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Essentials

Per-user managed IT with M365 Business Premium + the full OS-locked stack.

$179 / user / month inc-GST

Minimum 3 users. All prices include GST.

Book a discovery call → Compare all 5 tiers →

Who it's for

Micro business 2-4 staff who need real IT, full M365, and the full security baseline

  • → Trades business with 3 staff — director, office manager, field tech
  • → Allied health practice with 4 practitioners
  • → Small accounting or legal firm with 2-4 staff
  • → Professional services firm transitioning from a break-fix model to managed services

Why Essentials

Essentials is the tier most clients land on. Micro business — 2 to 4 staff — needs the full M365 Business Premium stack (Intune for mobile devices, Defender for O365 for email threats, Azure Information Protection for sensitivity labels) plus the security baseline that does the heavy lifting in 2026.

Per-user pricing means the cost scales with people, not devices. You can have a phone, a laptop, and a tablet per user with no per-device add-on charges — the user is the unit.

This is the tier where we stop being a vendor and start being the actual IT department. You stop having to think about what tool does what; we make those decisions and live with them.

What's included

Everything in Essentials, by category.

Bundled price; no separate line items. The list below is the full scope of what we deliver at this tier.

Microsoft 365
  • ✓ Microsoft 365 Business Premium licence included
  • ✓ Microsoft Intune (MDM) for mobile + endpoint management
  • ✓ Defender for O365 P1 — email threat protection (Safe Links, Safe Attachments, anti-phishing)
  • ✓ Conditional Access policies (baseline OIT template applied)
Endpoint
  • ✓ NinjaOne RMM + ticketing
  • ✓ Microsoft Defender for Business — MDR
  • ✓ Patch management — Windows, Mac, applications
Backup
  • ✓ Acronis Cyber Protect — endpoint + M365 backup
Identity
  • ✓ 1Password Business — per-user vault with shared team vault
DNS / Web
  • ✓ Cloudflare Gateway — DNS filtering + WARP roaming agent (per-user)
Email signatures
  • ✓ Exclaimer Standard tier — centrally-managed email signature per user mailbox
Documentation
  • ✓ Hudu per-client knowledge base, runbooks, password manager integration
Compliance
  • ✓ Privacy Act / NDB compliance baseline
Support
  • ✓ Business-hours support, email and phone, ticketed via NinjaOne
  • ✓ New-user onboarding (account setup, device enrolment) included

What's NOT included

Honest about the boundaries.

Other MSPs leave this off their service pages and then surprise you with line items. Here's the explicit list of what you don't get at Essentials.

  • ✕ Monthly business review (MBR) meetings — Standard+ tier
  • ✕ Defender for O365 P2 (Threat Explorer, AIR, Attack Simulator) — Standard+ tier
  • ✕ Premium-tier human SOC (Huntress)
  • ✕ Application allowlisting (ThreatLocker-class)
  • ✕ Quarterly business reviews
  • ✕ After-hours support
  • ✕ Compliance support (SMB1001 / Essential Eight uplift) — add-on

Need more?

Add Monthly Business Reviews, advanced email protection (P2), and growth-tier security.

Standard adds the inclusions you're missing here. Worth the difference if you fit the description.

See Standard →

FAQ

Common questions — Essentials

What's the 3-user minimum?
Below 3 users, Solo Secure works better — per-endpoint pricing is more honest for the smaller scale. If you have exactly 2 staff and need full M365 BP, we make exceptions; ask during the discovery call.
How does per-user pricing handle phones and tablets?
Included. A user is a person, not a device — your phone, laptop, and tablet are all covered under the one user fee. Add-ons only apply to additional desktops/laptops per user beyond the first.
Do you really include the M365 Business Premium licence?
Yes, at cost. Your invoice has one line: 'Essentials managed services × N users.' Inside that, the M365 BP licence (currently ~$38.21/user/month wholesale via Pax8, verified 09/06/2026) is included. We don't make margin on Microsoft licensing — we make margin on managing it.
Can I bring my existing M365 subscription?
Yes. Subtract the M365 BP licence cost (~$38) from the tier price. We manage everything else.
What about clients with very specific compliance needs?
SMB1001 certification + Essential Eight uplift are available as add-ons at every tier from Essentials up. For clients with regulator-mandated requirements (medical, finance, government tender), Standard or Premium is the right starting point.
Onboarding fee and contract term?
Essentials carries a $1,650 inc-GST one-off onboarding fee (~12-15 hours of setup labour — M365 BP migration, Conditional Access baseline, Intune enrolment, Hudu build, Exclaimer rollout, documented onboarding workflow). 12-month commitment is the default at the published $179/user/mo rate. Month-to-month is available at $197/user/mo (+10% covers Microsoft's NCE monthly licence premium). 24-month earns 5% off list, 36-month earns 8% off; onboarding is waivable on 24-month at our discretion and waived by default on 36-month.

Ready to talk about Essentials?

30-minute discovery call. We'll confirm fit and quote your specific scenario. No sales script.

Book a 30-min discovery call →