I'm getting 8 new printers installed in our office. The vendor will preconfigure them remotely and take care of the setup for scan-to-email and fax via our existing email account and fax line. They just need the IP and gateway details along with credentials for printer drivers. Additionally, the vendor will be present for the installation. However, our managed service provider (MSP) views this as a project and quoted us $6,000 for their deployment services. I'm curious what questions I should be asking to understand and possibly justify this fee better. Thanks for any insights!
5 Answers
Definitely ask for a clear breakdown of the costs. While 6k is hefty, deploying a few printers can involve quite a bit of work. If it's too much for your budget, consider doing some of the setup in-house.
Honestly, that price seems a bit excessive for the setup you described. We usually charge around $400 per printer for our managed clients, and even then, it's often less work than you'd think. Ask for transparency in the pricing and see if you can negotiate.
You might want to look into automating the client setup as much as possible. It can save a lot of time and reduces the amount of work your MSP would need to do, potentially lowering costs.
As an MSP, I can see where they might be coming from, but $6,000 does sound pretty steep. Printer vendors often do minimal work because they're focused on getting the hardware out. Your MSP might need to dive deeper to ensure everything runs smoothly. It’s reasonable to ask for a detailed cost breakdown to understand their pricing better.
If the job is only going to take a few hours per printer, then I really question the necessity of such a large fee. I’d want to see how they justify needing 30 hours for the deployment of 8 printers. That just doesn’t add up in most scenarios.
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