New Subscription plan suggestion: "playing time"-based plan

[mugendo]

I understand there are a variety of potential charge options online game companies can apply.
I can only state again I am content to pay the current fixed fee of Ryzom.
If you can save me a few dappers a month (as I am a low user player)....then Kudos to you...

Just hope those saved dappers don't come at the expense of another owner of ryzom going broke.

[jared96]

Whether or not 15 bucks a month is a lot of money is not the issue. For some people, just look at the good bye threads, obviously it is. And of course you will get the normal group who will argue against it cause the current system works fine for them but because they want it this way, they are still reluctant to let others have the option of choice.

The fact is howver that the cost of monitoring usage makes the pay by the hour system financially unfeasible. This why why for example why we might pay 5 bucks a month for 200 text messages and then 75 cents for each one therefter.....why ? Cause each one must be documented and every bill is different.

If the cost for Ryzom was $50 a month, an option might exist where ya paid $12.95 just for basic acess. The $12.95 pays for the cost of programming, the time tracking, documenting it, generating thosands of different bills etc. So having a pay by hour option might actually cost GF $12.95 + $1 an hour. Well after the 2nd hour, you ate the full month's cost. So how many would pay $12.95 + when for another $2 , ya don't have to worry about it ?

[viper579]

Originally Posted by jared96

If the cost for Ryzom was $50 a month, an option might exist where ya paid $12.95 just for basic acess. The $12.95 pays for the cost of programming, the time tracking, documenting it, generating thosands of different bills etc. So having a pay by hour option might actually cost GF $12.95 + $1 an hour. Well after the 2nd hour, you ate the full month's cost. So how many would pay $12.95 + when for another $2 , ya don't have to worry about it ?

logging player time is very very simple,

when player joins you add an entry to a table in a database, player x, logged-on, time

when player leaves / crashes / disconnects you add an entry to a table in a database player-x, logged-off, time

then you spend say 2 hours writing a script to parse the data, test the script and create an importer for your billing system. the only issue is they would have to do redo the php forums on their site, though they could just make it a credit card only option which would make it virtually unoticable.

[jared96]

Originally Posted by viper579

logging player time is very very simple,

Yes that is the easy part. Getting the necessary "paper" documentation for the credit card companies isn't; responding to every customer inquiry isn't. Auditing isn't.

Example: Our professional society has something like 300 chapters in 53 states and territories and each chapter has different dues. The # of states and # of chapters + # of other possible dues iterations resulted in 12k possibilities.

Our association managment software handles all the variations easily...it better after a $2mil investment. However there are labor issues, documentation issues, billing inquiries, request for verification and such which all require staff time. A study was done to estimate the cost of having uniform chapter dues within a state. Time was tracked whenever a staffer had to input data, change data, verify data, provide copies of data related to "what the chapter dues was". The result was $365,000 per year was being spent on the tracked activities. As a result the constitution and buylaws were changed to require uniform chapter dues within a state and after only 2 months, the savings is being realized. And we bill once a year !

Example 2: Same organization. We had a monthly credit card billing option where one could elect to pay say $15 a month instead of $300 a year. That $300 is divided between the state, national and chapter organizations. Now again, that's 1 dues category but lets forget about all the other chapters for a bit. Tax lawas and accounting practices require allocation of those funds to specific categories or "accounts" which all have to be audited. Checks have to be printed and signed. A chapter member who paid $6.00 in chapter dues would require us to send a check from our state organization to the chapter for 50 cents each month. Again, all billing and tracking was done with accounting rgram scripts but the manhours needed to implement what had to be done with the figures was extraordinary.

Ever get on a bus or subway in major city and pay by the mile ? When there are large amounts of different possibilities and larteg amounts of users, tracking on off can be easy in todays electronic world. Meeting accounting, auditing and customer service requirements is not.

That's why landline and cell phone costs have bucked inflation continually. Sending out bills that have either amount A, B , C or D saves them craploads of money. Cable TV also. Denny's, all you can eat buffet joints are able to provide low cost meals partially because the savings from not having staff add up numbers.