Same cost or less: how we audit a year of IT spend

When we say “same cost or less,” it’s a constraint we hold ourselves to, not a discount we dangle. Here’s roughly what an audit looks like.

Three questions per line item

We pull twelve months of IT spend and sort every line by what it’s for, then ask three questions of each. Is anyone using it? Is it priced fairly for what it does? Is there a better tool at the same or lower cost? Most bills have a handful of items that fail all three — the renewal nobody questioned, the tier you outgrew or never grew into, the tool bought for one project that’s still billing two years later.

Savings that compound

The savings are rarely one dramatic cut. They’re a dozen small corrections that compound, plus replacing one or two underperforming services with something better that happens to cost less. You don’t need to hire engineers or learn new acronyms to get there.

FAQ

How do you audit IT spend? Pull twelve months of spend, sort every line by purpose, and test each against three questions: is it used, is it fairly priced, and is there a better option at the same or lower cost.

What’s the most common wasted IT spend? Auto-renewals nobody re-evaluates, oversized tiers, and single-project tools that never got cancelled. Individually small; together, significant.