Category: Audit Series

It’s no crime to not enjoy software audits, who would? They’re stressful, unpleasant experiences that can result in crippling audit penalties and the feeling of being powerless when it comes to your own software. Humans naturally want to avoid things that cause us distress, so is there any way to avoid software audits? The short answer is no, there is no guaranteed way to completely eliminate the chance that you’ll be audited but there are ways you can decrease the frequency and likelihood of your company being audited. At MetrixData 360, we have noticed a pattern in the behavior of the auditors, and we’d like to share our findings in what can lower your chances of getting audited.

Why Do Software Audits Happen?

The first step in understanding how to decrease your chances of incurring a software audit is understanding why software audits happen.

(Un)Luck of the Draw

There is a sense of randomness to software audits, as some software vendors send out audit notices either regularly to their customers or through picking unfortunate names out of a hypothetical hat. So, there’s little you can do to stop it from simply being your turn. However, many companies think this is the only reason for software audits and so hang their heads and accept their fate, but there are other things that can cause a software audit as well.

Money

I wish I could tell you it’s more complicated than that, but in the world of business the heart and soul are plated in gold. Software publishers will often use software audits as a source of revenue, and if the software audit plays out the way they want it to (with you being out of compliance and writing a check to them with many, many zeroes on it), then they won’t even have to cover the expenses for the software audit process, that will instead be handed to you. However, if their goals are purely fiscal, then that means they’ll target companies that are guaranteed to reap massive rewards. Companies that the software publishers have strong reason to assume are out of compliance enough to yield a large return on investment might as well coat themselves in barbeque sauce, because all the software publishers will see is a meal.

Sales

Software Audits are also used to meet sales quotas because at the end of a software audit, you’re forced to purchase all your missing licenses at full price (no historical or contractual discounts will be included, sadly). It also puts you in a pressured position to buy, they’ve got you in a corner, they wait until they see the glint of panicked sweat on your brow and then they deliver to you a sales pitch.

The Payout for Hyper Complex Software Contracts

There are plenty of legitimate reasons why software contracts are as discouragingly complicated as they are: technology is constantly changing and licenses constantly struggle with dealing with that complexity, and many customers request hand-tailored licensing options. However, that doesn’t eliminate the fact that software vendors make no effort to simplify the matter into something their customers can actually understand.

How to Lower Your Risk of Being Audited

Now that we understand why software publishers conduct software audits, we can talk about what you can do to reduce the risk of software audits.

Demonstrate Organization and Understanding to the Software Vendor

This is especially true if you are a sizable company with multiple branches or if your company has recently gone through a merger or acquisition. Such situations will make you susceptible to disorganization and from there it increases the likelihood that you’ve missed something. If you are asked questions by the software auditors, it is important that you answer them effectively and completely to demonstrate a strong understanding of your software contracts. To gain full insight into your software estate, you will need to perform internal audits regularly, have a SAM tool in place that manages your software estate, and a team in charge of the project.

For more information on getting someone to manage your SAM or if you’re in the market to buy SAM tools, check out our articles: How to Hire a SAM Expert and 5 Factors to Consider When Buying a Software Asset Management Tool.

Have a Plan in Place

Educate your employees on the value of software asset management and have a defense strategy in place in case of a software audit. Even if you do receive a software audit, having the process be organized, streamlined, and resulting in minimal penalties will prove to the software vendor that you are not an easy target. Getting organized means having your licenses in order, having a defined person in charge of your organization’s response to a software audit, and having an audit defense plan in place. Software audits tend to have tight response times, so this cannot exactly be a ‘learning on the job’ scenario. By knowing what to do, it will mean that any software audit that is presented to you will go smoothly with minimal damages, so you are less likely to be audited again in the future.

Know What is in Your System

Have an effective asset life cycle in place, including a means of purchasing and a means of retiring any assets to ensure they are effectively tracked. We have seen rogue purchasing and ineffective asset retirement result in a quiet drain on IT budgets through the purchasing of multiple unneeded licenses.

