So much of our consumer life has become pay-per-use, or on subscription. This trend is becoming more and more common in the business world too under various names – Pay per use, Xaas (anything as a service), cost per measure, pay per measure and the list goes on.
As a business equipment or services vendor, if you sell a solution that can be measured and you are looking for a competitive advantage in the current climate, you may be able to offer your solution at a per use rate, rather than an up-front capital cost.
Historically, the pay per use model has worked extremely well in copier & printer technology where in-built mechanical or more recently, software-based counters keep track of a copier or printers completed pages. Costs associated with each page are easily measurable as consumables are reasonably consistent per page.
As technology has evolved, so to has our ability to measure usage of equipment that traditionally may not have had a counter but now with advancements in remote monitoring, can be easily measured. It has also opened to more subscription-based solutions that again can be measured on a usage or in the case of software, per seat basis.
The benefits associated with pay per use payment solutions start with the competitive advantage. In today’s economic climate, having the ability to offer your solution with payments aligned to the use of the equipment places you in a strong position when compared against alternatives offering only a fixed monthly rental, no matter how often it is used to derive income or reduce costs in that period. Your position is even stronger if you’re competing against an up-front capital cost.
Pay per use also allows you to manage your service revenue in a straightforward manner for both you and your client. Aligning consumables and maintenance to the use of the equipment, not a periodic timeline, or in the case of consumables, an ad-hoc basis.
When considering your pay per use payment solution options, it’s important you partner with a specialist that can provide you with flexible solutions:
-
- If you provide a fleet of devices, you need the ability to monitor and manage ins and outs of the various devices, to optimise the solution you have in place for your clients.
- If your fleet is deployed across business units or locations, you need the ability to bill at a cost centre level.
- If your service revenue is variable or includes other soft costs on a periodic basis, you need the ability to bill for those costs via the same single bill provided to your client by your payment solution provider. Offering your clients an exceptional experience.
3E Advantage, your volume solution specialist
3E Advantage has invested heavily in its product and system development to provide market-leading volume solutions to our partners in varying industries. We can provide you with solutions that deliver the flexibility required to align your payment solutions to you and your clients desired payment outcome, all delivered using 3E Advantages best of breed billing and collecting services.
Our systems provide you with the transparency required to optimally manage each client and their pay per use solution. Providing you with the tools to deliver the best customer experience, while driving service revenue growth and ensuring you retain your clients for the long term.
If you sell a solution that can be measured and you are looking for a competitive advantage in the current climate, now is the time to speak to 3E Advantage about how our market leading volume solutions can assist you.
Are you completing the billing and collecting for your finance partner?
If you partner with a payment solution provider that requires that you do the billing and collecting for your transactions, you may be interested in an earlier article we prepared.
