Operating costs
Expenditure to plan for the ongoing operation of an IT solution.
What are operating costs?
Operating costs here mean expenditure for running an IT solution, such as hosting, required licences, maintenance and operational support. They may be recurring or usage-based. Payment frequency alone explains neither service scope nor accounting treatment. A comparison needs identical periods, included services and volume assumptions.
In a fictional quote, a clearly bounded hosting and maintenance package costs 200 EUR per month. For 12 months, this is 12 × 200 = 2400 EUR. It does not follow that changes, every incident fix or unlimited storage are included. Those boundaries need description. Variable usage and internal staff effort can add costs; unresolved items must not silently be treated as free in planning.
Sources
Related terms
- Investment costsCosts of building a new or expanded IT capability, as considered in project planning.
- Migration costsEffort and expenditure for the planned move of data or functions to another environment.
- Exit strategyA prepared route to switch, take over or retire an IT service in an orderly way.
- Scope creepScope creep is gradual expansion of project scope without adequate assessment and corresponding changes to the plan.
- Project summaryA project summary briefly brings together an initiative’s purpose, boundaries, owners and key constraints.
- Decision briefA decision brief prepares a specific choice by presenting options, rationale, consequences and unresolved assumptions.
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