Your Active Directory is the place most software auditors will look when attempting to compile your compliance gap. Many companies do not have access to their Active Directory and as such their AD will consist of every device and every account that has passed through their software architecture, not just the ones that are currently in use. Employees that have left the company, and devices that have been sitting in storage collecting dust will all be present in your Active Directory and the auditors will argue that they will all need a license.

For More Audit Defense Information

Software audits are on the rise and they aren’t slowing down anytime soon. There’s no magical cure to repel auditors for good, but there are ways to reduce your risk of software audits. Your best weapon of defense is to be prepared. If you’d like to learn more about how to get ahead and stay ahead of the audits, you can download our Audit Risk Checklist, which will give you a breakdown of all areas where we see our clients struggle with compliance.

Below is an excerpt from our Software Audit Risk Checklist, which is available as a free download for subscribers to our newsletter. This is the same checklist that we use in our primary assessment of client environments.

Software Audit Risk Checklist

Software audits are considered an unpleasant and inevitable factor of business. Once, it may have been possible for a company to remain compliant with their software vendors with only a few spreadsheets managed by someone extremely organized. Now, however, software deployments and contracts have become so complex that this is simply not practical.

As technology has evolved, the way that software is used and deployed has become more complicated. Software publishers themselves have not made it any easier with their perplexing software contracts that are convoluted and difficult to read. The temptation to skip over the entire document, agree to the terms and conditions, and move on with our days can be irresistible.

Despite how the software vendors may be stacking the situation in their favor, preparation is your greatest tool of defense. In this document we’ll discuss how you can prepare for a software audit.

Understanding the Risks of a Software Audit

Are You Inviting a Software Audit?

Some software vendors will send audit and Software Asset Management (SAM) review requests at random or on an annual basis; such events are unavoidable. While most software vendors will provide little to no criteria for initiating audits, the fact that there are different kinds of audits should be an indicator that not every audit is born from the same kind of evidence or circumstance.

Vendors have discovered that software audits are an excellent source of revenue, especially if their customer’s compliance gap is large enough to force them to cover the cost of the software audit. Software audits can have a high return on investment, making it well worth the software vendor’s time and money. It is towards these safe ROIs that the software vendors will turn their interest.

Therefore, if there are indicators that a company is out of compliance enough to yield a profit, they can risk their vendor initiating the audit. If you are concerned about your company’s exposure to a software audit, below are the risk factors that increase the likelihood of an audit occurring.

When the Software Auditors Come Knocking

Software Audits. These two words strike fear into the hearts of many bold businesses. At their worst, software audits can be time-consuming and causing tremendous damage to the relationship with your vendor, leaving you frustrated when their representatives even dare to walk through your door. Not to mention the impact to your IT budget when the process is over. What exactly is a software audit though? At Metrixdata360, we’ve helped our clients through hundreds of software audits and we know exactly what to expect.

Definition of Software Audits

A Software Audit is conducted either by a software vendor or internally done by the organization to ensure the business is operating within the use rights of their specific software contract and to make sure that the use of that software aligns to the licenses they have paid for. Any areas where the client is underpaying for the software they are using would be referred to as a compliance gap. Compliance gaps can result in steep financial penalties that are almost never budgeted for.

How a Software Audit is Started

The software vendor will typically communicate the intent to audit through a formal letter in the mail. If the vendors are requesting a Software Asset Management (SAM) review, which is slightly different than a full-blown software audit, the news might come in the form of an email or a phone call. For a more in-depth examination of the difference between a SAM review and a Software audit please visit our article SAM Review vs. Audit.

Whatever the notification medium, it will specify whether there will be a software audit partner (some vendors use internal resources and others fire audit firms like KPMG or Deloitte) and the time frame. According to technology attorneys Scott and Scott, it is important during this period to determine whether or not you’ve received a SAM review or a formal audit. SAM reviews are conducted internally and voluntary, but audits are something that you are legally obligated to adhere to.

