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Blog · Coverage and territory · Education

Licence utilisation per institution: seats bought against seats used

How an education provider measures utilisation of what each institution has bought from the licence register and the usage export: seats or logins active against seats purchased, per programme per institution, the institutions under a stated utilisation ahead of renewal, the ones over it that need more seats, and why a renewal conversation without this number is a price conversation.

The short answerUtilisation is seats or accounts active in the period over seats purchased, per programme per institution, from the licence register joined to the usage export. Institutions under a stated utilisation with a renewal inside six months are the retention list; institutions over it are the expansion list. A renewal conversation that starts with the institution's own utilisation is about value; one without it is about price, and the provider loses those.

An education provider's renewal team knows which institutions are up for renewal. What it rarely has, in one table, is how much each of them has used what they bought. The licence register and the usage export, joined on the institution identifier, show it per programme. This guide sets out utilisation, the two lists, and the timing.

The measures

Per institution, per programme, per term:

Utilisation = active seats ÷ purchased seats Trend = utilisation this term against the same term last year

Per renewal:

Retention list = renewal within six months, utilisation under threshold Expansion list = utilisation over a stated ceiling, or active seats at or above purchased

The rows you need

  • Licence register: institution, programme, seats purchased, start, renewal date, value.
  • Usage export: institution, programme, seat or account, last activity date, activity count.
  • Institution master: institution, entity, enrolment.

Institution identifiers only.

The assertion

active seats ≤ purchased seats, per institution per programme

Where active exceeds purchased, either the register is behind or seats are being shared, and both are worth knowing; the row is listed rather than capped.

A worked list

Renewals in the next six months, one programme.

Institution Seats Active Utilisation Last year Renewal Value List
2207 400 82 21% 48% March £18,000 Retention: falling
4471 250 246 98% 91% April £11,000 Expansion
9034 120 131 109% 95% March £5,400 Expansion: over seats
1187 600 540 90% 88% May £27,000 Healthy

Institution 2207 halved its utilisation in a year and renews in March. The conversation is about why and what would change it, and it starts now. Institution 9034 has more active seats than it bought, and the renewal is a seat increase with the evidence attached.

Rolled up

Per account manager: renewal value in the window, and the share of it under threshold. Per entity, for trusts and districts: utilisation across their sites, so the trust-level renewal conversation has the site detail beneath it.

Where it goes wrong

Usage not joined to the register. The product team has usage; the renewal team has dates; nobody has both.

Active defined loosely. One login in a year counts, and every institution is healthy.

Window too short. Utilisation discovered a month before renewal cannot be changed.

Site licences ignored. Half the base has no seat count and no measure. Use enrolment as the denominator, labelled.

Every term, per institution per programme

Mapped once, the licence register, the usage export and the institution master produce utilisation, the trend and both lists every term. Covirage builds this from the exports as they are. The education page describes the setup, and the contracting entity guide covers the roll-up that puts site utilisation under the entity renewal.

Questions people ask

What counts as active?

A login or a completed activity in the period, per seat or per account, at a threshold the provider states: at least one login in the term, say, or a stated number of activities. The definition is written once and the same for every institution.

What about site licences with no seat count?

Utilisation against the institution's enrolment or staff count, from the institution master, as the denominator. Labelled as such. It is a weaker measure and still separates a school where forty percent of pupils use the programme from one where four percent do.

How early before renewal?

Two terms. A low-utilisation institution needs a term of onboarding or training to change the number, and the renewal decision is often made a term before the date. Six months is the usual window on the report.