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Managed Print Services

How much does it cost to manage your printing environment? This is a question that is difficult for many Small and Medium Businesses (SMB) to address. In many cases, the cost of printing is a top expenditure for small to mid-size firms. With decentralization, the emergence of remote workers, and mobile devices becoming prevalent in the workplace, device and supply procurement is often made at a departmental level. Decisions being made at a departmental level, can lead to a fragmented and inefficient print environment.

A fragmented print environment is far from ideal, and can consist of multiple vendors, manufacturers and models of printers and copiers. This can be unnecessarily costly; with the potential hassle of dealing with multiple vendors, product lines, and hunting down a wide range of supplies. Sixty-percent of North American companies have no idea what they spend on print annually. How can a company, of any scale, effectively manage its print environment, and control associated costs? The answer is simple, with Managed Print Services.

Managed Print Service (MPS) programs have been around for years, but were initially mostly adopted by the largest scale organizations. Now MPS has become prevalent in the SMB space as organizations of all sizes see the benefits associated with adopting an MPS program. In fact over the last several years, the SMB market has seen approximately a twenty-percent annual migration from transactional toner and supplies purchases over to MPS agreements for toner replenishment and supplies. The attributes of an MPS program are: decreased costs, decreased carbon footprint, ease of use, increased productivity, along with the ability to craft work flows to specific business needs or compliance requirements. Costs can be decreased through imaging/print-fleet optimization.

Imaging fleet optimization involves tracking detail at an individual device level to determine volumes, understand work flow, and gain a true understanding of associated costs. Once associated costs are determined, hardware can be standardized, the number of different devices can be reduced, and print jobs can be routed to the lowest cost devices. Costs in an MPS program are often measured on a “cost-per-click” basis, meaning each time a document is printed or copied, a charge is assessed. Another tremendous cost savings opportunity comes about through decreased IT Help Desk hours, with the MPS provider assuming Just-In-Time (JIT) delivery responsibilities for supplies replenishment, thus reducing the need for the client to hold inventory, and also handling the copier and printer maintenance.

An MPS program is able to strip waste out of the printing process in environmental fashion as well.   By routing print jobs to the most cost-effective and energy efficient devices, carbon emissions are often able to be decreased by more than 60% with the implementation of an MPS program. Determining the appropriate number of devices based on the number of associates and print volumes can dramatically decrease print costs. Working with a single vendor for copiers, printers, and MPS allows device standardization, streamlined supply chain management, bundled services, and consolidated billing.

Rules-based routing can also be used to control costs in a variety of ways such as by driving print jobs to the lowest cost-per-click devices, by only allowing monochrome printing, or by forcing duplex printing. The paperless office is an elusive concept for many firms, but becomes increasingly tangible with the combination of an MPS solution integrated with an Electronic Content Management system. Businesses that manage document output can realize an average cost savings of Ten-percent to Thirty-percent annually.

Managed Print Services foster improved business processes, and help with understanding and control of print related costs. As the MPS market continues to develop and more and more companies adopt this technology; if you are not using this technology, you have to wonder, are your competitors gaining advantage by adopting it?

Source Office and Technology is one of the few HP Preferred Partners in the United States that piloted the HP MPS program over 6 years ago. Today, Source is considered the largest and fastest growing HP MPS provider west of the Mississippi.