Software Licence Audit: Avoiding Compliance Risks and Reducing Costs
Software licence compliance is a ticking time bomb for many organisations. Audit penalties average 2-3x the cost of proper licensing. Regular self-audits prevent nasty surprises and often reveal cost savings.
Common Compliance Risks
- Over-deployment: more installations than licences purchased
- Wrong edition: using enterprise features on standard licences
- Virtualisation: not accounting for virtual machine licensing rules
- Cloud migration: on-premise licences that don't transfer
Audit Process
1. Inventory: Discover all installed software across all devices. 2. Entitlements: Compile all licence agreements and purchases. 3. Reconcile: Compare installations against entitlements. 4. Remediate: Address gaps through purchase, removal, or licence optimisation.
Cost Reduction
Audits frequently reveal unused licences that can be reclaimed. Most organisations find 15-25% of licences are unused and can be decommissioned or reassigned.
Audit your licences. Contact info@petatec.uk.
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