Intuit's Pricing Strategy for SaaS versus Client Software

[KenCarlson]

First off, i am a loyal customer and a long time TurboTax user.  A real big fan of this excellent product.

One would think that Intuit would prefer to migrate its user-base away from client software distributed via DVD and loaded onto home computers in favor of their cloud-based software-as-a-service platform.  It just makes sense because unit costs have to be lower and profitability better with the SaaS offering.

If I'm not wrong about that, why does Intuit make it more expensive for me to subscribe to the SaaS offering?  I buy my client software at Costco, and I believe that for the Premier version, I saved ~$15 (a pretty substantive percentage of total cost) buy buying the DVD, bringing it home, installing it, using the automated software update features, and preparing my return using the client software.

I would LOVE the added convenience of just using the cloud-based version, but I'm a cheapskate, and that fifteen bucks keeps me shopping at Costco.    I am NOT suggesting that Intuit jacks the price of the client software, but I AM suggesting that you make the cloud offering more cost competitive - at least the same price, but preferably lower.  Why wouldn't you?

[NCperson]

remember that TT doesn't control the price that retailers charge.  That becomes especially apparent at Costco since Costco's business model is to sell their items as close to cost as possible and make up their margins via the annual membership fee,

personally, for the convenience, I just sign up for the Advantage program and download the Desktop software each year.

[Pitchdeck]

A fantastic book on this subject is titled Monetizing Innovation. In conclusion, usage-based pricing  is the best approach; competitor-based pricing is always risky as it may result in a race to the bottom. Assessing willingness to pay is necessary to accomplish that, and both qualitative and quantitative methods can be used to do so. It's well covered in the book I mentioned.

[Critter-3]

There are still eight various software providers who will participate in the Free File program but they will not be available until sometime in January----so if you want to use one of them---WAIT.

Use this IRS site for other ways to file for free:

https://apps.irs.gov/app/freeFile/