Is your pricing a flat rate, or are there costs that show up later?

Covered by the monthly fee, with no per incident charge: unlimited remote help desk, monitoring, patch management, endpoint protection, firewall management, Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace administration, Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace backup with monthly test restores, network management, new employee setup, and after hours emergencies. Onsite labor is covered for managed clients, with a flat trip charge per visit at every managed level.

Quoted separately and never buried: server backup, which is priced per server and includes up to 1 TB of backup storage each; hardware; software you purchase; third party subscriptions we pass through; and one time projects such as a server replacement, an office move, or a migration. Those are priced before work begins, usually as a fixed amount. Managed clients also get a lower project rate than our standard hourly rate, and both numbers appear in your proposal.

When you compare providers, the exclusions are where the difference hides. Look specifically for per incident onsite charges, new user setup fees, after hours surcharges, and language like "included up to a set number of hours per month." A cheaper base rate with those attached usually costs more by March.