Please note that from 1st March 2022 there are price increases being applied to certain Microsoft 365 licences. There are also changes being applied the annual licence committments.
The table below shows the new monthly pricing for two of the most common M365 Business licences from March 1st 2022
Annual Commit, Annual Payment | Annual Commit, Monthly Payment | Monthly Commit, Monthly Payment | |
Product Name | | | |
Microsoft 365 Business Basic | £54.00 | £4.50 | £5.40 |
Microsoft 365 Business Premium | £199.20 | £16.60 | £19.92 |
Note: I’ve only shown the Business licences here – there are also similar increases for the Enterprise E1, E3 and E5 licences.
Enforced annual commitment on licences or 20% premium for monthly commitment
The other big change is that Microsoft are now enforcing the annual commitment to Microsoft 365 licences, i.e. if you take out a 1 year licence you cannot cancel that licence before the end of the term. You can pay for the licence either upfront in one payment or pay monthly but the commitment is for 1 year.
If you want to only have a month to month commitment, i.e. the ability to cancel a given licence on a monthly basis, you can do so but you will pay a 20% premium to have that right. This is the Monthly Commit, Monthly Payment column in the above table.
Microsoft are suggesting that businesses look at their current staff and licencing and start to think in terms of annual commitment licences for permanant staff and monthly commitment licences, with the 20% premium in cost, for temporary or seaonal licences.