One of the things that puts me off buying an inkjet printer is the whole problem of ink. The replacement cartridges sometimes cost as much as the printer itself and if not used they can dry up and become an expensive waste. Fortunately there are a few things that can be done to alleviate the situation.
First off, make sure you read our reviews and look out for which models are the most efficient! Buying an efficient printer with affordable ink is a must. Watch out because often these companies sell the printer cheap knowing that they’ll make money off the cartridges later.
The real good news is that the big printer companies are innovating in this area, they must be aware of how the consumer feels about their approach to ink refills. Companies like Epson with their Ecotank solution and HP’s Instant Ink are disrupting the status quo.
What is Instant Ink?
The idea is that rather than buying cartridges off the shelf and replacing them each time they expire, HP will send you ink through the post for a fixed monthly fee. How much you pay depends on how much you print. Your printer will monitor how much ink you use and communicate this back to HP.
When your cartridge is running low, HP will automatically send out a new one so you effectively never run out again. You are expected to pop the old one back in the supplied packaging and return it for recycling – fair enough.
You can select from four plans:
- Free! Yes, there’s a free plan! You can really print for free, but you are limited to just 15 pages a month. Each further 10 you print costs you £1.
- £1.99 buys you 50 pages per month. This time your extra pound buys you 15 more prints when your initial quota is exhausted.
- £3.49 buys you 100 pages per month. Each further 20 costs £1.
- £7.99 buys you 300 pages per month. And another 25 will be £1 each time.
If you have unused prints then they roll over until next month.
Online Monitoring
I’ve had a look around the Instant Ink website and I have to say it looks pretty impressive. You can get all the information you need to manage your printing. There are detailed stats on what you printed and when, how much ink you’ve got left, when you got the cartridge and a clear indication of what you have paid.
It’s actually pretty impressive to see the site looking so mature early on, it’s hard to imagine what more information you would need from the site.
Is HP Instant Ink worth it?
There isn’t an easy answer to that. In terms of the cost per print, I think the price looks good. Printer ink has never been cheap, we all understand that this is a fundamental part of the printer market business model. You can get greater efficiencies through laser printers perhaps but there are higher upfront costs here which rules them out for many home environments.
Having a fixed and known cost for your printing therefore makes life much easier. You won’t run out and overall your costs should be lower compared to purchasing repeat cartridges from the manufacturer.
There is a down side. You pay this fixed fee regardless of how much you actually print, whilst you get to carry over prints, this allowance is limited to just one month. So if you don’t print anything that month, you’ve potentially lost out.
At the other end of the scale, if you print more than needed you have to buy extra prints (or change your plan) at the cost of £1 for between 10 and 25 additional prints – depending on your initial plan. So again, your costs could be higher than expected at a busy time of year.
This means getting value for money will depend on your usage patterns. Fortunately HP track and expose this for you so at least you can work out if it is worth while.
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