Did mHelpDesk's prices go up???

[hmig89]

After all is said and done I'm happy overall with being able to keep the pricing. Support reply is fast as said here before.

 

[PCSComputerGuy]

I feel the need to chime in here, seeing and I am a one man band.

"How can a one man band afford this" is the wrong question that is being asked. Even at $150 per month I would still say "How can a one mand band afford to not have this"

I have found that not only has mHelpdesk helped me increase my profits(things not falling through the cracks, as well as helping with the cross sell) but it has also saved me a HUGE amount of time... I would venture to say 7-10 hours a month...at my rate of $70/hr mhelpdesk allows me to make an additional $500 to $700 a month by filling my old "paperwork time" with client appointments.

 

[DocGreen]

I feel the need to chime in here, seeing and I am a one man band.

"How can a one man band afford this" is the wrong question that is being asked. Even at $150 per month I would still say "How can a one mand band afford to not have this"

I have found that not only has mHelpdesk helped me increase my profits(things not falling through the cracks, as well as helping with the cross sell) but it has also saved me a HUGE amount of time... I would venture to say 7-10 hours a month...at my rate of $70/hr mhelpdesk allows me to make an additional $500 to $700 a month by filling my old "paperwork time" with client appointments.

Really it all depends on your workload... not the size of your business. A one-man-band repair shop could be anything from the guy who takes on one client a week, to the guy who takes on several clients a day.

 

[TechLady]

Really it all depends on your workload... not the size of your business. A one-man-band repair shop could be anything from the guy who takes on one client a week, to the guy who takes on several clients a day.

Yes, this is key. My workload can vary GREATLY depending on what is going on that month.

But I would like to add I do think Vincent has an excellent product. mHelpdesk actually changed my business completely...I went from being a scattered tornado of lost papers and post-it notes (and never-collected invoices) to a sensible and organized system that is 1000% more sane and dignified than my old system ever was.

Also, Vincent's pricing has NOTHING on Autotask. I laugh at the amount my competition across town spent on that system. They're not any bigger and it's a laughably ill-suited system for businesses our size. (Though I can't say it's the first dumb decision they've ever made).

And I have never once gotten the sense that Vincent is anything but honest and forthright. So yes...expensive now...but it is a very good product!

 

[nlinecomputers]

While I respect Vincent's business actions, I am concerned by them.

There is a risk with using a cloud provider, one that this has highlighted.

They can be there one day and gone the next.

Two price changes in less then a year doesn't deliver confidence to me that mHelpDesk is doing well. I could be misinterpreting that and I certainly don't expect him to state to world how he is doing but to me it is a bad sign. He wouldn't be raising his minimum price per client if his minimum price was making ends meet.

He has promised to honor the price level he set and I take him for his word. However, economics, might not allow him to keep that word because if it comes between a choice of cutting unprofitable clients or bankruptcy I get cut off either way. Because of this I have to wonder if using a cloud provider is a good idea. If it is MY server I control the data. Right now I don't and that has me a bit worried.

Hopefully his new pricing model will be so successful he can carry the load of us small fry shops.

 

[Knightsman]

I honestly think they are probably doing fine.

To me its one of two things. Either they are getting greedy

Or

As he was saying they are going to make all of these improvements. From that he shouldn't raise prices on his customers to offset the cost of new development. He should bring in an investor. Just my opinion. Could be way off base.

 

[mhelpdesk]

@nline your statements couldn't be further from the truth. We are growing faster in the first few months of 2013 than we have in all our history. In addition to a couple new key hires, we've also added a full time dev team to work exclusively on our Android and iOS apps. We are also releasing a web API to integrate several larger clients as we push forward for the rest of the year.

The math behind why we are doing this is simple.

The average one-man shop purchases a Lite plan for $19 and applies their to discount effectively paying only $14 per month

The average tech/dev at mHelpdesk makes $100 per hour.

Upon sigup, the average one-man shop will get 1 hour of tech assistance to answer questions and get everything up and running. Within the first month the one-man shop will submit another 4 tech support requests at 15 minutes each. Throught the year the one-man shop will require 1-2 Quickbooks support help at 15 minutes each.

Total that's 2 hours of tech time not including QB assistance.

One man shop pays $168 for the entire year.
MHelpdesk pays $200 to support that one man shop.

While the one man shop is getting a great deal, it doesn't help us provide outstanding service and continue product development aggressively.

Hope the math I've laid out clears everything up.

 

[cmonova]

That saga continues...

Here is my 2 cents worth and I don't even use mHelpdesk.....I have talked with Vincent numerous times about things and they are a Preferred Vendor of the Association and I am well aware of how great a product they have.

