Licence price is the number vendors compete on and the smallest part of what you will spend. This worksheet forces in the costs that decide which option is actually cheaper: implementation, internal time, integration, and getting out again.
Cost your own team's time. Implementation, migration, training, and ongoing administration consume internal days. At a loaded daily rate these frequently exceed the licence difference between shortlisted vendors.
Model the price increase, do not ignore it. Year-one discounts are common and renewal increases are too. Assume a realistic uplift in years two and three unless the contract caps it, and if it does, record the cap.
Include exit cost. Data extraction, format conversion, parallel running, and retraining are real. A platform that is difficult to leave carries a cost even if you never leave, because it removes your negotiating position at renewal.
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One column per vendor. Leave nothing blank: a blank reads as zero and distorts the comparison.
| Cost category | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | 3-year total | Notes / assumptions |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Licence / subscription | State user count and tier | ||||
| Assumed annual price increase | - | Default 7% unless contractually capped |
More free templates IT teams use alongside this one.
Most software evaluations are a decision already made, dressed in a scoring matrix afterwards. The two things that prevent that are locking weights before you see proposals, and requiring evidence rather than impressions in each cell.
The expensive date is not the renewal. It is the notice deadline, typically 30 to 90 days earlier, after which you are committed for another year whatever you decide. This tracker is built around that date.
RFPs produce incomparable responses because each vendor answers in their own structure and prices in their own format. Fixing the requirement format and the pricing table is what makes a side-by-side comparison possible at all.
Licence or subscription across the full term with assumed increases, vendor implementation fees, internal effort costed at a loaded day rate, data migration, integration build and maintenance, training, ongoing administration, support tier uplift, and exit costs.
Internal effort. Implementation, migration, administration, and training consume significant internal days, and at a loaded rate these frequently exceed the licence price difference between the vendors being compared.
Because a platform that is hard to leave removes your negotiating position at every renewal, which affects price for as long as you use it. Estimating extraction and transition cost up front also reveals which vendors genuinely support data portability.
