pricing confusion

[Shane Goguen]

Just a quick question, I saw that HIP mobile is $199 (which I want) and I have to pay $15 a month for upload service (which I don't want) just to use it?
I bought HIP desktop version just because I was told you where going to have a mobile version. Didn't know about all the extra costs, I am assuming I just wasn't reading this properly please set me straight.

[Dominic Maricic]

Hi Shane,

Yes, HIP mobile was a completely new app we've spent a year developing. We had a choice between increasing the base cost of HIP and bundling the mobile version in, or charging a separate fee. Since I'm estimating only 25% of guys will use the mobile version it didn't make sense to charge everyone.

Yes, you have to have the upload service. There's a massive amount of data storage between templates and inspections being uploaded to the cloud. We're having to purchase a lot of new servers (which aren't cheap at all) to handle all this. The upload service cost has not gone up. So we've added a lot of new features to the existing service and kept it the same cost (which means we're actually making less money obviously). We've done the best we can to keep everything affordable but we just can't do free!

Unfortunately mobile phone carriers have made it extremely difficult, if not close to impossible (like on the iPhone) to transfer data without the cloud and just use a phone cable as they want to sell internet services. You'll notice HomeGauge,3D, PalmTech all require you to sync via the cloud.

[Dan Musielski]

Hi Dominic...
Good or Bad, I havent had a chance to look at the new mobile yet(which Im looking forward to exploring), or even look at the message board much lately. ? Fortunately business has been up, brother getting married, working with a couple new agents, website crash..blah blah blah. ? Im still tweaking with 3.05 since I just started with HIP end of November.

Im already farmliar with the cost of "Mobile"...so my question is a little different. ? Im still using 3.05. Is there a cost to using 3.20 and replace 3.05...or only if I start using the mobile option? ? Im sorry if that already has been addressed somewhere and I missed it/

[Dominic Maricic]

Hey Dan,

Update to 3.2 is free. Your updates are free until 4.0 and for many even that's free.

[Steve]

Hi Shane,
I bought HIP for the exact reason that you did. I wanted the mobile version and am even buying a phone for the soul purpose of doing my inspections on it (the Samsung Note) I will admit that I too was a little unnerved to say the least, when I realized that there was an extra cost to upload to the cloud. (sorry Dom, I am sure that your ears were burning just a little during our email conversation last week) But do your self a favor and look around the HIP site and see what Dom has done in terms of bundles and packaging. His website packages are the best. For $75 bucks a month you get 4 websites, the upload service is very reasonable and if I am not mistaken there is a discount there for the mobile user. Also if you subscribe to the services you can get the major HIP upgrades free.
 Dom is putting together quite a service for us and as he mentioned above there is a cost to both him and us but the benefits that we reap make us money in the long run. If you look at the time we put into our reports, then look at the time we are going to save in doing the report as a result of the software, and put a dollar value on that time saved, there is a sense in which we are getting the monthly service for free.
For myself I also look at how fast I can get over problems. Dom and his staff are there when we nee them. Heck, he even wants our input as to what might be in the updates!!! When I weighed out all that id being provided with HIP as a package it is a pretty decent deal.
These are just my thoughts Shane for what they are worth.

[Shane Goguen]

Yeah agreed I am not going to advertise for someone else but I did go with hip originally for my site and chose to go elsewhere and am very happy for it. It has nothing to do with HIP I just found the cms they use for their sites (drupal 6) a real pain to work with. No complaints on anything else though, I don't care for tomatoes either. Just do yourself a favour and don't post anything about the new product on internachi's message board they will tear you a new one for doubting HIP even when it eventually turns out you are right lol. 12 pages of flamming on me, it was a massacre!

[Dominic Maricic]

Hey Steve. Just to clarify, there is no cloud charge on top of the upload service. The cost is included with the upload service itself. I wasn't sure if you understood that part from your post. We took the upload service we've had for 5+ years, kept the cost the same and added in the cloud service into it.

[Steve]

Yea sorry. In my case I am going to get the upload service to get the cloud. I usually send my reports via email so I kinda looked at it like I was paying for the Cloud use.

[Dominic Maricic]

Okay, just double checking! One cool part about this is that everyone can have a backup of their templates now in the cloud where that wasn't possible with the upload service before.

[Dan Musielski]

That's actually a very nice option.  My tablet has crashed, so now I'm doing a complete restore.  Fortunately I had a backup on an external hard drive.  My last few inspection were done with a regular laptop.

[Dominic Maricic]

Yeah it will definitely reduce a few calls from guys whose computers have crashed and they never backed up.