Microsoft 365
Buy your licences from someone who'll also run them.
The same Microsoft 365 licences you'd buy anywhere, bought through someone who sets them up properly, configures the security, and answers the phone when something breaks.
Why not just buy direct from Microsoft?
You can. Plenty of businesses do, and for some it's the right answer. But buying direct means you own every part of what comes next.
- Someone sets it up properly. A new tenant out of the box is not a secure tenant. Multi-factor authentication, sharing defaults, mail flow rules and admin accounts all need deciding, and the defaults are rarely what a small business wants.
- One place for licences, support and security. Rather than Microsoft for billing, someone else for support, and nobody for security.
- A person, not a portal. When a mailbox stops working you call 01202 138435, not a queue.
- You can still leave. Monthly commitment means cancel any time. I'd rather earn it than lock you in.
What the licences cost
Per user, per month, excluding VAT. These are "from" prices — the exact figure depends on your billing term, and annual commitment works out cheaper than paying month to month.
| Licence | From | What you get | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Exchange Online Kiosk | £1.54 | Email only. 2 GB mailbox, Outlook on the web, calendar and contacts. | Frontline and shared-device staff |
| Exchange Online Plan 1 | £3.10 | Email only. 50 GB mailbox, full Outlook desktop app, shared mailboxes. | Office staff who don't need Office |
| Exchange Online Plan 2 | £6.20 | 100 GB mailbox, 1.5 TB auto-expanding archive, Litigation Hold, Data Loss Prevention. | Regulated and compliance-heavy work |
| Microsoft 365 Business Basic | £4.60 | Web versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint, Teams, 50 GB mailbox, 1 TB OneDrive. | Cloud-first teams working in a browser |
| Microsoft 365 Business Standard | £9.60 | Everything in Basic plus the full desktop Office apps. | Most office-based businesses |
| Microsoft 365 Business Premium | £16.90 | Everything in Standard plus Defender for Office 365, Intune device management and Conditional Access. | Anyone serious about security |
If you're weighing Standard against Premium
The gap is about £7.30 a user a month, and what it buys is device management, conditional access and proper threat protection. For a business going through Cyber Essentials, or one where people work from their own laptops, Premium usually turns out cheaper than assembling the same protection from separate products. Ask me and I'll tell you honestly which one your situation needs.
How you pay
Monthly commitment
Billed monthly, cancel any time. The most flexible and the most expensive per user.
Annual, billed monthly
Twelve-month commitment with the cost spread across the year. The usual middle ground.
Annual, billed upfront
Twelve months paid in one go. Best value if the cash flow suits you.
Worth adding
Setup and consultancy — £95 one-off
A new tenant configured properly rather than left on defaults: tenant setup, your domain and DNS, up to five users and five shared mailboxes configured, mail flow verified, and the security basics set the way they should be. If you are moving from another provider or starting from nothing, this is the part most people underestimate.
Enhanced email security — £2.37 per mailbox per month
Proofpoint Essentials on top of Microsoft's own filtering: phishing and zero-hour threat protection, outbound filtering and encryption, email continuity so you can still send when Microsoft has a bad day, and archiving.
Managed email signatures — £0.70 per mailbox per month
Exclaimer, so signatures are consistent across everybody and you can change a banner or a disclaimer once rather than emailing staff instructions nobody follows.
Shared mailboxes cost nothing extra
Microsoft doesn't charge a licence for shared mailboxes like info@ or accounts@ — only the people who open them need their own licence. Up to five are included in the setup package.
The thing people forget
Microsoft does not back up your data the way you think it does. Their job is keeping the service running, not recovering the mailbox somebody emptied six weeks ago. Retention periods are shorter than most people assume, and once they pass the data is gone.
Backup is £2.23 per user per month and covers mail, OneDrive, SharePoint and Teams. Shared mailboxes are free and there is no minimum.
Order online, or talk it through first.
The ordering form takes a few minutes and covers licences, add-ons, shared mailboxes and your domain. If you'd rather work out what you actually need before committing to anything, call me instead — there's no charge for that conversation.