The Time Frame of a Software Audit

The time frame for a software audit may be negotiable, but the notification itself does require action sooner rather than later, as some software audit requests have a required response time of just 15 days.

The First Three Things You Need to do When You’ve Been Selected for an Audit

Who is Vulnerable to a Software Audit?

The broad answer is anyone with a software licence can be audited but there are things that do cause the ears of software companies to perk up and look to you with suspicion. If your company matches any of the following criteria, a software audit might be looming on the horizon.

According to Enhansoft, it’s important to establish whether or not you are comfortable to live with these risks and face the fact that you might one day very soon be confronted by an audit.

Watching What You Say Around Your Vendor’s Rep

Information can also be gathered by members of the software publisher’s company. We call it corporate espionage.

Let’s say someone from a software vendor has come into your company to talk about new products and during that conversation it comes up that one of your branches has started a new project that will eventually require 10,000 new licences. That vendor representative will get back to their office and tell the sales department that in a few short months 10,000 new licences are coming their way! Except…it doesn’t. Perhaps the project was postponed or cancelled on your end. However, the sales department of the software vendor is breathlessly waiting, but the order never comes. In response, the vendor starts writing up your software audit because for all they know, projects have commenced involving their software that they are not apart of.

We’re a Small Company, Will that Affect Our Chance of a Software Audit?

Typically, software audits are geared towards larger companies since they tend to have more licenses and are therefore more prone to have gaps in their compliance based on the sheer volume of software that they are handling.

It is also a matter of risk and reward for the software vendors. One of the reasons vendors perform software audits is to turn a profit from the auditing process, so small businesses with small licenses might not be worth the effort and their chances of receiving an audit are fairly low.

Hope During a Software Audit

Audits can feel like you’re sloshing through an endless swamp of confusing data while staring down a row of stone-faced auditors, it’s a daunting task for any business to face. Knowledge and the time to prepare will be the best weapon you have at your defense. At Metrixdata360, we can give you both the time and the information that you desperately need to get through this software audit with your yearly budget relatively unscathed.

Not Sure How to Prepare for a Software Audit?

Software costs for most companies are already sky-high, leaving the Finance team frustrated and IT departments stuck trying to stretch their budgets to near impossible lengths. Asking your team to prepare for a software audit may seem like trying to bleed a stone, but being unprepared will be far more costly. Audits are an unpleasant inevitability for businesses – it’s not a question of if but when.  At Metrixdata360, it’s our goal to save you money, so here are some ways to limit the financial damage of a software audit and bring your compliance gap down to what you actually owe.

1. Prepare to Prepare for a Software Audit

Is there such a thing as too much preparation? Maybe… but not when it comes to your software licensing! If your software vendors have their way, audits would happen fast. Vendors know that tight, audit turn-around timelines will leave you scrambling to gather all the data you need to prove your compliance; and if your data has gaps or grey areas, the auditors can make worst-case scenario assumptions to inflate your possible compliance gap.

According to Glasshouse Systems’ article How to Save Time and Money with Software Audit Defense, one of the best ways to save valuable time is understanding your licensing position and having the data organized and easy to prove long before you receive your audit notice. Remember, there is nothing motivating the auditors to do an effective job capturing your license position; any mistakes they make will be your pain and potential penalty to deal with. Having your own license position and your data at the ready should your company be called to the front for an audit, will not only improve your chances that your compliance gap will be lower, but it will also decrease the likelihood of being audited again in the near future. While some software vendors perform random audits regularly, auditors will also target clients that they believe have overly complex environments without the means to monitor them. Demonstrating a lack of preparedness during a software audit is like being that one antelope in the herd with a limp in their run; don’t assume the lions won’t notice. For further information about how best to prepare for a software audit, please visit our Software Audit Preparation article.

