* High cost of upgrade

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Gowermick
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High cost of upgrade

Post by Gowermick »

When I got the recent upgrade from V6.2 to V7 I received a discount, which I found reasonable but pricey at the time.

I have now discovered that I paid more for the upgrade, than those who recently bought V6.2 (which came with the free upgrade!). Are CP taking us for mugs? What price loyalty? :(
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tatewise
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by tatewise »

At first, I felt like agreeing with you, but on reflection established users have had up to 6 years use of FH v6, whereas those who bought FH v6 with a free upgrade to FH v7 have had at most a year. So the extra cost is offset by up to 5 years of use of FH v6.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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Gowermick
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by Gowermick »

Mike,
My compalint is more the fact that they felt they could justify a price hike of over 50% for standalone V7, over the price they sold v6.2 with V7, just a few months before!

PS Mike, you need to adjust your profile, it still says V6.2 :D :D
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ColeValleyGirl
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

I suspect Mike T is running both versions, as am I.

£60 full price is not out of line with similar products -- especially if you think that you'll probably get 4 or 5 years of free upgrades, so £15 per annum or just over £1 a month. Brilliant value.

As for complaining that CP were selling V6.2 with a free upgrade to V7 for some months, that's pretty standard practice as well -- as soon as the news appears that a new version is coming, many people who were thinking about buying V6 would have decided not to buy but to wait for V7. Allowing them to buy V6 with a free upgrade to V7 will have been essential to keep cash flowing into the business while V7 was being developed and tested. You might feel aggrieved that you didn't personally benefit from the offer, but that's life -- and you'd already had some years (possibly 6) of using V6 for whatever you paid for it.
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davepacey
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by davepacey »

I have been using Family Historian since 29th June 2002 and have happily paid for every paid upgrade since, on version 5, I chose to pay for the full version to simplify the reinstallation process, I don't have the information of cost for those 32 upgrades, most of which were free, but I do not regret paying for any of them.
The cost of this upgrade may seem quite expensive, but it is without doubt worth every penny of that simply for the extra benefits it brings. It's a major upgrade bringing a great many new features. The more I use it, the more I like the new features, No one has to pay for an upgrade, if they are happy with the old version, that is fine too.
I once bought a new 48" smart tv, two days later it was in a sale £100 less than I paid for mine, that's life I'm afraid :-)

Dave.
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Mark1834
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by Mark1834 »

Upgrade costs about the same as 3 GRO certificates, or 2 months subscription to Ancestry or FMP, or maybe a third of the cost of a basic overnight trip to a distant records office (remember when we allowed to do such things...?). It’s a lot less than the electricity cost of running your PC for the life of the product, so let’s keep a sense of proportion please.
Mark Draper
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Gowermick
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by Gowermick »

Perhaps I expressed myself badly or you are all missing the point.

Irrespective of whether you think the price is fair or not, the question I was asking was how do CP justify a price rise of 50% in just a few months? Inflation isn’t that bad!

Why do I get the feeling that they raised the price, solely so they would look good given us a discount!
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ColeValleyGirl
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

It's a different price for a different product -- they haven't upped the price for V6.
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Gowermick
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by Gowermick »

Helen,
That argument doesn’t hold! If V6 + V7 could be bought for £40, how can it now cost £60 for V7?
To me that’s a price hike of 50% for V7, whatever way you look at it.
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mjashby
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by mjashby »

Sorry, but what is the point of this 'discussion'? The price is the price the seller decides. It is simply "an invitation to treat" and the prospective purchaser is not compelled to pay the price asked, as they can walk away and buy/use something else if they don't feel it's worthwhile/affordable. They can even choose from the various opensource/freeware options if they so wish and only pay what they decide in the form of a donation/donations or by providing other more practical help. And let's not forget that 20% of the the price paid is VAT if the purchaser is a UK resident.
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ColeValleyGirl
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

mjashby wrote: 16 Dec 2020 14:24 Sorry, but what is the point of this 'discussion'? The price is the price the seller decides.
Absolutely right!
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GeneSniper
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by GeneSniper »

I don't think anyone is saying that over many years of owning something it gets better value, but CP could bring out another update in 2 years and the price hike that appeared for FH7 isn't such good value. I agree with Mike Loney on this one, hell I even mentioned it in another post, how can a company justify giving someone a discount so that they can purchase something more expensive than it was available the day before with extra's (V6 + V7< V7 upgrade). Oh and Davepacey were not talking about £100 off a tv were talking about buying a tv and getting the next model as well, at a cheaper price than the person who only gets the new model the day after you.

