Wow! Slamdunkpro, thank you for posting this - and thank you to everybody for your feedback! This has the makings of a good Frequently Asked Questions list. I really appreciate the opportunity to address your questions.
This post was just brought to my attention, and it's already quite long, so I'll be cutting and pasting and answering individual quotes here. I've reorganized them to keep my thoughts coherent and so I don't have to keep referring one question back to another in my answers.
I hope very much that this helps clear up confusion for everyone.
On the business side, the idea of never ending payments or the product stops working just rubs me raw.
EstiMate 2011 will never stop working - it will just go into a "read only" mode if your subscription stops. You will continue to have unlimited access to everything you ever did with it, and print any reports.
It will be internet based totally from what i understand?
EstiMate 2011 is still Windows based desktop software (it is built on top of Version 2). The only time it connects to the internet is when it downloads a new license file for you, either once a month or once a year, depending on how you paid for your plan.
Can't even imagine what happens when they screw up the billing (I'm sorry sir, I can't seem to locate your payment.) or when their server goes down... or any of the other scenerios that make it a risky venture.
Since EstiMate is desktop software, you don't have to worry about our servers going down - and our customer database is backed up several times a day. As for your payments, they are processed through Authorize.net - and I promise you they can locate it! In addition Authorize.net provides you an extra layer of security because we (EstiMate) do not store your credit card information in our own database.
I wonder if they are gonna try to shut down the 2.0 users somehow?
Of course not! EstiMate 2.0 will continue to work just fine.
For even a small shop you are talking less than 1/2% of sales for a very useful piece of software.....
Exactly. Our pricing plans start at $39 and go to $199 for monster shops. The real difference is in the number of users and the edition of the software you want to use. For those of you unfamiliar with EstiMate, there is also an hourly rate wizard where you build your hourly rate - and you can enter your subscription cost there and let your customers pay for it.
Smaller shops generally have 120-200 billable hours per month. Dividing $69 (A single user install of absolutely everything) by 120 billable hours means that raising your hourly rate by $0.58 will cover the cost of the software.
IMO this is a real bargain and not a high price at all, especially considering that it will pay for itself many times over anyway by making sure you don't miss anything in your quoting and putting many more billable hours back in your hands because it makes quoting so fast.
Until it goes down and it costs a day of production, or at least a few hours of aggravation.
Any software can go down. If you are referring to the subscription timing out, we always build in a buffer of 7-14 days to your license file so you're never stranded.
I am not sure where this leaves those of us who dutifully bought the software - can we not purchase the upgrade out-right.
You don't have to - like any software, your'e not obligated to upgrade. And yes, you can, but you will be migrating to EstiMate 2011 and paying a smaller amount monthly or annually instead of a big upgrade chunk.
I wonder too about online/offline computers. Some people have certain computers that do not connect to the internet for safety reasons.
We can easily email you your license file. If you drag it out of your email and drop it on your desktop, the next time EstiMate starts it will vacuum it up from there.
From what I understand it resides on your system, but it validates the key every time you sign on or every 30 days (depending on who you talk to).
That's correct. Every 30 days or every year, depending on how you pay for your plan. And there is buffer built in at the end so you don't get stranded because your license timed out.
Once a vendor goes this route, they no longer feel obligated to response to the needs of the user base.
This one came at me from left field! Probably because I can't imagine not feeling responsible to my users. Certain tech support cases have kept me up all night writing a patch to fix them. That's just my style. I do see your point though and will do everything I can to watch out for any "attitude creep" along these lines.
I am guessing that Mark Smith will be monitoring this thread and communicating with us- he is a good guy.
Thank you, Gene - good guess. Here I am!
