Many small and medium businesses in Europe have no
control ofprinting costs,according to research
commissioned byDell.
Over three-quarters of companies in the UK, France and Germany
with between 100 and 500 employees are unaware of their in-house
printing costs, according to the research.
A survey of 600 small and medium businesses (SMBs) found fewer
than 10% of those responsible for in-house printing knew the exact
costs of running their printers, 90% had no restrictions on
printing, and only 22% monitored staff printer usage.
The research shows there is huge potential for SMBs to cut
printing costs, but only if printer decision makers were able to
identify the costs of printing infrastructure, said Dion Smith,
imaging sales manager, Dell UK and Ireland.
However, Smith said it was encouraging to note that three
quarters of SMBs were cutting energy and service costs by sharing
printers.
The research found workgroup printing was the prevalent printer
usage model in SMBs, with an average of 9.3 users for every
networked laser printer.
Another trend identified by the research was an increasing
number of SMBs using colour printers, with 88% of those surveyed
having
colour printers and 78% seeing it as a business benefit.
The top three business benefits of
colour printing were said to be highlighting key information,
delivering more professional-looking documents, and creating
documents that were easier to read.