How a Madrid law firm cut print costs by thirty five percent with managed print services
A 65 lawyer practice in central Madrid was running 14 standalone office printers, four standalone copiers and a heavily used colour MFP, with no consolidated reporting and no service standard. Three years into a managed print services contract, monthly print spend has fallen 35%, the device fleet has shrunk to nine, and the partners no longer field complaints about print availability.
Snapshot of the engagement
The starting position
The firm occupied a single floor in central Madrid, organised into three departments: corporate, litigation and a smaller real estate practice. Print equipment had accumulated organically over a decade. Each partner office held a desktop printer purchased ad hoc. Four standalone copiers sat near the reception areas of each department. A single A3 colour MFP near the litigation team handled bundles, exhibits and client correspondence.
No single person owned the print estate. IT looked after the network side. The office manager booked toner deliveries through whichever supplier was easiest at the time. Finance saw the print line as the aggregate of about thirty supplier invoices a year, with no visibility into the per device or per user cost.
What the initial audit found
The managed print services engagement opened with a 30 day audit. The audit team installed monitoring agents on every networked device, pulled meter readings from the standalone copiers manually, and reconciled 12 months of supplier invoices. Three findings shaped the proposal that followed.
| Finding | Detail | Implication |
|---|---|---|
| True monthly volume | 52,300 pages across all devices, 22% colour | Higher than estimates suggested, with concentrated colour usage in litigation |
| True monthly cost | €2,840 / month fully loaded | 40% above the office manager's estimate |
| Device utilisation | 9 of 19 devices below 15% of duty cycle | Significant overcapacity in desktop and standalone copiers |
| Service incidents | 23 per quarter across the fleet | Concentrated in two ageing standalone copiers |
| Colour share | 22% overall, 41% in litigation | Process driven; case bundles and exhibits required colour |
The transition plan
The transition ran over six weeks, structured into four phases. Each phase produced a measurable outcome that could be reported to the partner committee.
Phase 1 — Weeks 1 to 2
Audit and proposal sign off
Audit complete, proposal presented to the partner committee, signature obtained. Proposal included a three year managed print services contract with consolidated billing, monthly meter reads via SNMP, and a single response SLA.
Phase 2 — Weeks 3 to 4
New device install
Three new A3 colour MFPs installed in shared positions, replacing the four standalone copiers and the previous colour MFP. Six new A4 colour MFPs distributed across departments, replacing 14 desktop printers with six shared devices. Pull printing software deployed across the network.
Phase 3 — Week 5
User onboarding and policy rollout
Five 30 minute training sessions for legal and support staff covering the new pull print workflow, scan to email destinations and case bundle production. New office print policy distributed and posted by each device.
Phase 4 — Week 6
Decommissioning
14 desktop printers and four standalone copiers collected by the managed print services provider. Hard drives wiped to NIST 800 88 standard with certificates issued. WEEE certificates filed for all 18 retired devices.
The crucial design choice: shared MFPs, not personal printers
The single largest saving came not from a better contract on existing equipment but from removing 13 personal desktop printers from partner offices. The firm reduced from 19 devices to nine, with each device producing roughly twice the volume of the average device under the old setup.
The partner reaction was less dramatic than expected. Pull printing made the shared model feel personal: jobs sat in a queue and released on PIN at any device. Privacy concerns about case work disappeared once partners understood that documents released only on their PIN entry.
Outcomes after 36 months
The contract anniversary review at month 36 captured the full picture. Three findings stood out.
Monthly spend reduction of 35%
Monthly fully loaded print cost fell from €2,840 to €1,847. The saving came from lower per page rates (12% of the total), removed devices (61%), and lower energy consumption (5%). The remaining saving came from reduced paper procurement following duplex defaults and pull print waste reduction.
Service ticket reduction of 42%
Quarterly service tickets fell from 23 to roughly 13. The two ageing standalone copiers accounted for the bulk of the reduction. The new fleet produced incidents at half the rate per page, partly because the devices are newer and partly because the managed print services provider proactively dispatches consumables before failure.
Compliance position strengthened
Hard drive encryption, pull print release and audit log forwarding satisfied the firm's GDPR processor obligations on client data flowing through the device hard drives. The compliance section of the annual data protection review now references the managed print services contract directly.
What did not go to plan
Three smaller issues arose in the first six months. None derailed the contract but each warrants noting for firms planning a similar transition.
Colour share crept back up
The pull print rollout cut colour print share from 22% to 16% in the first quarter. By month nine it had drifted back to 19%. A user education refresh and a driver default review brought it back to 17%, where it has stabilised. Colour share is now reviewed quarterly rather than annually.
One partner resisted desktop printer removal
One senior partner kept their desktop printer despite the rollout plan, citing client confidentiality. The pull print demonstration eventually persuaded them six months in. The lesson sat in scheduling more time for partner engagement during phase 3, not in the technical approach.
Mobile printing was harder than expected
Mobile printing from iPads and personal phones was added in month four after consistent partner requests. The initial driver setup did not anticipate this use case and required a separate configuration round. Future fleet rollouts now include mobile printing in phase 2.
What the firm would do differently
Asked at the 36 month review what they would do differently, the office manager and IT lead identified two changes for the next contract cycle.
Lock the indexation cap earlier
The original contract included a CPI linked indexation clause without a cap. The 2023 CPI year applied an uplift that exceeded the firm's expectations. The renewal contract caps indexation at the lower of CPI or 3%.
Push for tighter SLA on the litigation MFP
The litigation team's A3 colour MFP produces case bundles to court deadlines. The standard SLA was adequate for most departments but occasionally added pressure on tight filings. The renewal upgrades that single device to a same business day SLA with a credit clause.
Replicating the outcome elsewhere
The Madrid firm's experience is consistent with other law firm managed print services transitions of similar size. Three conditions enable the 30 to 40% saving range observed here: an ageing pre managed print services fleet with multiple personal printers; a clear opportunity to consolidate via pull printing; and a senior sponsor willing to enforce shared device behaviour. Where all three apply, the saving lands consistently in this range. Where personal printers are entrenched culturally, the project produces savings but at a smaller scale.