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User Subscription Model Change - Implications on your business?

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Comments

  • ✭✭✭✭✭✭

    The new model has been live for one day day and it is chaotic, to say the least. We need to have oversight and controls around member creation. Rather than taking away the free collaborators, I would much prefer if they replaced them with a paid collaborator access level that still limits the ability to create, but allows the person to work in assets created by others at a lesser price point than full fledged member. That would be a better compromise than what we have which is people creating new members by sharing without even realizing they are doing it.

  • Hi @Cheree Peterson

    Here is the documentation on what editing a user can do without being a Member:
    Site faviconManage users in the User Subscription Model | Smartsheet Learning Center

    It's in the FAQ section at the bottom. 🙂

    Need more information? 👀 | Help and Learning Center

    こんにちは (Konnichiwa), Hallo, Hola, Bonjour, Olá, Ciao!👋 | Global Discussions

  • ✭✭✭✭✭

    We are also concerned about the lack of asset control that will happen with this model. Wanting people to be able to edit doesn't mean we want them to be able to create.

  • ✭✭✭✭

    We just had our annual renewal and had to go with the new pricing model. Of course we ended up buying more licenses as we didn't have time to get out of Smartsheet entirely. The new licensing model though makes a nightmare for SysAdmins. I had 400+ users converted to Provisional Licenses. I have to assess each one and move them back to Viewer or confirm Member or they'll be part of our true-up at the end of the quarter. You'd think this process would be a one and done but no, Smartsheet allows a Member the ability to go back and give that Viewer the ability to Edit again and issue back the Provisional License. This of course means if I don't go back in and move them back to Viewer, then we'll be obligated to purchase a license at quarterly true-up.

    It's truly aggressive and unreasonable licensing tactics and puts admins back on their heels.

    Note below.

  • Community Champion

    @thadmclemoreQ

    Thank you for your update. I took a little positive out of it that Smartsheet didn't force you to purchase all 400+ in order to transition and they have given you the first quarter to decide on who needs licenses. This was an ambiguous message between what the help articles said and what some Account Managers have been saying.

    I agree that this model is now time heavy for the System Admin. Until the habit of sharing as Editors is relearnt by ALL the users to sharing as Viewers, this is going to be time consuming with financial penalties for people where managing users in Smartsheet isn't necessarily their main role.

  • ✭✭✭✭

    Well, to be clear, my sales rep did actually propose and strongly encourage buying 400+ licenses. We pushed back on that. His analysis was using any edits made by people within the last year. We cut that back to last 30 days to come up to our number.

  • I'm stunned at the Edit requirement tied to licenses. How am even going to deploy sheets out to team members for updates when they need full licenses to even Edit? I've been an strong proponent and user of Smartsheets for 4 years now and I'm shocked at this crazy subscription model. I now have to revisit whether I will permit my company of 500-600 employees to adopt Smartsheets. The previous billing structure was much more convenient and reasonable. This new subscription plan is definitely NOT and it's difficult even for me to justify. Maybe it's time to move on and spend our money elsewhere.

  • Community Champion

    @D.Connor

    I think there are a lot of people in your position, but I believe competitor products also charge for editors, so Smartsheet are claiming this move as bringing themselves inline with competitors. (for the record, I was also shocked!) As you have such a large potential license increase, we might have a suitable compromise in our pocket that could allow you to continue using Smartsheet. Please do reach out if you are interested in exploring an alternative (all data stays in current Smartsheet, its just accessed from a separate tool). My email address is in my profile (we are not supposed to put it in posts!)

    Thanks

    Debbie

  • Smartsheet has always had some dark patterns to try and force more paid subscriptions (e.g. by constantly telling free users they have limited access to a sheet, "click here" to request full access - but they are not told this costs money. Then a bunch of account admins get a message to approve a users access request and they are not told this costs money. So one of them clicks the "approve" button and now a new expense appears on your monthly bill and the user and the admin that approved them don't even realize what just happened.)

    With these recent changes Smartsheet has devised and implemented a whole new level of dark patterns:

    They have taken control away from admins and setup a system where conflict is inevitable between admins and users. Users are doing things that seem natural and don't even realize it costs the company money. System administrators have better things to do than babysit a true-up list to make sure provisional members don't slip past by mistake.

    Lets say you are a team leader for a small group. You have been given control over company funds and have the responsibility to decide when and how they are used. But another party, who is not even part of your company, just gave the ability to every team member to incur debt and expenses without your control or consent. The members of your team don't even realize their actions are costing the company money and adding to your work load by having to continuously monitor what they are doing and undo their actions.

  • ✭✭✭✭✭✭

    For me, managing a global enterprise, the cost increase brings it close to a full blown ERP system. It's a sad time for me since I've been a loyal Smartsheet user/admin since 2009, but all things must end. We are going to have to start moving users off of Smartsheet and restricting who uses it, until we land on a replacement. Like I said, I manage a global enterprise and Smartsheet is one of many tools that are currently being used, so it's a mater of moving people over to another existing platform. And for all the other platforms we have, why is Smartsheet so much more than the rest of them?



    @D.Connor bringing themselves inline with competitors = loosing their competitive advantage.

  • My post was removed without warning, lets try again.

    Smartsheet has always had some dark patterns to try and force more paid subscriptions (e.g. by constantly telling free users they have limited access to a sheet, "click here" to request full access - but they are not told this costs money. Then a bunch of account admins get a message to approve a users access request and they are not told this costs money. So one of them clicks the "approve" button and now a new expense appears on your monthly bill and the user and the admin that approved them don't even realize what just happened.)

    With these recent changes Smartsheet has devised and implemented a whole new level of dark patterns:

    (search google for "dark patterns)

    They have taken control away from admins and setup a system where conflict is inevitable between admins and users. Users are doing things that seem natural and don't even realize it costs the company money. System administrators have better things to do than babysit a true-up list to make sure provisional members don't slip past by mistake.

    Lets say you are a team leader for a small group. You have been given control over company funds and have the responsibility to decide when and how they are used. But another party, who is not even part of your company, just gave the ability to every team member to incur debt and expenses without your control or consent. The members of your team don't even realize their actions are costing the company money and adding to your work load by having to continuously monitor what they are doing and undo their actions.

  • ✭✭✭

    Same issue for my team - we'll be looking at moving out of Smartsheet next renewal process. The new changes are absolutely rediculous and the price point is barely a reduction. Major issues

    • We were promised that our separate volunteer domain name would be considered external. It's not, which increases our licenses by 200! We're hoping our rep can help adjust this, but if not that's an insane price burden.
    • The vast majority of our team needs simple editing features. I don't know why we're paying 130 a year just to edit sheets occassionally.
    • From an account perspective, it's absolutely impossible to manage. Not only do I have to manually go through all of our provisonal members (why isn't there a batch import feature to update permissions!?), but knowing that anyone can then grant editing access again begins an insane process in work.

    I don't know what Smartsheet expected to get out of this, but they're going to burn customers by tripling our prices for little value. I guess they're hoping clients remain due to inertia, but tripling our price while destroying the functionality we purchased forces us to move away.

    Desparately hoping Smartsheet roles this decision back, because it's absolutely terrible business decision.

  • ✭✭✭✭

    @D.Connor

    Reach out to me if you want to see ways around the Edit Sheet route, like Workapps and Dynamic views. Depending on how you are using SS, might be some easy workarounds. Then you can just monitor for anyone that might accidently become a provisional member (well, once SS actually fixes their reports for this)

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