Will I be charged for upgrades, regardless of the version I buy today?

Make sure that upgrades, for both major and minor releases, are always included in your support or maintenance contract. Otherwise, you will find yourself purchasing countless, costly upgrades each time the vendor decides to release a new version.

It goes without saying that the upgrade process should be quick and painless, involving no manual and time-consuming data migration.

What to ask vendors:

• Are all product upgrades (i.e., both major and minor) included in the support/maintenance agreement?

• How quick and easy is the upgrade process? Can we upgrade at our own convenience?

• Is the upgrade process too technical for us to complete by ourselves, in-house?

• Will our current data be automatically migrated?

• Do we have to upgrade to the latest version or can we remain on our current version?

• Will you continue to support all versions of the software?