Is $100 Per User a Fair IT Support Cost in Australia?

If you've been shopping around for a managed IT provider, chances are you've seen $100 per user per month quoted somewhere — maybe as a headline rate, maybe as a starting point "from" price. And the obvious next question is: is that actually fair, or is it too good to be true?

The honest answer is: it depends entirely on what's sitting behind that number. IT support cost per user isn't a single, standardised figure across the industry — it's a bundle of different services priced together, and $100 can represent a genuinely solid offer or a stripped-back plan with the important bits missing. This guide walks through what should be included at that price point, what tends to sit outside it, how team size changes the maths, and — just as importantly — how to judge whether an MSP is actually a good fit before you sign anything.

What Should Your IT Support Cost Per User Actually Cover?

Most Australian managed IT providers price using a per-user model because a big chunk of the underlying support effort scales with headcount — helpdesk time, security monitoring, and platform administration all grow as people are added, regardless of provider. That's different from the software licences themselves. Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Adobe, and similar platform licences are billed by the vendor and are typically a separate line item on top of the support fee, not bundled into it. When you're assessing an IT support cost per user, you're asking what level of support and management that number buys — not whether it includes the underlying software subscriptions.

At a minimum, a fair per-user IT support price should cover:

• Unlimited remote helpdesk support during business hours
• Proactive monitoring and patch management across devices
• Endpoint protection (antivirus/EDR) on every device
• Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace administration and support (setup, permissions, troubleshooting — not the licence cost itself)
• Basic backup monitoring, with regular recovery checks — not just backups running silently in the background
• User onboarding and offboarding

The plans that come in noticeably under market rate are rarely lying about the number — they're usually just quiet about the exclusions. The items that get quietly dropped first tend to be backup recovery testing, security awareness training, and after-hours coverage, because none of them are visible day-to-day until the moment you actually need them.

Beyond Per-User Pricing: Connectivity, Firewalls, Devices and More

A fair IT support cost per user only tells part of the story, because plenty of essential IT costs don't scale with headcount at all — they scale with your infrastructure and your software stack. It's reasonable, and common practice, for these to sit outside the per-user support rate as flat or per-device fees, or as pass-through costs:

• Internet connectivity and business-grade NBN or fibre plans
• Firewalls and network switches (typically priced per device)
• Servers and cloud infrastructure hosting
• Software licensing — Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Adobe, and other line-of-business applications
• Hardware procurement and device refresh cycles
• Larger project work — office moves, migrations, new system rollouts

This is actually a healthy sign, not a red flag. A provider who lumps everything — infrastructure and licensing included — into one flat per-user number is either overcharging light-infrastructure clients to subsidise heavy ones, or under-scoping the real cost of your network and hardware. The better question isn't "why isn't this all included in the per-user fee" — it's "what exactly sits outside it, and what does that cost separately?"

Does a Bigger Team Justify a Lower Per-User Rate?

To an extent, yes. A portion of what an MSP charges covers fixed overhead — the monitoring platform, ticketing system, and account management time — and that overhead gets spread across more seats as a business grows. A 50-plus user business can reasonably expect a lower per-user rate than a 10-person business buying the exact same scope of service.

Where this logic breaks down is when it's used to justify a price with no floor. Security tooling, backup licensing, and helpdesk labour still cost roughly the same per seat whether an MSP supports 10 clients or 500. Scale can trim the overhead component of the price — it can't make security and backup costs disappear. If $100 per user only works because compliance-grade security or tested backups have been left out, that's not a bulk discount. That's a smaller service wearing the same headline number.

The more useful question for a 50+ user business isn't "can we get it cheaper because we're bigger" — it's "are we paying for account management and monitoring twice over, once in the per-user fee and again as a hidden margin." A transparent MSP should be able to explain, in plain terms, why the rate is what it is at your size.

Price Aside, How Do You Know an MSP Is the Right Fit?

