3 September 2026LANTEK Computers
You have asked three providers for a quote and they have arrived in three different shapes. One is per user, one is per device, one is a single figure with no working shown. One includes something called endpoint protection, another calls it managed antivirus, and you cannot tell whether those are the same thing.
This is not you missing something obvious. There is no standard format, and the differences are usually genuine rather than presentational. Here is how to get them onto a comparable footing.
First, work out what unit you are being charged in
Per user means each person, regardless of how many devices they use. Good if staff have a laptop and a desktop and a phone. Worse if you have many machines shared between few people.
Per device means each machine. Good if a small number of people each use one machine. Expensive if everybody has three.
A flat monthly fee is simple to budget and impossible to compare, and it becomes an argument the moment you grow.
Neither of the first two is dishonest. But they produce very different numbers for the same business, so before comparing anything, count both for yourself: how many people, and how many machines that would need to be managed, including the ones in the workshop and the one at reception that three people share.
Then apply each provider’s rate to your own counts. A quote that looked cheaper per unit frequently is not once it meets your actual shape.
Then find the things that are excluded
This is where nearly all of the difference lives. Go through each quote looking specifically for these, and where a quote is silent, ask.
On-site visits. Included, capped, or billed? If billed, at what rate, with what minimum, and is travel charged? A quote that is cheaper monthly but bills every visit at a minimum of two hours plus travel can easily be the more expensive one.
Out of hours. What are the stated hours, what happens outside them, and at what rate? Also: is an emergency at seven in the evening out of hours?
Project work. Reasonably excluded, but establish where the line is. Is a new starter’s machine set up a project or business as usual? Is moving one person to a new desk?
Third party software support. When the accounting package misbehaves, will they help, and is that inside the fee?
Backup, and specifically restores. Backup is usually included. Restores are sometimes billed. Ask, because the day you need a restore is a bad day to discover a rate.
Licences. Often not included and often the largest line. Ask whether the quote assumes licences you already hold, and whether the same edition.
Onboarding. A one-off cost to take you on. Frequently omitted from the headline and legitimate in itself. Just get it stated.
Then look for the things that grow
A quote is a photograph of your business today.
Annual increases. Is there a stated escalation, and what is it linked to? A contract with no stated mechanism will still increase; you just will not know how.
What happens when you add people. At the same rate, or at whatever the rate is then?
Currency exposure. Some underlying products are priced in dollars. That is nobody’s fault and it is worth knowing which lines are exposed, because those are the ones that move independently of your provider.
Then read the term and the exit
Minimum term, notice period, and what you get on the way out.
The exit is the part people never read and always need. Does the documentation come to you? Do the accounts transfer? Is there an offboarding fee? A provider confident in their service does not need a long lock-in, and a long minimum term with a punitive exit is information about how they expect the relationship to go.
The single most important question is not in the quote at all: who will own the domain, the tenant and the hosting? The answer must be you. Changing provider is straightforward when it is and difficult when it is not.
A way to compare them fairly
Build one table yourself rather than comparing their documents.
Down the side: monthly fee at your real counts, onboarding, estimated on-site visits per year at their rate, out of hours allowance, licences, restores, and the escalation. Across the top: the three providers. Fill in the gaps by asking, and note which provider had to be asked, because that is data too.
Then add a row for total first year and a row for total third year. The rankings often swap between those two rows, and the third year is the one you will actually live in.
Two things that should make you cautious
A quote materially below the others. Not automatically wrong, but find out why. Usually it is a narrower scope, a longer response commitment, or fewer people behind it. Ask what is not included, and if the answer is that everything is included, ask again more specifically.
Unlimited anything. Ask what it excludes, and ask for the reasonable use definition in writing. The clause exists; the question is whether you get to read it before signing.
What the quote cannot tell you
Whether they are any good. For that, ask the questions in what a managed IT service should include and in five questions worth asking your IT provider. Ask for two references from businesses your size and telephone them. Ask what the last thing they fixed before the client noticed was.
A cheaper quote from a provider who does not notice things is not cheaper.
Our plans are set out on Service Plans, and what sits behind them on Managed IT Services. If you have quotes in front of you and want a straight read on what they actually say, send them to us. We will tell you where the gaps are even where the answer is that somebody else’s is the better fit.