Measure the Cash and Capacity Cost of Waiting for Client Approval

How to Use This Tool

Price the capacity blocked by approvals without pretending every delayed hour is fully billable. Calculate client approval delay cost from blocked projects, delay days, capacity hours, recoverable share and follow-up labor.

The decision this tool supports

Teams call approval delay free because payroll continues, even when blocked work displaces other projects and creates follow-up labor. This page keeps the decision bounded to total modeled delay cost and the supporting outputs shown beside it. Approval Delay Cost does not import an account, infer a market rate, or silently substitute an industry average.

Inputs and units

The Approval Delay Cost calculation uses Projects waiting, Average delay, Capacity blocked per project-day, Value per capacity hour, Recoverable capacity share, Follow-up admin cost. Keep all money values in one currency and all time, distance, mass, energy or volume entries in the unit printed beside the field. Mixing Approval Delay Cost scopes can produce a plausible number with the wrong meaning.

• Projects waiting is entered in projects.
• Average delay is entered in days.
• Capacity blocked per project-day is entered in hours.
• Value per capacity hour is entered in currency/hour.
• Recoverable capacity share is entered in %.
• Follow-up admin cost is entered in currency.

Formula and worked check

Recoverable capacity value = projects × delay days × blocked hours × hourly value × recoverable share; total adds follow-up administration. Three projects delayed ten days, six blocked hours per project-day, $100 hourly value and 50% recoverability produce $9,000 capacity value plus $400 admin cost. The Approval Delay Cost default is an executable known-answer case, not a benchmark or recommendation. Change one input and verify that the direction of total modeled delay cost still matches the stated relationship.

How to interpret the result

Use the recoverable share to avoid valuing every idle hour as lost revenue; a low share may still expose a process problem without a large cash claim. The additional Approval Delay Cost outputs expose the denominator, comparison, capacity or reverse value needed to audit the primary result instead of presenting one unexplained number.

Assumptions

• Delay days and blocked hours are attributable to approval waiting.
• Hourly value is a capacity value, not automatically billable damages.
• Recoverable share stays between zero and 100%.

Save the Approval Delay Cost input values and date with any material decision. A later Approval Delay Cost rerun is reproducible only when the same assumptions and units are available.

Limitations and safety boundary

The model excludes contract remedies, client relationship effects, multitasking efficiency, downstream deadlines and legal interpretation. Approval Delay Cost is an estimate and cannot replace a contract, local code, licensed professional, calibrated measurement, lender statement or platform report where one governs the decision.

Source and privacy

The Approval Delay Cost definition or rule was checked against U.S. Small Business Administration — Manage your finances on 2026-08-26. Recheck U.S. Small Business Administration — Manage your finances when a specification or policy behind Approval Delay Cost can change. Approval Delay Cost arithmetic runs in this browser tab; ecech does not receive the values through a calculation API.