCI Compliance Provider to Secure Multi-Unit Restaurant Environment

A recent study by the Ponemon Institute revealed that only one in four (28%) of smaller companies with 501 to 1,000 employees said they were compliant with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). This percentage is even lower for small franchisees like RIO Management. Referred to BHI Advanced Internet by a fellow Burger King franchisee, RIO Management was concerned with achieving PCI compliance within its restaurants.

Lacking the resources to successfully employ an IT department, the company needed a comprehensive, managed solution that would provide peace of mind for owner, David Cutter. "Our primary reason for contacting BHI was our concern over PCI compliance and the fact that as a small business we do not have anyone capable of filling our technical support needs. We needed an expert."

Utilizing a SecureConnect easyPCI package, Cutter is able to secure his multi-site restaurant environment with the managed firewall, logging and reporting, Virtual Private Network (VPN), quarterly vulnerability scanning, and PCI compliance assistance. "The BHI staff is very thorough and helpful. It's great knowing we can reach out to them for the support we need," says Cutter. Actively working with RIO Management's POS vendor, BHI has helped discover and mitigate compliance issues that would have otherwise gone unnoticed. In addition, BHI's Network Operations Center provides 24x7x365 monitoring and support. Cutter describes his experience with the SecureConnect support team as "Outstanding."

Beyond implementing the SecureConnect solution for compliance and security measures, RIO Management needed to replace its server and implement a better email system as well. BHI Advanced Internet's comprehensive service offerings allowed the franchisee to do all of this under one vendor. "With BHI's ability to provide us with a virtual server, we have enjoyed much better stability and peace of mind knowing things are being managed appropriately," says Cutter.

Franchisees like RIO Management can't be expected to successfully run the front-end of their business and have the time and resources to handle all the back-end issues as well. "We have found BHI to be patient with our lack of understanding of many technical matters, helpful in their explanations and diligent in working through any problems to a successful resolution," says Cutter.