HN Explorer

Ask HN: Are you using Asana premium and do you find the pricing misleading?

3 points by jjeaff ↗ HN
Was getting ready to try Asana premium but was rather frustrated with their pricing setup. It is advertised as $7.50 a month "per member per month" That number goes up as your organization falls into different pricing tiers.

But they don't actually charge you "per member per month" they charge you for the maximum amount of members you can have in the tier you selected. So 16 members means you pay $11.99 x 20 = $239.80 per month. But 16 members x $11.99 = $191.84

https://i.imgur.com/rMfccsh.png

Seems very disingenuous to list your pricing per member when you are actually just pricing it per tiered level.

I was about to pull the trigger as I had convinced myself I could get over the arduously slow load times, but the fancy footwork with the pricing scheme makes me want to switch to give Trello a try. (Where aparently $9.99 per user per month means $9.99 per user per month.)

7 comments

[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 24.7 ms ] thread
dmlittle
I wish more SaaS companies followed Slack's "Fair billing" policy[1] where you get charged per actual usage rather than subscribed usage. For example, if you're subscribed for 16 members but 4 of those members took a 1 week vacation each in a particular month, you'll only be charged for 15 members because you only used 15 members worth of member hours in that month[2].

[1] https://slack.com/pricing#fair_billing

[2] https://medium.com/hackerpreneur-magazine/is-this-the-best-c...

jjeaff
That takes it to an even higher level of fairness. So in comparison, slack is only billing for actual users AND only if those users are using slack. Asana bills for users that don't exist AND actual users whether they use it or not.
ajeet_dhaliwal
I only see the $9.99 pricing. Is the $7.50 the small business discount they're talking about?
jjeaff
Yes, if you have between 5 and 10 users it's $75 a month.
danieltillett
Pricing is an endlessly complex problem. If such a pricing strategy brings in more business than it drives away then it is good, otherwise bad. There is also that they want to everyone in the team to use it - by using tiers this stops those at the margins being excluded.

The tier-based pricing is certainly not clear from their website. I think they could do better here.

jjeaff
Ya, seems very simple. All they have to say is "up to 10 users". Not "per user per month". I don't think I buy the exclusion argument though. Seeing as I am specifically leaving out a few members of my team (contractors) just to get below the next tier.

I'm sure asana has researched it endlessly and has tons of testing under their belt. But in my use case, they would be making more money if it was actually per user.

danieltillett
This is the problem with any pricing scheme - there are always some users that are worse off.

I have no issue with their pricing scheme if that is what works for them best, but they should be more upfront about what they are actually charging.