When it comes to higher education, controlling operational costs is a never-ending battle. But the good news is it’s a battle we can win.
One area that often flies under the radar is printing. With dozens of departments, faculties, and research groups relying on networked printers every day, unmanaged print activity can quickly eat up your budget. This is where departmental chargebacks and smart print tracking come in. With these tools, universities and colleges can bring visibility and accountability to print costs across campus. The dream, right?
Define print cost centers by department
First things first, you need to establish print cost centers at the departmental level. By associating each print job with a specific department, faculty, or project code finance teams can attribute costs accurately, and fairly. This not only supports transparent budgeting, but it also encourages departments to take ownership of their printing behavior. Whether it’s the science lab printing giant color posters, or the history department generating bulk, War and Peace-style course readers, cost visibility always drives smarter decisions.
Benchmark usage with print auditing
Once your print cost centers are in place, regular print auditing is essential. Print auditing tools analyze who is printing, how much they’re printing, and in what formats across every single department. With this data, sysadmins can quickly benchmark usage patterns, or spot inefficiencies. For example, if two departments with similar staff counts show vastly different print volumes, you can investigate to see whether underprinting or overprinting is the issue (hint: it’s always overprinting).
Automate chargebacks with recovery tools
Manual reconciliation of print costs is time-consuming and error-prone. Not to mention a massive pain. That’s where automated print cost recovery tools come in. These systems track print activity in real time and automatically assign costs to the correct department, based on predefined rules. Monthly or quarterly chargeback reports can then be generated with minimal effort, making sure each unit pays its fair share.
Visualize data with dashboards
A centralized print tracking dashboard gives finance and IT teams a bird’s-eye view of print activity campus-wide. Not only that, but visualizing data in charts and graphs helps communicate trends and outliers clearly to other, less tech-savvy stakeholders. Dashboards can show usage spikes, quota overruns, or shifts in color printing volume – enabling proactive responses, rather than reactive clean-up. Huge time-saver.
Set quotas to encourage accountability
Beyond tracking and charging back, setting departmental print quotas adds a handy layer of proactive control. Each department gets allocated a monthly or annual print limit based on historical use or budget. When quotas are approached or exceeded, automated alerts can trigger internal reviews or a request for budget justification. This helps prevent unchecked overuse and reinforces the connection between behavior and cost, a link some people still struggle with.
Track color vs. black-and-white use
If you’ve ever been in charge of procurement, you’ll know that color printing is significantly more expensive than black-and-white (mono) printing. By breaking down print activity into color vs. black and white usage , universities can refine departmental budgets and nudge users toward more cost-effective choices. Some departments may justify higher color volumes (marketing and design spring to mind), while others can be gently steered toward grayscale defaults, without too many tantrums.
Link costs to grants and projects
In research-intensive environments, print activity often links directly to grant-funded work. But that’s okay. Aligning print cost recovery with project codes or grant accounts helps ensure accurate reporting and compliance. This is particularly useful during audits, or when applying for future funding, as departments can clearly demonstrate how their printing supported specific research objectives.
Enable cross-department reporting
Remember, it’s not just about tracking print behavior in isolation. Cross-department comparisons can be useful too; they often identify inefficiencies and highlight best practices. For example, if one faculty has significantly shrunk their print volume through digital workflows, others can learn from that success. Publicly sharing usage stats can also foster friendly competition, further incentivizing good print behavior.
Forecast with predictive analytics
Looking ahead to the murky waters of AI, predictive analytics can play a major role in managing your print costs. By analyzing historical data and usage trends, universities can forecast future printing needs and budget accordingly. This allows for smarter procurement decisions, such as when to upgrade printers, order supplies, or renegotiate managed print service contracts. If you’re after more info on this topic, we’ve covered the field of AI printing in more detail over here .
Stay aligned with your sustainability goals
Environmental responsibility is a growing priority across campuses. Heck, across the world. Integrating print tracking into broader sustainability efforts allows schools to measure their impact in real terms: trees saved, emissions avoided, and waste reduced. The kind of stuff that looks good on an ESG report. Charging departments for their print usage also encourages them to adopt greener habits or digital alternatives, aligning budget control with campus-wide sustainability goals.