2. Common IT Failure – Have Proof of Ownership Ready

According to Scott IP Technology Attorneys’ article Common Mistakes in Software Audits, one common mistake that companies fall prey to during a software audit is providing improper documentation that fails to accurately prove ownership for software licenses. As soon as an audit notice is received, some companies try to buy more licenses in order to mitigate compliance risk due to a potential shortfall in licenses for their workforce/environment. However, this route is a waste of time and money, since trade associations and publishers will only accept dated proof of purchase with the entire name of the company on the document. Companies should seek consultation before they try to purchase licenses during an audit in order to understand the potential consequences and benefits of this action.

3. Get a Proper SAM Tool

Having a proper SAM tool will be extremely valuable for budgeting your software. An effective SAM tool can not only highlight where the shortfalls in your license spending exist but also where you are overspending on licenses (something that tends to get glossed over by the software auditors). A SAM tool can also provide the accuracy of data to show you where your licenses are being used and where licensing could be re-bundled to save you money. Make sure that your SAM tool can accommodate multiple licensing metrics and can account for any programs you’ve moved to the Cloud. That way you will have a firm grasp of your licensing position before you are thrust into an audit.

SAM tools are also very useful in the event of a software audit. During an audit, the software vendor will hire a third-party auditor that will come to the table with their own SAM tools that they want to use to measure your data. Whatever you do, don’t let them! Having a different SAM tool come into your environment is a quick way to have your compliance gap inflated. The auditor’s SAM tool will have its own way to measure licenses with the possibility of accidentally applying duplicates and marking your test and development servers as full production (plenty of SAM tools do this by mistake, so make sure that you’re aware of this when buying your own SAM tool). Having your own reputable SAM tool to gather data is the best way to counter the auditor’s offer of using theirs. For more information on SAM tools, please visit our SAM as a Service article.

4. Monitor Your Usage – Even in the Cloud, and Do it Constantly

Software Asset Management really shouldn’t be a thing you only do once a year or when the auditors are walking through your front door. It needs to occur on a regular basis – ideally, it should happen at the very least once a month, if not daily. That way you will know immediately if anything is amiss and your team can save time and money proactively fixing it instead of reactively paying penalties following a software audit. Now that many companies have moved (or are in the planning-to-move process) to the Cloud, one trend we are noticing is that by NOT regularly monitoring access and usage to the company’s Cloud environment certainly results in the spikes in a company’s spending.

With the ability for anyone in IT to spin up as many instances in the Cloud as they want, you run the risk of having projects left open and running long after the project’s completion, resulting in a continuous and unnecessary drain on your IT budget and expense to your company. You will also want to make sure that you have the right to move your licenses to the Cloud in the first place, as often licenses will be non-transferable. The Cloud has its own license metric that will usually leave a few of your servers exposed and unlicensed. For more information on proper Cloud Migration, please visit our article Heading to the Cloud? 5 Problems You’ll Need to Address.

5. Hire the Right Software Asset Management (SAM) People for the Job

Hiring the right people will get you the results you need. It’s a great idea to have an audit defense team ready and they should include members of your procurement and IT departments. Leading the project should be an audit-experienced attorney who knows how much and how little to say to the vendor and their auditors. In our many years of software licensing consulting, we have had many clients ask us whether it is better to hire a SAM consultant or to do it themselves. We’d recommend hiring a consultant because they offer you years of expertise instantly and they can streamline the auditing process to save your company precious time and resources. For a more in-depth look at hiring a SAM professional as opposed to doing it yourself, check out our article Hire a Software Asset Management Expert or Do it Yourself? The Pros and Cons of Each.

Invest in Being Prepared for a Software Audit and Save Money

Software Audits don’t have to be a complete drain on your resources, time and budgets. Following these tips and ensuring that you’re ready long before the audit arrives, can save your business time, stress and money. When you prepare for a software audit, you are investing in your IT department.

