Pricing Guide
Lowest price often means lowest coverage, higher downtime risk, and hidden fees. The better comparison is total cost of ownership: direct support costs, avoided downtime, productivity gains, security risk reduction, and whether the provider can explain the business outcome behind the monthly fee.
Our pricing yardstick gives you a realistic starting range before a proposal conversation. It also makes vendor quotes easier to evaluate because you can ask what is included, what is excluded, and where the provider is creating measurable value.
Example Budget Range
Example company: $3,000,000 annual payroll
2% of payroll = $60,000/year, or about $5,000/month
3% of payroll = $90,000/year, or about $7,500/month
That range typically covers a managed IT package with helpdesk, monitoring, patching, backups, and baseline security. Advanced engineering, cloud migrations, compliance projects, or major infrastructure changes should be scoped transparently as project layers, not buried as surprises.
What’s Included
A baseline managed IT program should cover the day-to-day support and operational controls that keep staff working and systems protected.
- Direct helpdesk access and ticket management
- Proactive monitoring and patch management
- Managed backups and recovery checks
- Endpoint security baseline and policy management
- Quarterly IT roadmap and reporting
How To Compare Vendors
When vendors quote, compare outcomes instead of line items: uptime expectations, mean time to resolution, backup recovery process, breach response, reporting quality, and whether the provider connects IT work to business priorities.
A quote far below the 2-3% range usually means something is missing. A quote far above it should come with clear senior-engineering time, compliance scope, or guaranteed outcomes.
Use the range as a sanity check, not a substitute for scoping.
FAQs
Does this replace an internal IT hire?
For many SMBs, yes. Outsourced providers give you a broader skillset and a more predictable cost. Scout also supports hybrid models where we augment an internal IT lead or senior operator.
What about compliance and audits?
Compliance scope, such as PCI or HIPAA, adds implementation and documentation effort. We price compliance work transparently as a project layer on top of the baseline managed IT program.
Does the payroll percentage include production or field workers?
No. The guideline applies to office and administrative staff who use standard IT services. Production or field workers who do not use technology and do not need IT support should be excluded from the payroll base.