When calculating your business operational expenses, you might be surprised how much money you spend on print consumables. You’re not alone – many business owners often overlook the cost of printing.
As a result, that little gray box you use to print invoices, contracts, and the occasional cat picture can quickly become a bottomless drain.
One of the main benefits of print management software is regimenting print charging for your office. It’s a strategy that controls your printing volume based on real-world costs.
In this guide, we’ll explain how print charging works and why it’s essential for reducing business costs. We’ll also cover different methods to recover these expenses effectively across your organization, no matter the industry.
What exactly is print charging?
Printing a single page doesn’t cost much, but uncontrolled copy costs add up fast with paper, ink, toner, and maintenance costs involved. If your business has no management powers, single-sided full-color printing can snowball out of control.
Print charging automatically assigns a specific cost to every single print job you process, and this cost can be attributed to a specific user, client, or department.
Allocation provides the tools you need to recover these costs so nobody is overusing your resources and printing a novel worth of paper each day.
How to charge for printing
Simple cost per page methods
The most common way to charge is by calculating the cost of each individual page, and charging the user or department based on the number of sheets they’ve printed. This is best for businesses with high volumes that need accurate operational reporting.
Flat fees and tiered pricing
A flat fee involves charging a fixed amount for every print job, regardless of size. This works well for low-volume environments where clients prefer a predictable rate. Tiered pricing allows for scalability by offering discounts as printing volumes increase over time.
Charging based on users or projects
Some workplaces charge based specifically on individual end-user habits. User-based charging assigns a higher rate for infrequent printing and lower rates for prolific users. This encourages everyone to rethink that sneaky cat picture before they hit the print button.
Project-based charging is useful when multiple users contribute to a single initiative. Your organization sets a specific cost for each work project or departmental initiative.
This is a common strategy in legal firms where costs must be accurately billed back to clients.
Using print quotas and limits
Think of print quotas and print limits as a printing budget or pocket money for your staff. It prompts users to think before they print because they know their access isn’t limitless. You can set these limits by total cost or by a specific number of pages.
Currency-based quotas empower users to choose exactly how they want to use their allowance. Built-in reports can help you calculate a reasonable limit for different departments. This is a great way to improve user experience while maintaining financial control over your fleet.
Shared accounts for professional billing
Shared accounts are commonly used in professional organizations to bill clients or projects for printing costs. In higher education, staff members often use shared accounts to manage budgets for different faculties. This allows for fair allocation of costs across multiple departments or cost centers.
Streamlining with payment gateways
A “pay for print” system requires users to cover their own costs with real money. You can integrate popular gateways like PayPal or Authorized.net to streamline these transactions. Users can conveniently load their accounts with credit cards (or even cash, if you’re keeping it 3D) through kiosks.
Controlling your total printing spend
Whether you’re in a school, law firm, or a coworking space, print charging helps plug the financial drain. By assigning costs to each job, you ensure your organization isn’t losing money on basic operations. All your operational expenses are accounted for and recovered where possible.
Develop a print charging system that works for your business and helps you to manage your printing costs effectively.