I've setup mHelpdesk but am set in my ways but that is not to say how nice the product is and the support I received just in my barrage of questions. The pricing is what it is....When you do a comparison of all the products out there and what they bring to the table Vincent and his team has put together a very robust package and continually adds to it.

I don't like to nickle dime things or try to same a few dollars on things especially if I look at a product/service and it's exactly what I want i.e. I own a Bomgar (big $$$$)..

People don't like change and that is understandable but in reality it happens and you go on...I like Vincent and I see the total support they provide and to me that makes it worth the money.

 

[angry_geek]

This has been beaten into the ground. Vincent has already responded with assurances to honor prices for trial users and even give a TN discount. It's been repeated multiple times.

If you can't afford the product, go to something else; there are cheaper alternatives. They may not be as good, but they're cheaper. If you feel froggy, develop your own. I would ask, though, that you think about something before griping about this anymore. How many of us have raised our prices over the years to cut dead weight?

This reminds me of all the griping done when companies raise their rates due to rising costs of doing business. Everyone seems to think businesses should just give their products and services away, unless it's their own business suffering with rising costs. Then it's perfectly ok to raise rates, charge mileage fees, etc.

 

[Knightsman]

My response to that is make it $40 month for the lite. Is it not the one man shows that got your business going on the first place?

If your paying your dev $100 hr to complete a project, why not use an investor to cover that cost until the project is complete?

 

[nlinecomputers]

@nline your statements couldn't be further from the truth. We are growing faster in the first few months of 2013 than we have in all our history. In addition to a couple new key hires, we've also added a full time dev team to work exclusively on our Android and iOS apps. We are also releasing a web API to integrate several larger clients as we push forward for the rest of the year.

The math behind why we are doing this is simple.

The average one-man shop purchases a Lite plan for $19 and applies their to discount effectively paying only $14 per month

The average tech/dev at mHelpdesk makes $100 per hour.

Upon sigup, the average one-man shop will get 1 hour of tech assistance to answer questions and get everything up and running. Within the first month the one-man shop will submit another 4 tech support requests at 15 minutes each. Throught the year the one-man shop will require 1-2 Quickbooks support help at 15 minutes each.

Total that's 2 hours of tech time not including QB assistance.

One man shop pays $168 for the entire year.
MHelpdesk pays $200 to support that one man shop.

While the one man shop is getting a great deal, it doesn't make sense for us.

Hope the math I've laid out clears everything up.

Yes it confirms what I was thinking. I've seen this happen with other providers. You provide an excellent product. It is just a shame that us small shops are too small a client to make it profitable for you. And I do appreciate your candor and hope this works out for you.

 

[carrcomp]

My response to that is make it $40 month for the lite. Is it not the one man shows that got your business going on the first place?

If your paying your dev $100 hr to complete a project, why not use an investor to cover that cost until the project is complete?

That's not what we said.

What is said is that on average the support costs to support someone that starts up an account in the first couple of months is 200$, and he hasn't taken the support for Quickbooks integration into account yet.

I think he made the right call and at the rates he is charging, they are quite fair.

 

[Knightsman]

This has been beaten into the ground. Vincent has already responded with assurances to honor prices for trial users and even give a TN discount. It's been repeated multiple times.

If you can't afford the product, go to something else; there are cheaper alternatives. They may not be as good, but they're cheaper. If you feel froggy, develop your own. I would ask, though, that you think about something before griping about this anymore. How many of us have raised our prices over the years to cut dead weight?

This reminds me of all the griping done when companies raise their rates due to rising costs of doing business. Everyone seems to think businesses should just give their products and services away, unless it's their own business suffering with rising costs. Then it's perfectly ok to raise rates, charge mileage fees, etc.

I think its certainly reasonable to grip about a product, a product many of us made business plans to incorporate mhelpdesk into a budget. If it went up $10 or $20 I'd be ok with that, but $20 to $150 to be able to utilize more than one license is a huge difference. This would be like oil change shops upping their pricing from $30 oil change to $150. We all need it, but then only the big guys could afford it.

You can come on here and say if you cant afford it find something else. Sure, lets all forget about the time, effort and money we already put into the product to be able to utilize it. Oh well, little guys always get ****** on.

 

[carrcomp]

I think its certainly reasonable to grip about a product, a product many of us made business plans to incorporate mhelpdesk into a budget. If it went up $10 or $20 I'd be ok with that, but $20 to $150 to be able to utilize more than one license is a huge difference. This would be like oil change shops upping their pricing from $30 oil change to $150. We all need it, but then only the big guys could afford it.

You can come on here and say if you cant afford it find something else. Sure, lets all forget about the time, effort and money we already put into the product to be able to utilize it. Oh well, little guys always get ****** on.

Except that if you've already started using it your price didn't change.

Unless you made a budget based on a product you haven't purchased yet. If that's the case, then that's bad planning if you can't repurpose now.

