Copier Lease vs. Buy: How to Decide
A practical comparison of leasing and purchasing for small and mid-sized offices.
Leasing spreads cost and usually bundles service, but the total paid over sixty months often exceeds the purchase price by a wide margin. Read the escalation clause — many contracts raise the base rate annually.
Buying makes sense when volume is predictable and the machine will stay in service past five years. You then choose your own service provider rather than being tied to the lessor's rates.
Whichever route you take, get the cost per page in writing for both black and color, and confirm what happens to overage charges.
What this means for your office
Most of the trouble we are called out for is preventable, and much of it is cheap to prevent compared with the emergency visit it turns into. If any of the above matches what your machine is doing, note the make, model and exact wording of the message on the panel before you call — it shortens the diagnosis considerably.
When to call a technician
Call when the same fault returns after a full power cycle, when print quality degrades in a repeating pattern, or when a maintenance counter is past its rated interval. Those three signals almost always mean a worn component rather than an operating error.
Need hands on the machine?
Opheliaaro Co. covers Plano and North Texas with same-day dispatch on most calls.
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Questions this guide didn't answer?
We answer the phone during business hours and give straight advice, even if it means no service call.