I just feel if you are going to do what CP did they should have let their users know the upgrade price was going to be greater than the V6 + v7 upgrade so that those who were going to upgrade anyway could have got themselves an extra copy of V6. It wouldn't have saved me from the price increase as I was waiting to see if V7 was the way I wanted to go before I upgraded, but there are those who will upgrade no matter what and they would have saved a few pounds and gained another copy of V6.
William

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David2416
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by David2416 »

I do agree with GeneSniper. On the other hand with hindsight I would have chosen different lottery numbers. At the end of the day it's not a big sum, just momentarily annoying. I'll be updating soon just tidying up the file first.
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ronk
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by ronk »

David2416 wrote: 17 Dec 2020 08:22 At the end of the day it's not a big sum, just momentarily annoying.
Precisely, and as another noted, let's keep a sense of proportion. I am happy in any event to contribute to Calico Pie a amount less than the cost of nice night out (pre-pandemic ;) ) for a premier product, regardless if other users might have paid more or less.
Ron Krzmarzick~~ FH 7.0.20 TNG 14.0.2 website Roots & Relatives Remembered, Laragon 5.0, Win 11 pro
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brianlummis
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by brianlummis »

As I said in a different topic about Calico Pie, a company's marketing strategy should be to look after it's own customers first before targeting new customers. What they should have done, prior to announcing that Version 7 was in the pipeline, was to increase the price to new purchasers of V6 to the increased price of V7 and then give a discount to existing V6 customers when V7 was launched. That way there would have been no complaint from anyone!
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Gowermick
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by Gowermick »

Brian,
Sadly, companies (not necessarily Calico Pie), don’t think like us customers. Their target is to increase customers at any price. If that mean upsetting existing customers, so be it.
You only have to look at energy and Telecom companies, who try to attract new customers with deals that are not available to existing customers.
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keith_r59
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by keith_r59 »

brianlummis wrote: 17 Dec 2020 17:31 As I said in a different topic about Calico Pie, a company's marketing strategy should be to look after it's own customers first before targeting new customers. What they should have done, prior to announcing that Version 7 was in the pipeline, was to increase the price to new purchasers of V6 to the increased price of V7 and then give a discount to existing V6 customers when V7 was launched. That way there would have been no complaint from anyone!
Existing V6 customers received a 30% discount when they upgraded to V7.
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GeneSniper
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by GeneSniper »

Mike

I am not sure what CP's thoughts are, over a 50% increase in price is not the way to increase your customer base. Unless everyone else increases their prices substantially then FH has just shot itself in the foot. They have now moved them selves very close to FTM (The expensive one), especially the upgrade price I was offered last month and I would imagine not going to pull many users from them. I presume they are happy with their customer base and have realised it doesn't matter what they charge them as most will upgrade because changing will only get harder as they add more things to the program that will be more difficult to export.

Keith

30% discount from what? the highly inflated price? The original gripe was that someone could have bought FH6 in the last year for less than the upgrade price and got a free upgrade. Most companies are struggling at the moment, so not rushing to increase their prices by 50%. I would have imagined in pretty much any other sector a 50% increase would be suicide for a company.
William

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AdrianBruce
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by AdrianBruce »

brianlummis wrote: 17 Dec 2020 17:31... What they should have done, prior to announcing that Version 7 was in the pipeline, was to increase the price to new purchasers of V6 to the increased price of V7 and then give a discount to existing V6 customers when V7 was launched. That way there would have been no complaint from anyone!
Excuse me? Any new customer would have been downright disgusted at the price going up for no increase in capabilities, and would have been over the hills and off to FTM and RM in no time, telling everyone else in the process. Not a good way to increase your customer base.

Incidentally, I remember that in the past CP have added extra functionality in the free .1 (mostly maintenance) release.
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AdrianBruce
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by AdrianBruce »

GeneSniper wrote: 17 Dec 2020 19:54... I would have imagined in pretty much any other sector a 50% increase would be suicide for a company.
Isn't this like expecting to get air-conditioning in your new car for the same price as the old version without air-con? I don't see car manufacturers adding facilities without increasing prices.

Remember v7 has some seriously increased abilities - to be frank FH v6 was behind the curve, particularly in the US, by being stuck on GEDCOM 5.5 (ignoring the question of whether this actually was a genuine disadvantage ;) ) and by not having source templates and enhanced reporting capabilities such as bibliographies and different first and subsequent "footnotes". And, worst case scenario, being behind the curve means no sales to new customers.
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Mark1834
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by Mark1834 »

Gentlemen, this whinging about price is totally pointless and getting rather tedious. A price is an invitation to tender. If you don’t like it, just go elsewhere.
Mark Draper
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GeneSniper
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by GeneSniper »

It has been thought about Mark
William

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Gowermick
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by Gowermick »

AdrianBruce wrote: 17 Dec 2020 22:45 Isn't this like expecting to get air-conditioning in your new car for the same price as the old version without air-con? I don't see car manufacturers adding facilities without increasing prices.
Adrian you seem to be missing the point. CP were effectively selling V7 (along with V6) prior to official release, then hiked price of V7 by 50% when it was finally released. We’re not talking about raising the price for a new product, but the same product i.e. V7.

That was my original compaint, i.e the price hike of V7 itself, not the difference in price between V6 and V7!
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AdrianBruce
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by AdrianBruce »

Gowermick wrote: 18 Dec 2020 12:59... That was my original complaint, i.e the price hike of V7 itself, not the difference in price between V6 and V7!
OK - fair enough. I guess I was mentally responding to those who were complaining about the v6 to v7 increase.
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themoudie
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Re: High cost of upgrade

Post by themoudie »

Oh you "poor" souls, what was your Xmas bill for a day of gluttony? CP didn't cosh you over the head and use a set of stilsons to extract the 50p pieces from your clenched fists. :evil:

You don't "need" software to enjoy genealogy, it makes your self-imposed task more convenient, for you. ;)

Smile, enjoy your breath and see how fortunate you are to have the health and time to delve through archives, when compared with the rigours of the generations past. :D

Good health, Bill
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