For many attorneys, the best new app that was released in 2014 was Microsoft Word for iPad. As I noted in the review I wrote in April, the app works great when you want to view or edit Microsoft Word documents on an iPad. I use the app almost every day in my law practice. But as I also noted in my review, while the app itself is free to download, if you want to edit documents you need to have an Office 365 subscription, and the pricing of that can be confusing.
Last week, Microsoft announced new monthly subscription plans for Office 365, and some folks have asked me which plan is best for attorneys who want to use all of the features of Word for iPad and the other Office suite apps (Excel for iPad and PowerPoint for iPad). The two new plans are Office 365 Personal for $6.99/month, which allows access on one computer and one tablet, and Office 365 Home for $9.99/month, which offers access to up to five computers and up to five tablets. Those monthly subscriptions are actually not a bargain because they cost more than an annual subscription. For example, you can get Office 365 Home for $99/year. Or you can even buy a subscription key card on Amazon and pay a discounted price of only $63.99 per year, which is only $5.33 a month. So which of these plans is best for attorneys?
Actually, I think that the answer is none of them. Technically, any of those plans will give you a license number that you could enter to make Microsoft Word work on your iPad. However, the license agreements impose limitations on what you are supposed to do with those plans.
If you look at the Microsoft website, you will see that Microsoft offers many different plans for Office 365. This page lists six of them, ranging from Office 365 Personal to Office Professional 2013, but that isn’t close to all of the plans offered. Nevertheless, I link to that page because it does state that Office 365 Home and Office 365 Personal are licensed only for “home use.” What does that mean? The Microsoft Software License Agreement includes the following in the “Additional Terms” section:
8. HOME AND STUDENT SOFTWARE
“Home and Student” edition software may not be used for commercial, non-profit, or revenue-generating activities.
If you are an attorney, presumably you are using Microsoft Word for “commercial” or “revenue-generating” activities. Even if you are doing purely pro bono work, you would still seem to be doing “non-profit” activities. Thus, if I am reading the license correctly (and I think I am), attorneys are not supposed to use an Office 365 Home or an Office 365 Personal subscription to use Microsoft Word for iPad to view and edit work-related files.
Instead, you need to look at the Office 365 for business plans to purchase an appropriate license for using Microsoft Word on an iPad. This page lists seven such plans, which range from $5 per user a month to $22 per user a month. Four of those plans provide access to Microsoft’s mobile apps (which includes Microsoft Word for iPad). The Office 365 Small Business Premium plan costs $150 per user a year and supports a maximum of 25 years. If you have 26 to 300 users, it looks like you can use the Office 365 Midsize Business plan, which also costs $150 per user a year. Microsoft also offers the Office 365 Enterprise E3 plan, which costs $240 per user a year for unlimited users.
But that’s not all. Microsoft also offers education plans, government plans, and nonprofit plans. Plus, Microsoft has sales representatives with whom you can negotiate packages based upon your specific needs.
I know that at first blush, $150 a year seems like a lot, but remember you are not just paying for the iPad apps. That also gives you the latest versions of the desktop versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Access and other programs (if you use a PC; only some of those programs are available for Mac). It also gives you 1 TB of storage on OneDrive for Business and access to other Microsoft services.
[UPDATE 9/16/14: Legal tech consultant Ben Schorr alerted me that Microsoft has new plans coming out on Oct. 1 for companies with 1 to 250 employees. The current Small Business, Small Business Premium and Midsize Business plans will be replaced with Office 365 Business Essentials, Office 365 Business and Office 365 Premium. The Office 365 Business plan will cost $8.25/month per user ($99/year) and includes all of the Office applications for up to five PCs or Macs plus the iPad apps. If you also want Exchange, you’ll have to get Office 365 Business Premium, which is $12.50/month per user ($150/year). Thanks, Ben!]
I suspect that many attorneys are already paying for an Office 365 subscription to use the desktop software, and if that applies to you, then you can think of the iPad apps as a free add-on. If you are using older versions of Microsoft Office software on your computers, consider whether you want to upgrade to Office 365 to get a license for the iPad apps. If you cannot yet upgrade, I recommend that you talk to a Microsoft sales representative about the best options for your law office.