Now you’re working from home, do you need to buy a better printer?

With the Corona virus pandemic unfortunately in full swing, you may have been stuck working from home for just a few days or perhaps a week or more already. You may have started to realise how much in fact you relied on the good old office copier. All of a sudden you can’t make copies of important documents, you can’t scan and you can’t fax…were you really still using fax at the office? Needing to buy a better printer now you’re working from home may have crossed your mind.

Perhaps you’re also finding yourself in the unenviable but likely unavoidable position of running a home based classroom. And while your kids’ teachers have been kind enough to upload their assignments online, there are most likely still worksheets and a host of other documents that you have to print out to use.

So, now that you are working from home, is your printer up to the task? Whatever the reason, you realise buying a better printer may be unavoidable. And probably not just a regular printer, but a multifunction printer; one that can copy, print, scan documents, send scanned documents to your computer, or via email and perhaps even by fax. 

Although your company may be reimbursing you for printing costs associated with printing work related documents and possibly for the purchase of such a printer, if your own printer is insufficient for your new printing and scanning requirements, you’re still responsible for maintaining it and would no doubt like it to be reliable and for supplies to not cost more than the printer itself.

To ensure that all your home office printing needs are met, choosing the right printer for your temporary (or perhaps more permanent) home office shouldn’t be that difficult if it wasn’t for the sheer multitude of multifunction printers available both in terms of brands, models and optional extras.

Buying the right printer

Now that you require more from your printer, at least for the near future while you may be working from home, a simple home or consumer quality printer may no longer be enough. You may want to consider a business or commercial grade printer. These types of printers of course come at a higher price bracket. As a result they are often purchased under a lease or rental arrangement, along with some type of service plan or agreements, ensuring you get the most from your printer and costs are manageable in case of a breakdown. 

On the other hand, business quality printers tend to be a lot cheaper to run over the longer term. Why do you think there are literally hundreds and hundreds of choices of $60, $100, $200 or even $300 or $400 printers sold by retailers and online stores? Because they make the real money from consumables; inks and toner cartridges. The cost of running these types of printers means you’ll have paid 10x or 20x that much over only a few short years. It is just false economy to utilise a printer designed for home use for business printing purposes. Additionally, business grade printers have better scanning quality and functionality, usually better print quality and are more reliable under higher levels of use, be it printing, copying or scanning.