If you’d like more tips on how to be prepared for an audit, please check out our Learning Center for more information.

Software audit preparation is becoming more and more important as publishers view audits as revenue streams instead of simple compliance tools.  In this game of company overlords and intimidating auditors with charts streaked with red, it can often feel as though you are powerless to stop your software vendor from marching in and walking away with double your yearly budget. In this series, we are going to discuss ways you can prepare for an audit before the software data hits the fan. 

Putting out the Sparks Before They Burst into Flames

The best software audits are the ones that don’t happen. Some vendors treat SAM reviews like routine check-ups and there’s little you can do to avoid it simply being your turn.  That being said, there are strategies you can implement that lower your risk of facing a software audit in the first place.  

Maintain a Good Relationship with Your Software Vendor.

As is the case in any relationship, communication is key. Keeping an open dialogue with your vendor and making you are upfront in regard to any decreased spending or changes in your company’s growth, so that your vendor feels like they are in the loop about your software.  

 Negotiate the Audit-Clauses in your Contract

In every software contract, there is a clause that states the right to audit. In the rarest of rare cases you might be able to remove the clause entirely from your contract but by the time your contract is up for renewal, you’ll be hard pressed to get your vendor to agree to such a deal twice. That being said, you still might be able to edit the clause a little bit. The first thing you can alter is how long the down period between audits is allowed to be (usually it’s a year). The second thing you might also be able to include in the clause the amount of time a vendor can go without contacting you during the auditing process before the software audit is considered closed. This is a valuable thing to have in your contract, since some vendors can leave an audit dormant for months before kicking things up again. Another possible point you might want to fight to have included in the contract is what time period can be classified as your ‘busy season’ and therefore the ‘no-audit’ zone. Auditors can’t come in and steam roll a business, that’s already in most contracts. If you’re an Airplane company, you can’t deal with an audit the week before Christmas and the resources that are sapped by the auditing process would handicap your revenue, so be certain that timeframe is specified.  

Understand Licensing Models Before you Sign Up for Them and Do Not Sign Up for Models That You Cannot Manage

Complexity is a breeding ground for human error and if your head is spinning when the vendor is laying out the system you’re signing up for, make sure you do your homework and do your best to understand where your money is going. That way, there will be no surprises when the auditor’s data findings come in. If you think that an overly complex system is something you just can’t manage, you can always find another contract with a system that can suit you better. Unless you already have systems in place, it’s more likely you won’t be able to account for hundreds of licences and profiles with just a couple of spreadsheets.   

Understand the Big Risk Factors and Show Microsoft You have Processes Under Control 

Software Audits come in many shapes and sizes and it’s impossible to predict when an audit might come but there are things that increase your chances of being audited such as 

1.Having undergone a significant decrease in your spending with the vendor.   

2.Having a complex infrastructure with multiple locations that can range to an international scale. This will make it easy for things to be missed.  

3.Having frequent mergers and acquisitions 

4.Having an overly complex profiles and multiple licenses with the vendor  

5.Having your spending with that vendor not match recent company growth 

Understanding these risks can help you proactively try to counteract them. If your company has an overly complex structure, show your software publisher the systems you have in place that will keep track of them. This will demonstrate to your vendors that you are prepared, organized and have everything under control.

For a more detailed look into the difference between SAM Reviews and Software Audits, see our How does a Microsoft SAM differ from an Audit?

When you Feel the Storm Brewing: How to Get Ahead of the Software Auditors

But what if these tips were helpful to know five months ago? What if, for you and your business, most of these ships have already sailed and that leaves you on the beach, panicking as you’re waiting for the inevitable software audit to breathe down your neck. Not to worry, there are still things that can be done to prepare yourself.  

