3 Common Mistakes that Drain Your IT Budget

January 17, 2019 |  Budget
2 min

Just like that subscription to Audible you always intended to use, these 3 overlooked practices are quietly draining your school’s IT resources, but that doesn’t have to be the case.

Just like that subscription to Audible you always intended to use, these 3 overlooked practices are quietly draining your school’s IT resources, but that doesn’t have to be the case.

1. Paying for software that isn’t used.

Yes, Professor Kim fought hard for those 400 Adobe CC licenses 2 years ago, but has anyone checked in to see if they’re actually being used? Of the 400 students in the design program, how many are commuters with their own laptops & software? How many would rather wait in line at the library lab rather than walk across campus to the design lab? In reality, one license per student doesn’t always work out, and odds are a percentage have never been used.

Whether you’re shelling out cash for an expensive license suite or nickle-and-diming a subscription for each computer, unused software has got to be the biggest budget-suck of all time. Learning how, when and where your priciest software apps are used is the key to a balanced budget that keeps both students, faculty and administrators happy.

2. Letting computers collect dust.

Hardware is not a one-time cost. Hardware upgrades, labor-intensive lab management and maintenance of aging machines are constant drains on your budget, adding up to approximately $1,000 per computer per year.

That means if you have 20 lonely computers– you know, the ones in dark corners of the lab or right next to the lab manager’s desk, you might as well wave goodbye to $20k of your budget at the start of each school year.

3. Keeping labs open too long.

If you’re paying a lab tech to babysit an empty computer lab, you might as well just throw a chunk of your budget out the window.

When it comes to choosing a lab, students are picky- they consider lab size (is there going to be an open computer?), noise level (am I going to be able to focus?), installed apps (does it have the software I need?) and location (do I really want to walk that far?).

Knowing what students are looking for is key to scheduling computer lab hours, and avoiding fully-staffed, empty labs.

How to Stop the Bleeding

Outsmart these silent budget thieves with accurate data. Start tracking hardware and software usage across your campus to eliminate unused software applications, right-size labs and streamline staffing. With LabStats computer lab monitoring software, you can start to see trends in as little as two weeks, and be ready to make big budget decisions with confidence in the first year.

It’s time to take control of your budget and make every dollar count.


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LabStats specializes in helping IT leaders reduce spend and get their budgets right.

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