Microsoft licensing
Microsoft 365 licensing, bought deliberately
Almost every environment we look at is paying for seats nobody signs into, and is short on something else entirely. Both are quiet, both recur monthly, and neither shows up until somebody goes looking.
Nobody buys licensing on purpose
It accumulates. Someone joins, someone leaves, a project needs a capability, a plan gets applied to everyone because that was simpler at the time — and three years later the bill is a record of decisions nobody would make again.
It is rarely dramatic. Being over-licensed wastes money quietly, and it is the more common of the two. Being under-licensed is the one that carries real exposure, because licence compliance is auditable and "we didn't realise" is not a defence. Most environments manage both at once, in different corners.
Where the money actually goes
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Licences for people who left
The most common finding and the easiest to fix. Offboarding removes the mailbox access and leaves the subscription running, month after month, because those are two different jobs in two different places.
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Everyone on the same plan
One plan applied uniformly because it was simpler to buy that way. Warehouse and field staff rarely need what the finance and engineering roles need, and they are usually the larger group.
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The top plan bought for one feature
A single capability justifies upgrading the whole organisation, when a lower plan plus a targeted add-on covers the handful of people who need it for less.
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Paying twice for the same capability
A third-party tool for archiving, email security, MFA or device management that duplicates something the plan you already own includes. This one hides well, because the invoices arrive from different suppliers.
The confusions that cause most of it
Microsoft's naming is the single largest contributor, and it is not the customer's fault. Three distinctions account for most of the mistakes we find:
- Product family versus edition. Microsoft 365 and Office 365 are not two sizes of the same thing. One adds the Windows and device-management side; the other is the applications and services. Paying for the larger family and using none of what makes it larger is common.
- Plan tier versus what you switch on. A higher tier is only cheaper than the alternative if you actually deploy what it adds. Licences bought for security features that were never configured are the most expensive kind of shelfware, because they look like security on the invoice.
- User versus device. Most of this is licensed per user. One person with three devices needs one licence — and a machine shared by three people does not get cheaper for being shared.
There is a fourth that costs less but catches everyone: the seat ceiling on the small-business plans. They stop at 300 seats, which is invisible until the year you cross it, and the migration off them is a project rather than a checkbox. Worth knowing about at 250 rather than at 301.
Related: what managed IT costs, including how licensing sits alongside it rather than inside it.
The two programmes we carry
Two, stated as two. We do not carry GCC, Azure Government or Azure Government Secret licensing — and we would rather you heard that from us now than found it out after signing.
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Microsoft 365 GCC High Licensing
The government community cloud tenant built for handling CUI, sold and provisioned for contractors who need it. GCC High is not something you can buy on a credit card — it goes through an authorised partner, and eligibility has to be established first.
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Microsoft 365 Commercial Licensing
Standard Microsoft 365 licensing for businesses with no CUI obligation, including working out which plan you actually need rather than the one with the most features.
Choosing between them is a bigger decision than a licensing decision, and it is not the case that the stricter one is the safer default — it costs more, it trails on features, and fewer third-party applications support it. We wrote up how to tell which one you need, including the cases where the answer is genuinely contested rather than settled.
Buying from us rather than from someone else is a separate question, and a fair one: how the reseller chain actually works, including who we buy through and five questions worth asking any provider.
A review, or someone who owns it
A one-off review
We look at what you hold, by plan and by role, against who is actually signing in and what they actually use. You get the findings whether or not you buy anything from us, and most of them are yours to act on regardless of who bills you.
You do not have to move your licensing to us, and you do not have to move your IT.
Ongoing, as part of managed IT
The problem with a one-off review is that the drift starts again the following month. Where we run your IT, the licence position is part of what we own — joiners and leavers reflected as they happen, and the plan mix revisited when your business changes rather than when someone notices the bill.
Part of managed IT, not a separate line item.
If CUI is anywhere in scope
Licensing is usually where the compliance question surfaces, because it is the first time somebody has to choose an environment rather than a feature. It is the wrong moment to decide it — by then the choice is being made under a purchasing deadline.
What settles it is what data you hold and what your contracts require, not what a plan comparison page says. If any of it is export-controlled, or a prime names an environment in a flowdown, the answer is usually already made for you.
Related: CMMC Level 2 readiness, what actually counts as CUI, and the migration itself once the decision is made.
Questions we get about licensing
Do you sell Microsoft licences, or only advise on them?
Both. We resell Microsoft 365 Commercial and Microsoft 365 GCC High, and we can also review what you already hold without you moving anything to us. The review is worth having either way — most of what it finds is yours to act on regardless of who bills you.
What is the difference between Microsoft 365 and Office 365?
They are different product families, not different editions of one. Office 365 plans give you the applications and cloud services. Microsoft 365 plans add the Windows and device-management side. Businesses regularly pay for the larger family and use none of the part that makes it larger, and just as regularly buy the smaller one and then bolt on device management separately at a worse rate.
Should we be on E3 or E5?
It depends on how much of E5 you would actually turn on. E5 adds security, compliance and analytics capability, and it replaces things you may already be buying elsewhere — which is what makes the comparison worth doing properly. The wrong answer in either direction is expensive: E5 for everyone when three roles need it, or E3 plus four add-ons that together cost more than E5 would have.
Are Microsoft 365 licences per user or per device?
Per user, for most plans. One person with a laptop, a desktop and a phone needs one licence, not three — which surprises people coming from per-machine software. It cuts the other way too: a machine shared by three people across shifts does not become cheaper for being shared.
Do you sell GCC, Azure Government, or Azure Government Secret licensing?
No. We carry Microsoft 365 Commercial and Microsoft 365 GCC High, and nothing else. If your answer turns out to be a programme we do not carry, we will tell you that rather than take the order and work it out afterwards. We also do not recommend GCC for defense contractors — it was built for public sector organisations and it is not a cheaper GCC High.
Can you take over licensing we bought somewhere else?
Usually, and it does not require migrating your tenant — the tenant stays where it is. What matters is the terms and the timing of your existing agreement, which is the first thing to look at. If moving would cost you more than it saves, we will say so.
Is being over-licensed a problem, or just a waste?
Just a waste, and a recurring one — you are paying every month for seats nobody signs into. Being under-licensed is the one that carries actual exposure, because licence compliance is auditable. Most environments we look at manage both at once, in different corners.
Bring your licence list
Twenty minutes and a list of what you are currently paying for is enough to spot the obvious ones. If it turns out you are buying sensibly, we will tell you that too.
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