Overages have their consequences Bentley

I'm an autodesk product user mainly, but we have a couple microstation and water cad seats on select.

We got a $500 bill this week for some one opening a third watercad once, likely to just look at the program.

We normally have only one person using it at once, and have never had an overage.

Let me just say that after seeing how Bentley handled this, with a sudden invoice like they did, is the worst thing they could have done.

We have paid about $7,000 a year to them and only use about 1/2 the software. No More.

Node Locked it is.

Parents
  • Yes, we recently received a substantial bill. Bentley did not realise that the INSTALLATION process also consumes a license, so while we were upgrading our machines and and at the same time migrating to CE, were unwittingly were creating overages.
    While Bentley finally removed these instances from the final bill, they were a source of serious conternation and questioning from Senior Management for some time. FWIW, there was a user left the license checked out when specifically instructed not to while we trained a new user. Our own fault, but a painful lesson, and definately easily preventable by Bentley.

    The ability to prevent Overages should be a setting by SELECT Server Admins (now changing to Bentley User). It is siply done and I really cannot understand Bentley's retisence in enabling this tool, other than akin to our police speed enforcement practices - income.

    It certainly does not endear them to their customers, nor create the environment where we are confident in using their software, or even trialling software fo rpotential purchase.
    I do understand their position that they do not wish to halt production simply due to someone taking an extra seat, but with the tools available now (and were in the SITE based SELECT Server), this is very simple to resolve.

    • Bentley - Include the option to STOP new seats of software being initiated when an overage situation is reached.

    The user above would then have the confdence to run the software on SELECT Server and you would have a potential extra seat when they start using the product more widely and demand rises.

    Greg Smith

    Microstation 10.17.01.058

    Opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily those of my employer

  • This has been a problem for years and Bentley point blank refuse to listen.

  • Yes, I saw that but it would be really simple for them to allow admins to prevent over usage and they won't do it.

  • Microstation Connect Update 11, if I understand correctly, now has the ability to warn the user if they are opening a session that would result in an overage.  This still does not apply to all products, but they are working on it.

    But doesn't that use a licence just to get to the warning dialog?

  • We insitigated our own warning process by converting to "Checkout Only". Even this proces though only provided a one-shot warning (once in 7 days!), and only then the warning was that the user did not have a checked out license.

    We use K2 by Sassafras to limit our licence usage. Works really well.

  • Hi Stuart,

    Again, per the information that has been given to me, any usage under 10 minutes in duration is supposed to be free.  (Recorded as though it never happened.)  The warning dialog is fairly early in the boot process, so I am hoping that it is occurring before they record a usage--so if you quit at this point, it is not counted as being opened.

    --Robert

  • Hi Stuart
    Not sure what the K2 module you have costs, but the K2 module we have in house, well, let's just say we could treble our licence pool and still have change for a big night out for the team.

    Third party apps are NOT the solution, unless of course they are a tiny fractional total cost of ownership, like almost free no matter the quantity of seats you support (and don't forget, you probably have to support the whole company unless you can guarantee no one can load the software elsewhere, even at home).
    This is the major issue inhernet in using external apps to control usage based on a cloud server and a single code

    Now while User names will take that away somewhat, a single user can still consume multiple lics.

    There is a moralistic judgement that vendors should provide security and be responsive to their customers (or am I just old fashioned)

    Greg Smith

    Microstation 10.17.01.058

    Opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily those of my employer

Reply
  • Hi Stuart
    Not sure what the K2 module you have costs, but the K2 module we have in house, well, let's just say we could treble our licence pool and still have change for a big night out for the team.

    Third party apps are NOT the solution, unless of course they are a tiny fractional total cost of ownership, like almost free no matter the quantity of seats you support (and don't forget, you probably have to support the whole company unless you can guarantee no one can load the software elsewhere, even at home).
    This is the major issue inhernet in using external apps to control usage based on a cloud server and a single code

    Now while User names will take that away somewhat, a single user can still consume multiple lics.

    There is a moralistic judgement that vendors should provide security and be responsive to their customers (or am I just old fashioned)

    Greg Smith

    Microstation 10.17.01.058

    Opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily those of my employer

Children
  • Agreed 100%. Bentley has been kind enough to remove some accidental overages for us but really... is it so hard for them to simply not allow overages?  Like every other company I've ever dealt with.  This is not rocket science, it's just good customer service and common sense. 

    My favorite bit is how they couch overages as being for the end user's convenience.  It's incredibly sketchy and causes much stress and anxiety on my part as well as time managing third party apps to do what should be built into Bentley's licensing model.

    I'd be fascinated to see how much overages contribute to Bentley's bottom line.  I'm thinking it's quite substantial. 

  • since it is now apparently possible (in CONNECT Update 11) to get a notice of a possible overage, and, as it has been stated that it would be possible to prevent overages, I would like to see the CONNECT licensing strategy to implement a way for the Site Administrators to configure the way to handle potential over uses. Make it possible for the Administrator to decide if he/she want overages to be a warning and allow continues use, or just deny access until a new seat is available. That would preserve Bentley's desire to not deny access to their software IF THE ADMINISTRATOR DECIDES ITS IN ALIGNMENT WITH COMPANY POLICY.