When an end user wants to connect to a Surgient platform, they should first run the URT (aka User Readiness Test, browser test) to confirm that their local machine can connect to the Surgient lab.
The test can be accessed either by the "See if your Browser is ready?" link on the login page, or they can go directly to http://site.somewhere.com/(VxMS|Platform)/URA/
The top solutions to URT issues are covered under the "available on the help page." link in the first paragraph at the top of the URT test.
If none of the solutions provided in this help link lead to a successful test, it is likely that group policies at the site are not allowing the configuration changes to take effect or a local firewall is blocking the connections to the lab. In either case, you would need to talk to the local IT/Security group to see if you can get the URA server "white listed" (in the case of network problems), or to get an exception to the group policies in place for this connection.