A simple way to estimate whether building (or buying) software pays for itself. Fill in the blanks — pen and paper is fine — and you'll have a payback period and a three-year net figure.
Fill in a few numbers (pen and paper is fine) and you’ll have a payback period and a three-year net figure for replacing a manual process with software. It walks you through:
Enter your email below to open the full fill-in worksheet and how to read the result.
| # | Line item | Your figure |
|---|---|---|
| A | Hours per week spent on the manual process | ____ hrs |
| B | Loaded hourly cost of the people doing it (wage + overhead) | €____ |
| C | Weekly cost (A × B) | €____ |
| D | Annual cost (C × 48 working weeks) | €____ |
| E | Estimated one-time build (or first-year software) cost | €____ |
| F | Estimated annual saving (time recovered + errors avoided; usually a portion of D, plus revenue gained) | €____ |
| G | Payback period in months (E ÷ F × 12) | ____ mo |
| H | Three-year net ((F × 3) − E) | €____ |
How to read it: A payback under ~12 months is strong. 12–24 months is reasonable for a core process. Over 36 months, reconsider or look at off-the-shelf. The biggest savings are usually error reduction and freed-up time, not headcount.
Want help putting real numbers on this? Get a free software review.