To lease new printer or keep the old and just get a maintenance contract.

[Prep017]

Hey all,

Trying to figure out if I should lease new printers or buy out current machines and just have a maintenance contract. Sales guy is telling us that the click charges for maintenance on the old equipment
wont make it feasible. Don't really believe that myself. Just looking to see some opinions or see what others have done in this situation.

 

[kansasquaker]

If it's a Xerox, don't be surprised if the click charges do make it unreasonable to continue running the machine. They raised our click cost 7.5% per year like clockwork and then the last year was 20%. I don't know about any other makes, but Xerox uses that click cost to force you to buy new equipment whether you want it or not. Coincidentally enough, our sales guy happened to be working on a proposal for a new iGen just as I got the 20% increase notice. What luck! So we one upped them and bought a Nexpress instead - couldn't be happier.

 

[Prep017]

Thanks for the input. I am dealing with Canon and find they probably work the same. Try to strongarm you into the new equipment.

 

[MailGuru]

Something to consider -- as technology advances, click charges are becoming cheaper and cheaper. New machine, new technology = lower click charges.

Also, as machines get older and production-fatiqued, they tend to break down more often, requiring more frequent service calls. Since it costs more for your vendor to maintain them, that added expense is passed on to you through click charge increases, regardless of the vendor.

@ kansasquaker - as far as Xerox's annual increase in click charges go, you have to remember to negotiate a locked-in click charge for the life of the lease so that it doesn't increase year after year.

We replaced two Xerox 8000AP's which had locked in click charges with two Xerox Versant 2100's. Because of the new technolgy on the 2100, we are saving about $0.02/click for color over the 8000's. At our volume, that $0.02 per click savings almost wipes out the lease payments, so, it's like getting new machines for free! We are an all-Xerox shop for color. We have two new Xerox Versant 2100's and couldn't be happier.

 

[Craig]

I will echo what MailGuru said. Lock in the click charge for the lease length. They will argue you will be paying slightly more in the beginning, but it is a lot less that what happens at the end. Many sales jerks will try to talk you out of it, since they want that attractive low number at signing.

Also keep in mind that as the machines age the image quality tends to degrade. I saw that when we started to keep color reference sheets on install and randomly do comparison reprints throughout the life of the machine. Just remember to keep those prints in a light free environment. BTW the techs hate it when we pull the prints out and show them why it needs to be fixed. The next thing we will do when we have a new install is have the sales and service manager sign off on the prints as being the quality the machine will produce. This along with a CED is invaluable.

 

[kansasquaker]

To Craig and MailGuru, yes I understand your points. I'd just rather do business with companies that don't make it necessary for me to perpetually defend myself against their contracting practices. I have enough real issues to address. I don't need a hardware vendor creating artificial problems.