I was a user of PC Repair Tracker for almost a decade.
In short: I would say that yes, overall, PCRT is reliable for long term use.
PCRT is good for small shops, but you can outgrow it and wish for more integration between other vendors and services, in the future.
You will need to host PCRT on a webserver. This is fine, but if you also host it on the same webserver as your Website - it may pose some issues. This was the problem I continually ran into, and what ultimately made me switch as I grew my business.
I was running into PHP issues - where my Website and plugins needed a "newest" version of PHP - but PCRT wouldn't run with the newest version of PHP... it was great when it worked, not so great to wake up on a random morning to find that PCRT wouldn't load any longer. I also ran into some issues with various Website Plugins that didn't play well with PCRT - and caused it to not display at all, not display correctly, or have other strange issues. Sometimes a plugin worked fine with PCRT from one day to the next until an update was received for the plugin - which broke PCRT. After a while, it was untenable to try and troubleshoot what the problem was on my own - and be told by the PCRT developer that it must be "something else".
Support was great when I first started with PCRT - but gradually got worse to none-at-all towards the end. I can't speak to whether it has gotten better or not.
It looks like PCRT has not been updated in some time, at this point (2021, V9). So, I'd be a bit concerned with that, IMO.
TLDR: Run PCRT on its OWN webserver - and not on the same webserver as the one that you host your website or other services. This can incur additional hosting and Domain costs, so be sure to factor in those costs against a SaaS RMM solution like Syncro, RepairTech, Kaseya, etc.
The PCRT software is solid. The database never "blew up" and the software overall worked well when I used it, so I don't have concerns about the software in general. I do have concerns about the software's security (resilience against hacking, etc.) as it was on older PHP.
Support for the software, when I left, was moderate to poor - taking days or even a week to get up and running again with email support only. The software seems to be developed and supported by one guy - so, I imagine he's quite busy with his PCRT client base and support tickets, which led to longer support resolutions.
I applaud the developer of PCRT for his software - but it feels like he never wanted to "grow" himself into a full-solution.
