What does it cost to get support for RMS ?

jd,

The program does not expire, but it is highly recommended that you purchase the Maintenance support for the product.

This gives you access to the private CustomerSource website, all updates to the program for the year, some on-line training, downloading additional reports, receipts from CustomerSource

The cost is 18% of the retail price of the product.

No, the product doesn't expire and is not subscription based. MS does offer an annual support plan that gives you access to the "Customer Source" support site. You need to be on the support plan to receive updates (hot fixes and service packs) to the product. The support plan is 18% of the retail price of your software annualy. Support does not include "Incidents", but gets you access to a knowledge base where you can get some self-service support.

"getting support" for RMS can mean many things, and price will depend on what you want and who you get it from. RMS is sold through a partner channel and different partners will offer different services at different rates.

Being enrolled in the support plan also gives you the right to upgrade pricing when a new version of RMS gets released. Only customers on the MS support plan can get upgrade pricing. If you do not have a support plan, you must the full retail price in order to upgrade.

Mind you they will sometimes make an exception and let you buy the new version at the upgrade price, but will require you to purchase a support plan as well as a back payment for the amount of time you have been using RMS without a supprt plan. However this is by request only and is dealt with on a case-by-case basis. If you continually decide to lapse on your RMS support plan, I doubt they will give you much lenience.

Thanks for all the info.