How do you manage multiple presses with different overage thresholds?

[jdodoubleg]

We have one digital press right now and are looking into getting a second. We asked if we could pool our clicks if we were to get a second press. The answer was no because we lease. So I am wondering what solutions have others done.
Without tracking the clicks on each machine, I can see a scenario where we pay for overages on one machine while the other one still had available included clicks for the billing period.

 

[TJPrinter]

Talk to your vendor about having no base or minimum monthly charges on the second machine. I have never had a service contract that included a minimum and would not want one. Not sure what owning vs leasing has to do with a base charge for the service contract but if you can’t get them to remove it maybe let them know you’re talking to other vendors.

 

[kslight]

I thought significant minimums were a thing of the past. Today, our machine has something like 25000 per month as a minimum, which is easy to hit. If your vendor is trying to give you crazy minimums (what are they trying to set you up with?), shop around. This is absolutely negotiable. It’s also definitely possible for them to pool the minimum across multiple machines, I’ve seen contracts like this also - but may be easier to pull off when you buy multiple machines at once.

Also, you may determine if your meters are actually calculated monthly or quarterly. On my machine the meters are quarterly, which is a lot more friendly for business as we know it goes up and down.

At my old job, we had a fleet of 6 machines with vastly different and honestly very business unfriendly click minimums. I had a spreadsheet, and these machines were quite old and the newer ones were set not to phone home to Xerox. I manually reported the meters, and if we had not hit a minimum on a machine, I would report it as if I did. Then schedule to catch it up next month. This was a hassle, and if you can’t keep track of it you will get caught….but it was part of my job at a failing company so did what I had to do to keep getting paid. It’s also possible that if a technician gets the meters while servicing and reports them, that number could make it back to Xerox accounting, so you don’t want to let it get it too far behind.

 

[jdodoubleg]

I like the idea of going without a minimum. That would reduce the lease payment quite a bit. Our current machine minimum is 30,000 and we always exceed it. Basically, i am trying to take the money i put towards the overages and get a second machine to help with down time and give us more capacity for the busier times.

 

[bill kahny]

30,000 is very low for a ricoh 7210. If you don't have that in a month how do you justify the 2nd lease payment? Your lease payment will go up for a 0 minimum contract. What is your average monthly click count?

 

[jdodoubleg]

30,000 is very low for a ricoh 7210. If you don't have that in a month how do you justify the 2nd lease payment? Your lease payment will go up for a 0 minimum contract. What is your average monthly click count?

30,000 is our minimum. We always exceed 100,000.

 

[kslight]

30,000 is our minimum. We always exceed 100,000.

Then I wouldn’t stress about it, just becomes a job scheduling issue.

For context, I have a Ricoh 7210, and our meters are billed quarterly. Average 90k per month since end of March 2022, with a 25k minimum. Purrs along just fine, for us I haven’t felt a need another machine.

 

[jdodoubleg]

One of the problems I have is I do some inline catalog production. When I get a good size order, the press could be stuck running that job for quite some time.

I have a recurring project that I have to break up into sections because 200 catalogs will take 4 hours and the order is for 1000 catalogs, which is a good 20 hours of press time. Since I only have the one 7210x right now, all my other jobs have to wait.

I've also had times where the press was down and having a second press would be very beneficial for those times.

I am trying to figure out when it is the right time to pull the trigger on a second press as well as how to manage those clicks.

 

[kslight]

One of the problems I have is I do some inline catalog production. When I get a good size order, the press could be stuck running that job for quite some time.

I have a recurring project that I have to break up into sections because 200 catalogs will take 4 hours and the order is for 1000 catalogs, which is a good 20 hours of press time. Since I only have the one 7210x right now, all my other jobs have to wait.

I've also had times where the press was down and having a second press would be very beneficial for those times.

I am trying to figure out when it is the right time to pull the trigger on a second press as well as how to manage those clicks.

Ah that makes sense, why I declined inline finishing on this machine; I don’t like to tie up the printer for finishing work. Got an offline booklet maker (duplo dbm150) instead. Maybe an offline booklet maker would allow you to make due with one press without the huge commitment?

I’d figure out if having a second press is a nice to have or a necessity for your volume. Figure out how much time the machine is down for service per month. Maybe also see what the ship time is (our 7210 took around 9 months to arrive, but that was in 2021), if there are any incentives (Ricoh just announced a new model), or if there are refurb models.