A3 costs vs A1 and OVS

[smcmahon]

Hi,

 

Could someone explain what is the cost benefit of the A3 license? We currently have A1 licences for staff and students so get access to O365 accounts for free. We have an OVS agreement in place based on 33 FTE staff and pay approx. £1650 per year for this. This allows us to install Office and Windows on staff and student devices. Looking online you pay for the A3 per staff/student per month (£2.85 and £2.20 respectively) so based on those figures staff licensing cost £2.85 x 33 FTE x 12 months = £1128.60 a year whilst pupils would be £2.20 x 240 x 12 months = £6336 a year. This gives a grand total of £7464.60 a year for A3 licensing more than £5800 a year than we are currently playing.

 

I understand that if/when we move to a cloud server we will need A3 licences.

 

Have I missed something here?

 

Pricing source: Compare Office 365 Education Plans (microsoft.com)

[Max_Power]

A3 licences for students are free (I think it was 100 student licences for every 10 faculty licences bought?)

[liamrobinson]

I'm looking at getting A3 or A5 for the additional features you get in the back end, plus intune etc. I've been quoted but they have quoted for Student licences, i was under the impression Students were free and we only paid for FTE licences.

[CHiLL]

I don't think you need A3 to use the desktop office apps. For example, we only have A1 licenses. Office 365 for faculty/students for the online stuff and Microsoft 365 Apps for faculty/students for the desktop apps. We only purchased the FTE (or whatever they call it these days) count anmd the student licenses were provided free.

[mavhc]

Don't need to pay to get Windows, it's usually free with the computer.

 

I get OVS Office ProPlus, which gives us A1 Plus I think, for whatever reasonable number of licences I ask for. £25.89 vs £34.20 for A3

[jmak]

I think you need A3 to get the desktop apps - but if you buy them for staff, you should get them free for students.

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/servicedescriptions/office-365-platform-service-description/microsoft-365-education

 

Note that if you go for an M365 rather than an O365 subscription you get Intune, server CALs, Azure AD P1 which includes conditional access.

 

Can't recommend strongly enough speaking to a licensing reseller! John Levis at very PC has always been helpful for me. There's always more than one way to get licences for the products you need.

[mavhc]

You can still get the same apps via OVS:

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/servicedescriptions/office-365-platform-service-description/office-365-education

 

Some schools are eligible for Education Plus, which includes Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise, and allows students, faculty and staff to install the latest version of Office on up to five PC or Mac computers and on other mobile devices, including Windows tablets and the iPad. Schools qualify for Office 365 Education Plus when they license Office institution-wide for faculty and staff through Enrollment for Education Solutions, Open Value Subscription Education Solutions, or a school contract.

[kingoranks]

A1 licenses is free, we dont pay anyone. You can even get it renewed online by MS.

unlimited for faculty.

Microsoft Office 365 For Education

Office 365 for public, private, and charter schools is free. The only requirement is proof that the school is accredited as an academic institution. However, while many of the tools in the software are free, there are some more advanced Office 365 versions that come at a price—some schools may want to consider the benefits these versions could bring.

 

Office 365 A1

Price

 

Students: Free

Faculty/Staff: Free

Features

 

This version of Office 365 is free. Included in this package are information protection, compliance tools, email, Microsoft Teams hub for class collaboration, and video conferencing. It also comes with:

 

Outlook (online only)

Word (online only)

Excel (online only)

PowerPoint (online only)

OneNote

Exchange

OneDrive

SharePoint

Skype for Business

Teams

Sway

Forms

Stream

Flow

PowerApps

School Data Sync

https://www.agileit.com/news/office-365-educational-license-comparison/

[yac2016]

I think you maybe confusing the 2 options O365 A3 and MS365 A3 are different so be careful if you are looking to replace your OVS agreement with the correct one.

 

Most schools will want to go with MS365 A3/A5 as it will cover Windows 10/11 licenses and Office software, however your devices will need to be enrolled into Azure so the licenses can activate for different users. Current OVS licenses activate on prem using MAK for example as a one off.

 

Like others have said MS 365 A3 comes with Intune etc as well so is the main one you want to bundle together.

[TechMonkey]

Yes, as yac2016 said ensure you are going for M365, unless you are totally sure you only want O365. Any supplier pushing O365, or not pushing M365, needs to be looked at with a modicum of curiosity. This change came in around 2018 and all suppliers should know about it and be using it.

The confusion is that both options come with A1 and A3 levels, so it can get very confusing if talking at cross purposes.

[NicholasEsping]

A3 incudes Intune and Minecraft licensing and I believe it is also required to do group based license assignments in Azure AD. We run a mix of A3, and A5 licenses. if you use Minecraft or Intune I would definitely go with the A3 at a minimum.

[CHiLL]

I think you need A3 to get the desktop apps - but if you buy them for staff, you should get them free for students.

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/servicedescriptions/office-365-platform-service-description/microsoft-365-education

 

Note that if you go for an M365 rather than an O365 subscription you get Intune, server CALs, Azure AD P1 which includes conditional access.

