Re:Ask HN: Forming an IT service organization, how much do I...
by patio11 on Thursday December 12, 2013 @10:22PM
(#6898893)
Is $60/month enough for such a service?
No. Not even close. $60 a month is cheap for best effort support via email 24 business hours later, rather than on-demand phone support 7 days a week.
Consider from the store's perspective. "My database is corrupt." means "We can't process transactions and are losing $15+ per minute", right? That sounds like it's worth closer to "What you pay for insurance every month" rather than "What you pay for toilet paper every month."
I'd be inclined to price this in the hundreds per month for virtual intervention. After you get a few clients under your belt, I suspect that while it might be priced monthly it will be sold yearly. (i.e. It's $500 a month, you want to buy it, OK, I'll invoice you for $6,000 for your first year of service and if you want to continue it 11 months from now I'll invoice you for another $6,000.")
Local hands-on assistance available "at preferential rates."
So if I hire a $35,000 a year help desk employee - I've got approximately $6K a month left in revenue to work with.
I'm not aware of your location, which makes it difficult to calculate this with specificity, but you should know that a $35k a year employee will likely cost you closer to $50k all in. You will be responsible for payroll taxes, contributions on unemployment insurance and worker's compensation, etc etc. I also think you're underestimating your staffing needs by at least 0.5 FTEs. (Consider: your employee gets a standard offering for holidays/sick days/vacation, right? Do databases just agree to not corrupt themselves when she's on vacation or do you need to plan for availability then?)
No. Not even close. $60 a month is cheap for best effort support via email 24 business hours later, rather than on-demand phone support 7 days a week.
Consider from the store's perspective. "My database is corrupt." means "We can't process transactions and are losing $15+ per minute", right? That sounds like it's worth closer to "What you pay for insurance every month" rather than "What you pay for toilet paper every month."
I'd be inclined to price this in the hundreds per month for virtual intervention. After you get a few clients under your belt, I suspect that while it might be priced monthly it will be sold yearly. (i.e. It's $500 a month, you want to buy it, OK, I'll invoice you for $6,000 for your first year of service and if you want to continue it 11 months from now I'll invoice you for another $6,000.")
Local hands-on assistance available "at preferential rates."
So if I hire a $35,000 a year help desk employee - I've got approximately $6K a month left in revenue to work with.
I'm not aware of your location, which makes it difficult to calculate this with specificity, but you should know that a $35k a year employee will likely cost you closer to $50k all in. You will be responsible for payroll taxes, contributions on unemployment insurance and worker's compensation, etc etc. I also think you're underestimating your staffing needs by at least 0.5 FTEs. (Consider: your employee gets a standard offering for holidays/sick days/vacation, right? Do databases just agree to not corrupt themselves when she's on vacation or do you need to plan for availability then?)