Even a perfectly fair number doesn't guarantee a good outcome — the quality of the provider behind it matters just as much as what's on the price list. A few practical signals worth weighing before you sign:

• Response times and SLAs: ask for actual guaranteed response windows for critical issues, not vague "we're quick" assurances
• Proactive vs reactive posture: do they talk about preventing issues, or only about fixing them once they've happened
• Communication style: are explanations in plain English, or buried in jargon you're expected to nod along to
• Transparency on scope: can they clearly tell you, unprompted, what's included and what isn't
• References and track record: are they willing to put you in touch with existing clients in a similar industry or size

The pattern that shows up across clients who've switched providers is rarely a single bad incident — it's a slow drift where communication gets vaguer, response times creep out, and "we'll look into it" replaces a real answer. Price is easy to compare on a spreadsheet; fit only shows up once you're actually working together.

Questions Worth Asking Before You Sign

Bring these into any conversation with a prospective IT provider — the quality of the answers will tell you more than the headline rate:

• What's included in the per-user support price, and what sits outside it as a separate cost (licensing, infrastructure, projects)?
• What are your guaranteed response times for critical vs. non-critical issues?
• How often are backups actually tested for recovery, not just monitored as "completed"?
• What happens to pricing as our headcount grows or shrinks?
• Are there early termination fees or lock-in periods, and how long is the initial contract term?
• Can we speak with a current client of a similar size or industry?

On that last point about lock-in periods — this is worth taking seriously. The unfair contract terms provisions under Australian Consumer Law specifically apply to standard form contracts with small businesses, so it's worth knowing your rights around exit terms and automatic rollover clauses before you sign anything long-term. The ACCC's guidance on contracts is a useful primer if you want to understand what a fair exit clause actually looks like.

Try It Before You Commit: The Affinity MSP 90-Day Guarantee

Most IT contracts ask you to commit before you've experienced the service. You sign, you hope, and you find out over the following months whether the provider actually delivers what the sales conversation promised.

We built the Affinity MSP 90-Day Guarantee — our honeymoon period — because we don't think that's a fair way to ask a business to commit. For the first 90 days, you get the full Affinity MSP experience: our support, our response times, our way of communicating. It's the chance to see, in practice, whether we're actually the right fit for your business — not just on paper.

Most clients stay well beyond the 90 days, and that's the outcome we're aiming for. But if it genuinely isn't working for your business, you can walk away with no early termination fees and no lock-in. We'd rather lose a client in month two than have one stuck in a contract they never wanted to sign in the first place.

In practice, this means you get to test the relationship before making the big commitment — instead of the usual approach of signing blind and hoping for the best.

Sources referenced:

• ACCC — Contracts (unfair contract terms guidance): https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/buying-products-and-services/contracts
• ACSC — Essential Eight (cybersecurity maturity framework, for MSP due-diligence conversations): https://www.cyber.gov.au/resources-business-and-government/essential-cyber-security/essential-eight

FAQ

Is $100 per user per month too cheap for IT support in Australia?
Not necessarily — it depends on what's included. It's a realistic price for basic helpdesk, monitoring, and patch management, especially for larger teams where fixed overhead spreads across more seats. It's worth a closer look if it's meant to cover comprehensive security, tested backups, and after-hours support as well.

Does the per-user IT support price include software licences like Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace?
Generally no. The per-user fee usually covers support and administration of those platforms, while the licences themselves are billed separately by the vendor. It's worth confirming this explicitly with any provider you're comparing.

Should firewalls and internet connectivity be included in the per-user IT support cost?
Not always, and that's normal. These costs scale with infrastructure, not headcount, so many MSPs price them separately as flat or per-device fees. What matters is that the provider is upfront about what's inside the per-user number and what isn't.

What happens if Affinity MSP isn't the right fit during the 90-day guarantee?
You can walk away with no early termination fees and no lock-in. Most clients choose to stay, but the guarantee exists so you can genuinely test the relationship before committing long-term.