 

[angry_geek]

I think its certainly reasonable to grip about a product, a product many of us made business plans to incorporate mhelpdesk into a budget. If it went up $10 or $20 I'd be ok with that, but $20 to $150 to be able to utilize more than one license is a huge difference. This would be like oil change shops upping their pricing from $30 oil change to $150. We all need it, but then only the big guys could afford it.

You can come on here and say if you cant afford it find something else. Sure, lets all forget about the time, effort and money we already put into the product to be able to utilize it. Oh well, little guys always get ****** on.

Yes, I came on here and said that. If you can't afford the mercedes, get the taurus. If you were planning the cost of mhelpdesk into your budget without even running the trial, then how is that anyone's fault but your own? You said you already put "time, effort and money" into the product. This would tell me you're running the trial and, therefore, are not affected by the increase. It's not the company's fault for someone not being able to afford their product. They upped their rates, drastically, I'll give you that. However, it's their right to do so. It's your right to take your business somewhere else if you want. I just don't understand what appears to be some deep-seated anger towards them. They're not running a charity; they're in business to make money. If something isn't profitable for them, they either have to change it or dump it. Or is this not how you also do business?


Edit: As for your oil change analogy, you're wrong. We don't all need this software. You should be able to run a shop just fine with a couple of pens and some notebooks. It's definitely not as efficient, but it got most of us by for years as we were starting out in this industry. I remember when I started doing my invoicing with excel. Wow! (Actually, I still print a few that way.)

 

[DocGreen]

The number of people going off the deep end about this is really starting to blow my mind... I started this thread with a valid concern: my existing pricing was changed. Vincent has fixed the problem for me and has confirmed publicly that existing customers *including trials* will not be affected, and original rates will be honored. He also confirmed that existing customers can continue along the original upgrade path, and won't ever be forced to jump from the $20 plan to the $150 plan. And as if that wasn't enough, He created a whole new plan specifically for TN members who are not yet customers, so they could still join at the original rates!

What in Gods name are you people still bitching about?? Vincent has bent over backwards for us!

Nobody on this forum should be crying about how they can't afford the new rates, because the new rates don't apply to ANY OF US! Its that simple! Jesus Christ, its like you guys aren't reading the entire thread... you're just picking and choosing what you want to see, then posting your own rant based on incomplete information.

This is just getting to be exhausting. At this point, I wish mHelpDesk would just post a new thread with an announcement of the new prices, and information about the TN plan so that martyn could delete this thread and sticky the announcement.

 

[K007]

T
What in Gods name are you people still bitching about??

Ha ha!
You may be good at what you're doing, but it seems you don't have a clue what a spark can do in a pool of gasoline

Edit:
I understand you feel remorse.. but no worries, it will pass.

 

[Knightsman]

I'm gripping because he forgot where he came from, and none of the responses he gave show any concern at all for that.

I've used mhelpdesk for about almost a year. We stopped using them for a while and started again. We use it for projects, we go for a month or so and never use it, but will constantly for 3 weeks. I had a budget planned out to upgrade to two users next month, and slowly move to the full suite after 1 yr. A budget i just submitted to my own investor. It will make me look like a complete fool to go back and change it that much. I still manage the "little guys" for cheap because they got me to where I am now. I just trained a guy on it, now that time is wasted.

And the oil metaphor was meaning we all need management software of some sort. Same as we all need to change our oil.

We also don't pay the discounted rate, we pay $20 month, so he isn't losing money on us. I highly doubt I'm the only one.

 

[angry_geek]

He didn't forget where he came from. He wants to grow his company. You can't do that without change. If that means cutting off a certain segment that isn't profitable, then so be it. I started out charging $25/hour. I have definitely lost a good deal of those original customers, and I absolutely do not regret it.

He has already promised the same rates to current customers. What more do you want? Are you implying he should maintain the same business model forever and ignore growth potential just to suit the small guys? That's not realistic. If you're a current customer, then you're not affected. If you're constantly turning your subscription off and on, then you'll be subject to the consequences of that decision.

And as for "just find an investor": investors want to see a return. If you can't show growth potential, then nobody will invest. Not to mention, with each investor, you lose a little piece of your company.

 

[nlinecomputers]

His facebook page show pictures at valhalla partners. They are a venture capital firm. So he is either already got VC backing or is seeking it.

My only concern as he has demonstrated that a client like me isn't profitable. He is being very generous in continuing to be in business with me at all let alone at the rate at which I originally signed up for. I've raised my rates a number of times and never kept the old rates with my clients. Even contracts last only a year and get reevaluated. I just hope the amount of clients he is doing that for don't destroy his ability to make a profit at all. Hopefully he already has or can soon land enough big fish to cover for that generous treatment of us small fry. Thanks Vincent. I hope it works for you.