 

Can't recommend strongly enough speaking to a licensing reseller! John Levis at very PC has always been helpful for me. There's always more than one way to get licences for the products you need.

You only need M365 A1 for the desktop apps.

[mullet_man]

Sorry I might be straying off topic slightly here but our reseller wants to move us to a Campus agreement and a M365 A3 subscription model we would still be licensing our servers, RDS etc. Does this model change the way Windows is licensed and is digital only or can we still use KMS?

 

Cheers.

[TechMonkey]

Is it a campus agreement of the new Cloud Agreement? If it is the Cloud one then, yes, it changes how Windows is licensed and your KMS will be redundant. But be warned, if you have any devices that are older and do not have firmware embedded Windows licenses you will come unstuck.

[mullet_man]

Is it a campus agreement of the new Cloud Agreement? If it is the Cloud one then, yes, it changes how Windows is licensed and your KMS will be redundant. But be warned, if you have any devices that are older and do not have firmware embedded Windows licenses you will come unstuck.

 

Yeah this is where am worried and our reseller hasn't given us much information back. We do have some older devices so it could cause a problem with digital licenses.

 

We are a few months away from renewing so I've got some time to research it.

[drewp]

I would recommed having a chat with John Levis @ Very-PC about licensing!

[jmak]

You only need M365 A1 for the desktop apps.

I can't find a service description for M365 Education A1, only A3 and A5. I'd definitely be interested to at least find the price difference.

[mullet_man]

I can't find a service description for M365 Education A1, only A3 and A5. I'd definitely be interested to at least find the price difference.

 

Try this

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/servicedescriptions/office-365-platform-service-description/microsoft-365-education

[jmak]

Try this

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/servicedescriptions/office-365-platform-service-description/microsoft-365-education

That's the same one I linked. It has Office 365 Education A1, but not Microsoft 365 Education A1. And O365 A1 is marked as not including the apps.

 

Maybe I'm confusing what you buy for staff and what you get free for pupils. If you buy M365 for staff and sign up pupils for O365 A1, the pupils get rights to the apps iirc.

[DrCheese]

Is it a campus agreement of the new Cloud Agreement? If it is the Cloud one then, yes, it changes how Windows is licensed and your KMS will be redundant. But be warned, if you have any devices that are older and do not have firmware embedded Windows licenses you will come unstuck.

 

Not quite - I switched to M365 Cloud agreement recently (EES, Not CSP) and still get KMS/MAK keys under this licensing - Was a big thing I was worried about, as a lot of my older machines don't have digital licenses (Old Windows 7 machines that now run 10)

[Katy]

You get "Office 365 A1 Pro Plus" for free when you already licence the Windows/Office Core Desktop thing on your traditional volume licensing (which includes the desktop apps). Office 365 A1 is web apps only, also free.

 

This page shows the difference between Office 365 and Microsoft 365, comparing both the E3 plans (the A3 are basically identical to E3, ignore the cost as edu is nowhere near that price) Compare Office 365 E3 and Microsoft 365 E3 enterprise solutions

 

M365 A3 includes the desktop apps, Windows Enterprise/Edu (upgrade from Pro), Azure AD P1, Intune, Minecraft and a few other goodies - so you don't need to pay for the windows/office core desktop pack if you have M365 A3. Last time I ordered licenses you got 40 free "M365 A3 student use" with every paid for "M365 A3 Faculty". The faculty ones are about £40-£50 a year per staff member.

 

But basically - speak to a specialist who knows all the ins and outs and is more up-to-date than we are.

[mullet_man]

Not quite - I switched to M365 Cloud agreement recently (EES, Not CSP) and still get KMS/MAK keys under this licensing - Was a big thing I was worried about, as a lot of my older machines don't have digital licenses (Old Windows 7 machines that now run 10)

 

Yeah this is what am worried about and hoping then it's the same for me as it was for you. I'll get our reseller to check it's EES rather than CSP.

[TechMonkey]

Not quite - I switched to M365 Cloud agreement recently (EES, Not CSP) and still get KMS/MAK keys under this licensing - Was a big thing I was worried about, as a lot of my older machines don't have digital licenses (Old Windows 7 machines that now run 10)

That is cool, that may be a change since we kicked up a fuss and I know other schools who were sold the dream did also. Glad they made a sensible decision

[DrCheese]

Remember - There's not a lot of resellers that can offer EES - The ones I know are...

 

Bytes software services

CDW

Civica

Comparex

Insight

Phoenix software LTD

Pugh Computers

Softcat

SoftwareONE

XMA

 

They get around the 1000 employee requirement by associating with JISC (This is all fully above board and sanctioned by Microsoft)

Other resellers may try to push you down the CSP route and that won't get you what you need.

[mavhc]

You can easily get your old Win7 machine a Win10 digital licence though.

 

Basically your options are from cheapest to expensive:

 

Office Pro Plus + free O365 A1 Plus. You can then use Desktop Office 365, sign in per user. Assign licences to AD synced groups automatically, manual MFA enabling.

M365 A3: Office 365 + upgrade your Win10 Pro to Win10 Edu + Intune + Minecraft + Not having to use MFA when on site.

M365 A5: Pay more to not get hacked!