At the end of term, who pays to ship the copier back to the leasing company?

I tell customers that technically, it is THEIR lease and they are responsible for the return. However, that the unwritten rule is the person who secures the business should return it for the customer. If you know a machine like that exists, add the cost to your quote and make sure that it is known that you will return the machine for them. If the other guy hasn't figured that in and gets asked, they either have to:

1. Look like bad guy to charge an extra fee
2. Tell them it's their responsiblity (makes it look like they aren't doing everything to take care of the customer)
3. Or say they will do it, eat the costs and have me mentioning that they didn't do this upfront (what other costs are they NOT going to mention).

And some customers say they will return it on their own and it's done. The key is to pull this issue out in the light and deal with it FIRST.

We all understand the ethical "Deal with it first" approach. Unfortunately, this often does not happen in the copier business.

I do like your line, "Well, if your new copier vendor did not deal with this well known hidden cost, what else is he not telling you?".

When we decline to return a copier at our cost due to a competitor not doing this at their expense, we do suggest to our former customer two moving companies they can call to pick up the equipment.

Of course, we will keep in polite contact over the next few years, as we known when the lease will expire next time.

Often the same Decision Maker is not around 3-5 years from now, so you will have to remind the new DM about the extra freight costs they incurred with their present copier vendor. Plus this time around you will take care of that hassle and expense for them by a line item in your new quotation.

SSG:

Good Stuff, the return of the old system is one of the items that needs to be addressed, more often than not, if the customer has the space and the willingness to store and then ship the machine themselves, I'm all for that!

Coming from the lease finance area of the copier industry I know this always ends up in an arguement. so we use a simple Rule

If its End of Term (EOT) and the customer is upgrading we take the cost

if the deal is at EOT, the customer is returning and going to a competitor, then the customer eats the cost