Kaseya High Watermark Pricing Is Gone. Audit This Before June Ends
Kaseya high watermark pricing is going away. Good. Now MSPs need to do the boring part before June ends.
Kaseya said at DattoCon 2025 that Datto RMM, SaaS Protection, and Autotask would move off high watermark pricing effective December 2025, with the rest of Kaseya's tools expected to follow by the end of June 2026. The replacement is committed minimum quantity plus variable consumption.
That sounds cleaner. It can be cleaner.
But only if your committed minimum matches the client base you actually support now.
Quick answer: what should MSPs audit?
MSPs should compare active endpoint counts, committed minimum quantities, variable usage, product-level license pools, and client billing rules before Kaseya finishes the high watermark transition. The goal is simple: make sure vendor commitments, live usage, and client invoices tell the same story.
Do not treat this as a vendor-news item. Treat it like margin work.
A pricing model change does not automatically give margin back. Sometimes it just moves the leak to a different line on the invoice.
What high watermark pricing meant in plain English
High watermark pricing meant your bill could be tied to a peak usage level instead of the number you were using right now.
If your endpoint count went up, the high watermark went up. If your endpoint count later dropped, your commitment did not always follow it back down fast enough. That is why MSPs hated it.
This hurt most when normal MSP life happened:
- A client churned.
- A project temporarily inflated device count.
- A messy tenant cleanup left old seats behind.
- A large client downsized.
- A tech forgot to remove stale agents.
None of those moments feel dramatic when they happen. They show up later as a vendor bill that still thinks you are bigger than you are.
That is the trust problem hiding under the pricing problem. MSPs can tolerate a high bill when it maps to real client revenue. They get angry when the bill lags behind reality.
Kaseya's official DattoCon 2025 announcement says the company is ending high watermark pricing for Datto RMM, SaaS Protection, and Autotask. CRN also covered the same pricing change, noting the move to committed minimum quantity and variable consumption.
The new model is better only if you read the fine print
Committed minimum quantity sounds fairer than high watermark. You commit to a baseline. Usage above that baseline becomes variable consumption.
But the minimum is still a commitment.
Datto RMM's CMQ billing FAQ says billing is based on your committed minimum quantity or calculated license usage, whichever is higher. It also says reducing usage only reduces the bill down to the committed minimum, and reductions to the committed minimum can only be made when renewing a contract.
That last sentence is the one to put on a sticky note.
If your committed minimum is too high, deleting stale agents helps with overage. It does not fix the floor. You need renewal negotiation for that.
The Datto RMM FAQ also says monthly usage is calculated using license count at midnight UTC on the last day of the previous month. If you are used to cleaning up stale devices whenever someone remembers, that timing matters. A cleanup on the first of the month is not the same as a cleanup before month-end.
For SaaS Protection, Datto's documentation says standalone and legacy SaaS Protection subscriptions moved to committed minimum quantity and variable consumption in December 2025. It also explains that protected seats can include active, paused, inactive, or archived statuses, depending on subscription type and status.
Translation: this is not one count. It is several counts wearing the same coat.
The audit: five numbers to pull before June ends
You do not need a perfect billing archaeology project. Start with five numbers.
| Number | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Current active endpoint count | Shows the estate you actually support today. |
| Current committed minimum quantity | Shows the floor you pay even when usage drops. |
| Last 90 days of license usage | Exposes month-end spikes, cleanup misses, and usage drift. |
| Highest billed count in the last 12 months | Shows how far the old model may have drifted from reality. |
| Client-billed endpoint or seat count | Shows whether vendor cost and client revenue still match. |
This is not finance busywork. This is how you find the gap between vendor billing and client billing.
If Kaseya says Datto RMM now includes a 90-day license usage history with daily usage across Kaseya 365 and CMQ licenses, use it. Pull the history. Screenshot it. Export it if the tool allows it. Match it against PSA agreements and client invoices.
