Maybe it's the toner?

**DAG COPIERS & COMPUTERS** · 08-30-2013

Originally Posted by Akitu

Your customers actually want to upgrade their machines Dag? Consider yourself the luckiest tech ever! It's a struggle in most cases here to get them to upgrade. They see it as being frugal to hold on to their increasingly archaic machines to the point where they can't run anymore and parts can't be procured without great expense. They ignore the fact that if they got a new lease, they could actually save several hundred dollars a month in operating costs because it's been burned into their brains that longevity = value.

Yes, I must admit that customers here actually do upgrade their machines regularly. The tech's recommendation on the status of the machine is very instrumental in shaping their decisions to do so. Other criteria used is the m/c's counter readings as well as the years it has served in the field. For most organizations and government departments, 5 years of service is considered the maximum duration of a machine's service life, and this include even vehicles. You hear a customer saying, ''Yah, this machine has really worked, 5years, I think we now really need a new machine. You write your recommendation and attach a quotation for a new machine, so that we forward to the management for consideration.''
As for the 'small timers'.... I mean the individual customers, they take any word we(the techs) say about their machine as 'the gospel truth'.
I must point out one thing though; Our market here operate in a different way from that of your country. Ours is a 'cash economy', therefore this business of 'LEASING' equipment doesn't work here. Some banks have tried to introduce the leasing concept here but with little success if any; they might have registered some isolated success here and there in lease of Agricultural equipment like tractors. but not office equipment.
Here, all customers and this includes government departments and organizations do outright purchase of their office equipment, it has been so for decades and I see no end in sight to the practice. Payment is by cash, checks,TTs or EFTs. And you own the equipment, there's nothing like taking it back to the suppliers etc. Upon 'retiring' the m/c, you may sell it through auctioning, donate to charity, throw it away, or whatever you decide to do with it, you own it.