“Unlimited Seats” Is Not Generous: It Is How Spend Hides

“Free” Access is Very Expensive

I hate the word “Unlimited.” In finance, nothing is unlimited. Resources are finite. Cash is finite.

When a SaaS vendor offers an Enterprise License with “Unlimited Seats” for €50,000 a year, they are selling you a blindfold. They know that if they charged you €50 per user, you would audit the user list every month. You would remove Sarah who left in March. You would remove Dave who moved to Sales.

But because it is “Unlimited,” you stop caring. “Just invite everyone!” the CTO says. Suddenly, the intern has Admin access to your CRM. The freelance designer has access to your project management core.

This is Seat Sprawl. It creates security risks, but primarily, it destroys your data logistics.

The Leak: The Invisible Cost Per Head

Profit is an opinion. Unit economics are a fact.

If you pay €50,000 for a tool, and you have 500 employees, you think the cost is €100 per person. But I audited a client with this exact setup.

• Total Employees on list: 500
• Active Users (Logged in last 30 days): 42

The real cost was not €100 per person. It was €1,190 per active user. They were paying premium enterprise rates for a tool that 90% of the company ignored.

If they had stuck to a “per seat” model, they would have paid for 42 seats. Even at a higher rate of €200/seat, the total bill would be €8,400. They overpaid by €41,600.

That is the price of “Unlimited.”

The Plug: Internal Chargebacks

How do we fight this? We fabricate a cost.

Even if the bill from the vendor is flat, the cost to the department must be variable. We implement Internal Shadow Billing.

1. The Audit: Every quarter, export the “Last Login” data.
2. The Calculation: Take the total fee (€50k). Divide it by the total active users (e.g., 50).
   • Real Price: €1,000 per user.
3. The Chargeback: Tell the Head of Marketing: “You have 10 active users. I am charging €10,000 to your budget.”

Watch what happens. The Head of Marketing will scream. “That’s too expensive! Dave only uses it for 5 minutes a week!” “Good,” I say. “Then remove Dave.”

Suddenly, the “Unlimited” plan doesn’t look so relaxed. The team starts cleaning up their own access.

Summary

Vendors use “Unlimited” to hide the truth. Your job is to reveal it.

If you cannot calculate the cost per active user, you are not managing spend; you are just paying bills. Meten is weten.

FAQs

Isn't a flat fee easier to budget?

Easier? Yes. Efficient? No. It masks the reality. You are paying for shelfware, not software.

But we are growing, unlimited helps us scale!

Does it? Or does it just let you give expensive tools to people who don't need them? Access should be intentional, not a free-for-all.

How do I measure the cost then?

Divide the Flat Fee by the Active Users (last 30 days). That is your real price. It is usually shocking.