Do the same for Autotask and SaaS Protection where relevant. The exact screens may differ. The question does not.
Are you paying for work you no longer bill?
Where MSPs will get caught
The first trap is assuming committed minimum pricing fixes stale inventory. It does not. It fixes one pricing shape. You still need operational hygiene.
The second trap is looking only at total endpoint count. You need product-level counts.
A stale RMM agent, an old SaaS Protection seat, and a security add-on do not behave the same way. They may have different license pools, billing dates, and cleanup steps. One sloppy client offboarding can leave several little charges behind.
The third trap is treating vendor cleanup as separate from client billing. It is not.
If a client agreement says 87 endpoints and your RMM shows 102, one of three things is true:
- The client is underbilled.
- Your tooling is dirty.
- The agreement no longer describes the environment.
All three are fixable. None fix themselves.
The fourth trap is waiting for renewal theater.
If you find a committed minimum gap in June, do not wait until the account manager calls with a cheerful renewal deck. Bring numbers now. Current usage. Historical usage. Client churn. Product-level count changes. Screenshots. Contract term dates.
You may not get a mid-term reduction. Fine. But you will know the negotiation position before renewal week turns into panic week.
How to reconcile vendor cost with client billing
Build a simple client-level reconciliation. Ugly spreadsheet is fine.
For each client, list:
- Client name
- Active RMM devices
- Active protected users
- Security or backup add-ons
- What the client agreement bills for
- What the vendor bill charges for
- The delta
- Owner for cleanup or billing correction
Then mark each row with one action:
| Finding | Action |
|---|---|
| Vendor count is higher than client bill | Clean up stale licenses or update client billing. |
| Client bill is higher than vendor count | Confirm scope. You may be billing correctly for service, not tools. |
| Committed minimum is higher than live usage | Prepare renewal negotiation with evidence. |
| Usage spikes above commitment monthly | Decide whether to raise commitment or clean month-end process. |
| Client churn left licenses behind | Fix offboarding checklist and assign cleanup ownership. |
Do not overcomplicate the first pass. You are not building a finance system. You are finding margin leaks.
If you use Scopable, this is exactly the kind of work that should feed the client record, roadmap, budget, and quote. A vendor pricing change should not live in someone's inbox. It should become a client-level decision: absorb it, clean it up, pass it through, or change scope.
If you want that discipline wired into assessment, roadmap, budget, quote, and project workflow, join Scopable early access.
What to say to clients if billing changes
Do not make this about Kaseya drama. Clients do not care about your vendor politics.
Make it about inventory accuracy and agreement accuracy.
A sane client note sounds like this:
We are auditing endpoint and user counts across our management stack because vendor billing rules changed. If your active count has changed, we will reconcile it against your agreement before making any billing adjustment. No action is needed from you unless we find a mismatch.
That is clear. It does not overpromise savings. It does not blame a vendor. It gives you room to correct both directions.
If the client is underbilled, say so plainly. If they are overbilled, fix it. If the environment has grown, update the agreement.
The worst answer is eating the delta quietly because nobody wants an awkward conversation. That is how pricing leaks become culture.
The renewal packet you should build now
If your committed minimum is wrong, prepare the renewal packet before the renewal.
Include:
- Current active usage by product
- 90-day usage history
- 12-month billed usage if available
- Client churn or expansion events that changed the count
- Stale license cleanup completed before month-end
- Your requested committed minimum
- Your requested rate or term adjustment, if any
Ask for the contract shape you actually need. Not the one you accidentally inherited from a past peak.
A fair committed minimum should reflect the base of the business you expect to carry, not a spike from a messy quarter.
Bottom line
Kaseya ending high watermark pricing is a useful change. It is not a margin strategy.
The strategy is the audit.
Pull the counts. Compare the commitment. Reconcile vendor cost to client billing. Clean stale usage before month-end. Build the renewal packet before the renewal trap closes.
Vendor pricing changes are where margin either comes back quietly or disappears quietly.
Make it loud.
