Microsoft Office is needed my most people, to write letters in Word, receive emails in Outlook, and to keep budgets in Excel. Up until a couple of years ago, the only way to buy MS Office was to purchase a software CD. Essentially, there were 2 versions. Home and Student (Word and Excel) or Professional (all applications). The price for Home and Student was about £100 and Pro was about £200. These prices were for 1 user or 1 pc.
Due to the cost of a full version of Office, many non genuine copies of the software started to circulate and consequently Microsoft lost revenue. However, in line with the advent of “cloud” storage, Microsoft designed Office 365.
In short, Office 365 is a way of “leasing” office from Microsoft. You never own the software but if you pay the monthly or annual subscription, you will always have a genuine and up to date version of Microsoft Office (currently Office 2016). The cost is straight forward:
1 licence for Office 2016 Professional is either £5.99 per month or £59.99 per year
5 licenses for Office 2016 Professional is either £7.99 per month or £79.99 per year.
If you have more than one computer, or a family, the 5 license version makes a lot more sense financially.
In addition to always having an up to date copy of Microsoft Office, you also benefit from being able to download the equivalent apps on your phone or tablet. This will enable you to work more effectively on these devices. Microsoft also give you One Drive which is their cloud storage facility. A very important benefit is that Office 365 can be used if you have a Mac. Once you purchase the software, you can chose which download you require, Windows or Apple.
A final problem is also resolved with Office 365. When a computer fails, or the hard drive becomes faulty, the Office license would often @die@ with the pc and clients would end purchasing yet another copy. 365 has this issue covered. Simply login to your Microsoft account (this is where your 365 is registered), go to Installs and you will see the computer names on which your software is installed. If you then delete the computer that has failed, you will instantly be able to download office to your new computer.
If you still prefer to own office outright, you can still purchase the software either on-line or at a retail outlet, but for once, Microsoft have actually produced a product that is cost effective and has longevity.
For more details, please click here for the link to Microsoft Office 365 pages.
