Tools
Downtime cost calculator
Use your own figures. Rough numbers are fine: the point is to see which part of the cost is largest and what a faster recovery is worth.
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Result
Where the annual cost comes from
If outages were
How the downtime cost calculator works
Cost per hour = people affected × hourly cost per person + revenue lost per hour.
Cost per outage = cost per hour × average outage length + extra cost per outage (overtime, contractors, penalties).
Cost per year = cost per outage × outages per year. The saving for one hour of faster recovery is cost per hour × outages per year.
Reputation, lost customers and regulatory consequences are not included because they cannot be estimated honestly from a form.
Planning estimates. They do not replace a measurement on your own systems.
In practice
Worked example: 25 people at €30 an hour plus €400 of lost revenue cost €1,150 for every hour of outage. Four outages a year of three hours each, with €500 of extra recovery cost per outage, add up to €15,800 a year.
The yearly figure is usually larger than people expect, and it gives a fair budget ceiling for prevention. Redundancy, monitoring and tested restores that cost less than a year of outages pay for themselves.
Questions about this tool
What hourly cost should I use per person?
Gross salary plus employer contributions and overheads, divided by the hours actually worked in a year. If you are unsure, 1.3 to 1.5 times the gross hourly wage is a common estimate.
Should all revenue during the outage count as lost?
No. Count only revenue that does not come back. Many customers simply return later; others, such as online orders or bookings, go to a competitor.
Why are reputation and penalties not included?
They are real but too uncertain to put a number on from a form. If your contracts have penalty clauses, add them to the extra cost per outage.
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