Software pricing seems straightforward until you try to apply it to a franchise network.
Most business software charges per user. One seat, one monthly fee. It works well enough for a single company with a fixed team. But franchise networks aren’t a single company. They’re a network of semi-independent businesses, each with their own staff, managed by a head office that needs visibility across all of them.
Per-user pricing wasn’t designed for that structure. And when you try to make it fit, things get awkward fast.
The per-user problem in franchise networks
Think about what “users” actually means in a franchise network. Head office has admin staff, operations managers, maybe a finance team. Each franchisee needs access. Their office admin probably needs access too. And then there are the field operatives — the people actually doing the jobs.
A modest 20-unit network with three users per franchise is already 60 seats before you’ve even counted head office. At typical field service software rates of £30-50 per user per month, that’s £1,800-3,000 monthly. And it only goes up from there.
But the cost isn’t even the worst part. The worst part is the conversations it creates.
“Does she really need a login?”
Per-user pricing forces franchisors into an uncomfortable role: gatekeeper of software access. When every seat carries a full monthly fee, every access request becomes a cost decision.
Does the franchisee’s partner who covers on Fridays need a full seat? What about the admin who only runs reports once a week? The new operative who’s still in training?
When each of those seats costs £30-50 a month, those questions start to matter — and they slow down adoption, create friction with franchisees, and turn software into a political issue rather than a productivity tool. The whole point of bringing in software is to make things easier, not to create new arguments about who’s allowed to use it.
How per-franchisee pricing works differently
Per-franchisee pricing ties the headline cost to network size, not headcount. You pay for each franchise unit in your network, and each unit comes with a block of users included — enough for the owner and their core team — so the everyday people who need access have it without a separate purchase decision for each one.
This changes the dynamic:
Costs track the right number. Your bill is driven by how many franchises you run, not how many individuals happen to log in. Adding your 25th franchise is a predictable step, not a trigger to renegotiate a software contract.
The core team is covered. Each franchise includes three users, and head office includes three of its own. For a typical small franchise — an owner-manager and a couple of operatives — that’s the whole team, at no extra cost.
Heavy users aren’t penalised. Where a franchise does need more than its included users, additional users are a flat £12 per month — well below the £30-50 per seat that per-user tools charge. The field operatives generating your job data are never the expensive part of the system.
What franchisees think about it
Franchisees notice pricing models too — especially when they’re the ones paying or contributing to shared costs.
Per-user pricing penalises franchisees who invest in their team. Every new hire is another full-price seat, which creates a perverse incentive to limit access to the very tools that help people do their jobs. Per-franchisee pricing softens that: the included users cover most teams, and where extra users are needed, the marginal cost is modest rather than another £30-50 seat. The cost reflects the franchise far more than the team size, so franchisees can grow their teams without watching the software bill climb in lockstep.
The hidden cost of per-user workarounds
When per-user pricing feels expensive, people find workarounds. Shared logins. One person entering data on behalf of others. Operatives phoning the office instead of using the app because “we don’t have enough seats.”
These workarounds defeat the purpose of the software. You lose the audit trail of who did what. Data entry gets delayed or delegated, so it’s less accurate. And the field operatives — the people generating the actual job data — are the first to be locked out because they’re seen as occasional users.
In a jobs-based franchise, the operative completing the job is the most important user in the system. Their data is what flows up to the franchisee and then to head office. A pricing model that makes those users expensive to add is working against you.
What this looks like in practice
Jobs360 uses per-franchisee pricing. Head office and your first franchise are free — no credit card required. From the second franchise, it’s £36 per franchisee per month, and each franchise includes three users (head office includes three of its own). Additional users, where you need them, are £12 per month each.
That means a 25-unit network pays £864 per month for the franchise subscriptions, with 75 users included across the network before any per-user cost — every franchise owner and their core field team covered. Compare that to a per-user model where the same network at three users per franchise would cost £2,250-3,750 per month, and you’d still be having arguments about who gets a login.
Choosing the right model for your network
If you’re evaluating software for your franchise network, ask the pricing question early. Not just “how much does it cost?” but “how does it cost?”
Per-user pricing works for single businesses with stable teams. But franchise networks aren’t that. They’re growing, distributed operations where dozens or hundreds of people need access across multiple locations. The pricing model should reflect that reality, not fight against it.
Jobs360 is franchise management software built for jobs-based networks, with simple per-franchisee pricing and users included at every location. See what it does or get in touch to find out how it works for your network.