Set up your Audit Team

The first thing you need on your side in the shadow of an approaching audit is a team of experts, but what should that team consist of? It’s tempting to throw the problem at IT since this is a tech problem, isn’t it? According to BizTech’s article How to Prepare for a Software Audit, while you will need the IT department on the team to help you collect data, they won’t be helpful leading the process and the same is true if you hand the whole thing over to the procurement specialist or your financial rep. These people will be useful on the team but not leading it. Software audits have an intense legal aspect to them and they should be led by attorneys with experience in dealing with software audits. On the team you should also have people from upper management and pick someone (preferably someone who knows how much and how little to say) to be the point of contact with the vendor and the software auditors.   

Get an NDA in Place with Your Auditor

A non-disclosure agreement is critical if you are dealing with a third-party auditor hired by the software vendor. This will keep the auditors from taking the king’s share of your data and bringing back to the vendor far more than what they should be privy to, given the scope of the audit. Imagine what would happen if your software vendor knew you were buying more products from their competition than you ever bought from them. Relations with that vendor might suffer as a consequence. A Non-disclosure agreement will also state that everything the auditor’s plan to give the software publisher needs to pass under your eyes first. This has its advantages because you’ll know what your license position is before the publisher does and you’ll be able to check for any mistakes, clear up any grey areas and write letters to the vendor in order to explain yourself and propose mitigation strategies for the future before the data is sent over to the publisher.  

Understand the Scope of your Vendor’s Software Audits

Look over the vendor’s past audits (if possible) and make note of what your vendor usually looks at. If your company has multiple locations, make sure you understand which branch and which region (if your company reaches an international scale) has which products. That way, you can anticipate what sort of access your vendor will ask for. You might have to push them to ask for a scope during the auditing process so that you don’t have to face the unpleasant effects of scope creep. Scope creep occurs when an audit continues on into product after product and region after region until the auditors eventually find something that will give them the profit they originally anticipated when they first began the auditing process.

Make Sure you Have up to Date Entitlements, Contract Stacks, etc

Nothing says prepared, organized and under control better than up-to-date contracts and date entitlements. If your contracts have renewal dates (also called the end date, it is found most often with maintenance contracts, and typically includes one year minus one day after the contract’s start date) make sure that they have not expired. Have the renewal conversation with a software vendor well before the auditing process has taken place, as it might overly complicate the process and effect data results.  

 Verify the Accuracy/Completeness of your Hardware and Software Deployments

Deployment refers to the installation of software on your servers and it is one of the metrics used to calculate your usage of that software. The metric will then either take into account your hardware (how many servers do you have using the program?) or users (how many user accounts have this program or how many users are on the program at any given time). Make sure that both data findings are up to date and ready to go because this will most likely be used in the auditing process. It will save you a lot of time and will allow you to better check the auditor’s data if you have this already available. 

Build your Own Estimated License Position (ELP)

During the gathering of data, the auditors will come up with an estimated licensing position for you. According to Software Media’s article Microsoft License Verification Process FAQ, an estimated licensing position is a rough outline that states how much you are under on your software use, areas of improvement, or critical weak points. The auditors hired by your vendor will come up with their own licensing position for you during the software auditing process and it can easily inflate your compliance gap to horrendous levels (and very rarely will they show you where you are overspending). One great and easy way to counter this is by having your own licensing position ready to compare the auditor’s findings with. 

The Comfortable Lies We Tell Ourselves

Many companies we’ve come across over the years tell themselves pleasant stories that allow them to sleep easy at night. That is until their software audit arrives and they find that their perfect defensive strategy was held up only by wishful thinking. If you are telling yourself any of the following statements, it might be time to have a closer look at your audit preparation strategy.  

“Any application installed on a server is licensed via Citrix”

There are two products that come from Citrix: XenApp and XenDesktop but the one we need to worry about is XenApp. XenApp lets you install software on your server and then it manages the software that you have on your desktop such as Adobe Acrobat and Office. The thing that people often don’t realize is that Citrix has its own licencing metric that doesn’t necessarily coordinate with the metrics of the software that you are installing through Citrix. A licencing metric is how any particular vendor decides to measure your purchase. As an example, Microsoft charges you by the number of devices using the software but Citrix charges you by the users on Citrix at any given time (concurrent users). So if you have 1,000 devices but only 500 users on Citrix at any given time, Citrix will ask for 500 licenses but Microsoft really wants 1,000.

