Office 365 License Commitment Changes

welcome back to another episode of cappuccino chat this time we're talking about some of the changes that Microsoft made to Office 365 licensing all right this time we're talking about licensing changes that Microsoft did to us last year and the change that they made had to do with the pricing now there was a price increase last year and with that price increase came some changes so previously you could um commit to owning a license for a year like you weren't going month to month if you will and you'd get a discount but you could adjust the number of licenses that you had throughout the year and there was uh you know your bill would go down bill would go up whatever the case would be if you're going up or down on licenses now what Microsoft has done is at the time of starting or renewing your license agreement you are locking in a certain number of licenses that you cannot reduce to get that reduced rate which is basically the old rate they if you wanted to stay on what the old pricing was you had to commit for a year you couldn't change so let's say you got a small business you've got 10 users started your license agreement you got to commit to 10 users for a full year if throughout the year you lose a employee and you want to reduce a license you can't you're still paying for the 10. now there is another licensing method that they brought out and it's a true month to month the problem with that is the price went up on all the licensing so you really have to make sure that you understand you're paying more for it and I would do it for a reason so if you know you're going to be um maybe a seasonal business where you staff up for a couple of months and then for the other parts of the year you staff down you don't need those licenses for whatever reason that might be an instance where this would be uh useful other than that I would say purchase the licenses that you need no more no less I'm looking for two new employees don't get those until you absolutely need to because the nice thing about the licensing things is let's say you bought those 10 licenses at the start for your business and you add employees three four five months in you can add additional licenses and those additional licenses will term out at this as the same as the original 10. so it's not like you're starting a brand new yearly agreement with those two or whatever additional licenses that you have so my recommendation is get just what you need no more no less and then add as you need again the other option is you could get sum or the majority of them as the fixed licenses that you can't adjust so let's say again we go back to that 10 user business I'm going to buy 10 now of those but you know what I got two employees I'm gonna be starting next week month but they're only coming on for a couple of months I'm going to get two month to month for a total of 12 licenses 10 on the annual commitment two on month-to-month month a month you're going to pay more for but you could do that you can mix and match and have a little bit of both but it really needs to pay off because the price jump going month to month is quite a bit it to me it doesn't make sense uh depending on how many of those you might need you're better off just paying through the year on the lower rate and it'll probably work out about the same thing or maybe even save you a little money depending on how many of those licenses you're getting so if you have any questions about your Office 365 licensing or which license to get what's the best licensing term you should have those types of things please reach out to us at the office 760-770-5200