What the calculator works out
Automation proposals often come with impressive claims and little arithmetic. This calculator lets you do the arithmetic yourself for one process at a time. You enter how many times the task happens per month, how many minutes it takes today, what share of that time automation would realistically remove and the hourly cost of the people doing it. You then add the one-off setup cost and the monthly running cost of the tools.
- Hours saved per month and per year.
- Value of the time saved, at your hourly cost.
- Monthly operating cost and net monthly benefit.
- Payback period in months for the setup cost.
- Three-year return on investment, shown with simple bar charts.
Choosing realistic inputs
The most common mistake is assuming automation removes 100% of the work. In practice someone still reviews exceptions, answers follow-up questions and checks the output, so 50 to 80% is a more honest starting point for most office processes. Use the fully loaded hourly cost — salary plus employer costs and overhead — rather than the gross wage, or the billable rate if the freed time would genuinely be billed.
Count only the process you are automating. If an intake form saves ten minutes per enquiry and you receive forty enquiries a month, that is under seven hours. Worth doing, but not a reason to buy an expensive platform.
Beyond hours saved
Some benefits are hard to put in the calculator but matter: faster responses that win more clients, fewer missed deadlines, consistent document requests and less stress in busy periods. Some costs are easy to forget: maintenance when a connected tool changes, staff training and the time to handle errors. Note them alongside the numbers when you make the decision.
Everything runs in your browser and nothing is sent to us. If you want help identifying which processes to calculate, our automation opportunity scanner suggests candidates based on your website.
A worked example
Suppose a firm handles 120 new enquiries a month and spends 15 minutes on each to send an acknowledgement, request documents and book a first meeting. If automation removes 60% of that time, it saves 18 hours a month. At an internal cost of 50 euros an hour, that is 900 euros of time. With tools at 60 euros a month and a 1,500 euro setup, payback takes about two months. Your numbers will differ, which is the point of entering your own.