“These servers are owned by our Service Provider so, we don’t have to license them”

Many companies hire a third-party to manage their servers. These service providers install products, set them up in a company’s systems and manage any technical difficulties that might arise. Since it seems that these service providers have everything under control, many companies think their job is done. The truth of the matter is, if the software is on the company’s server, it’s the company’s responsibility and they are liable if the software is improperly licenced. Even if a third-party service provider has their licenses all in a neat little row, the company might still need to buy their own licenses. Should the service provider try to buy the licenses for the company, they might be violating the software vendor’s terms of use. Don’t let this matter fall to someone who is technically not responsible if something goes wrong. Even if your service provider is doing a great job, have your licenses lined up and organized as well.    

 “We don’t have a list of users to devices, so I guess you can just make assumptions”

Never allow the auditors to make assumptions, because it will never be in your favour. The third-party auditors are not on your team, in fact they more likely will be paid based on how large they can make your compliance gap. So they will not give you the benefit of the doubt. They can easily claim you owe double or triple then what you actually do in your licensing position. If the vendor sees those numbers before you’re given the chance to explain yourself or clear up any grey areas that might lower the number closer to reality, then that inappropriately high number will be your starting point during the negotiation process. 

 “These are test/dev servers, but we don’t have a full list, and I don’t manage them so I don’t know why all those users have access”

Many vendors allow for you to sample their products before installing them with full licences. These are called test/dev and they aren’t priced or licenced at the same rate as products in production (the ones your whole company uses). The vendor will outline terms that will classify a product as test/dev and usually that includes a limited amount of user access. This is because hypothetically it is only your IT department that will be using and testing these products while they are in test/dev. Many companies don’t learn what sort of criteria a product has to meet to be classified as test/dev and often will let their products accidentally slip from test/dev into full production territory while still improperly licenced. Make sure you understand what qualifies a product as test/dev and then make absolutely certain that those qualifications are met and maintained.  

“But my Microsoft Account Rep or reseller said….”

Vendor Sales Reps, including Microsoft are highly trained to sell you licenses, first and foremost. They are trained to present to you high pricing proposals that include many products and “extras” that may not suit your business needs or accurate cover everything you require. They may come across as though these are fixed rates that are non-negotiable. There is also no way to validate what a Microsoft Account Rep did or didn’t say. To avoid getting into a confrontation that puts your word against the Account Rep, it’s best to maintain the philosophy ‘unless it’s written down, it didn’t happen.’ What’s more, don’t trust the Microsoft Account Rep over your own data, even if what you’ve been told is true, it’s far better to have it backed up with tangible evidence.   

 “We have a SAM Tool and it says…..”

There are many SAM tools that claim to be able to track your software activity and collect data for any impending audit, but plenty of vendors do not actually accept the data these programs collect. Often businesses will have to fight in order to convince the auditors to use their SAM tools over the ones the auditor’s will bring in themselves. It is also not guaranteed that these SAM tools will gather everything an auditor asks for. Every vendor uses a different licensing metric. So, it is important that these tools are not your only source of auditing aid for any upcoming software audit. 

No one particularly enjoys software audits, but one thing that is worse than a software audit is a software audit that is unorganized, ill-prepared and banked on pleasant half-truths. So, take some time to see if there’s anything you can do to lower the risk of an audit or prepare for one if you feel like it is already on the way. So, when the software vendors and their auditors walk through your door, they won’t find you sleeping with your ears stuffed with easy wishful thinking. Instead, they’ll find you ready for a fight. For more information on how to prepare for a software audit, please visit our Learning Center.