If you haven’t gone paperless yet, it’s time to consider how much your business could save. Going digital isn’t just a win for your staff, bank account, and the environment—it’s also a powerful step toward a more productive and efficient operation.
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Our calculator shows you just how much you can save by going paperless. Fill in the relevant information and get an immediate overview of your potential savings when going paperless.
Calculate Paper Consumption
Color ($0.14 per page)
Includes Images ($0.55 per page)
Pages saved when moving to Connecteam
How to Use the PaperfreeSavings Calculator?
Personalize Your Settings with the Sliders:
- 🧑💼 Number of Employees: Adjust to match the total employees in your organization.
- 📝 Number of Forms per Week: Set how many forms each employee fills out weekly.
- 📄 Number of Pages per Form: Choose the average number of pages in each form.
- 💰 Cost per 1000 Pages ($): Enter your current cost for every 1,000 pages of paper.
Watch the Magic Happen:
- As you move each slider, the numbers next to them update instantly.
- The calculator recalculates in real-time—no waiting or extra clicks needed!
Discover Your Potential Savings:
- 📉 Weekly Pages Saved: See how many pages you can eliminate each week.
- 📆 Yearly Pages Saved: Visualize your annual reduction in paper use.
- 💵 Yearly Cost Saved: Find out how much money stays in your pocket every year.
- 🌲 Pine Trees Saved: Learn how many trees you’re preserving by going digital.
The True Cost of Paper: It’s More Than You Think
Did you know that the average office worker uses around 10,000 sheets of paper per year? With a cost of approximately $120 for that stack of paper, multiply this by the number of employees, and the expenses add up quickly. But that’s just the start. The real cost goes far beyond buying paper—it includes everything that happens after it’s printed.
Supply Costs: Let’s talk about the office supplies you need to handle all that paper: printers, toner cartridges, shredders, photocopiers, folders, and filing cabinets. These costs can easily stack up to over $1,000 annually per employee(!). Then there are the expenses associated with maintaining and operating those machines, not to mention the valuable office space they occupy.
Energy Costs: Operating multiple fax machines, printers, and copiers not only consumes electricity but also requires extra space and lighting. Running an office on paper creates wasteful expenses that drain your resources. While it’s hard to put an exact dollar amount on this waste, we can all agree it’s more than just a minor hit to your budget.
Productivity Costs: Beyond the direct expenses, paper usage comes with hidden costs. Employees waste an average of 1.8 hours daily searching for paper documents, according to a McKinsey report. That’s the equivalent of hiring five employees but only getting the productivity of four—the fifth is lost in a paper trail maze, hunting for documents rather than contributing real value. On average, it takes 18 minutes to find a document, and if it’s misfiled, that search time can extend to 120 minutes.
Now, consider the labor cost: Employees spend around 150 hours a year searching through filing cabinets. At $30 per hour, that’s an annual expense of $4,500 per employee just looking for documents. For larger businesses, this can translate into millions in lost productivity.
The Hidden Dangers of Paper: It’s not just about dollars and cents. Approximately 2-5% of an organization’s paper documents are lost or misfiled every day. Finding a single lost document can cost up to $120 in labor, and many of these documents are never found. This leads to further delays and risks with a companies spending roughly 25 hours on recreating each lost document. Plus, paper-based businesses are at risk of catastrophic data loss from fires, floods, or other disasters, a risk that could cripple a company within weeks.
Environmental Impact: Paper is a Problem for the Planet
If cost alone doesn’t convince you, consider the environmental toll. Producing just 1kg of paper requires 324 liters of water, and about 42% of global deforestation is due to paper production. By sticking with paper-based processes, we contribute to the destruction of forests that produce the oxygen we breathe. On top of that, paper manufacturing is one of the biggest fossil fuel polluters in the world.
The Solution for Cost and Environmental Savings
With a paperless system, you not only save money but also reduce your carbon footprint. A digital app like Connecteam automates your business processes, allowing you to scan paper documents into a searchable, shareable, and secure digital format.
Here’s how going digital can transform your business:
- Time Savings: Retrieve and share documents instantly, without wasting time searching through piles of paper or navigating coworker-specific filing systems.
- Cost Reduction: Eliminate supply costs for paper, ink, and printing hardware, along with energy costs for running these machines.
- Productivity Boost: With all documents easily accessible in a centralized system, your employees can focus on their real work instead of spending hours each week tracking down paperwork.
- Data Security: Digital storage offers more secure data management, reducing the risk of lost or damaged files and ensuring compliance with data protection regulations.
Make the Switch to a Paperless Business with Connecteam
Going paperless has never been easier with Connecteam’s Documents and Forms & Checklists features. These powerful tools enable businesses to digitize all their paperwork, leading to significant cost savings and enhanced operational efficiency.
By replacing physical documents with digital versions, you eliminate the need for printing, reduce storage space, and streamline your workflows.
Connecteam’s Forms & Checklists feature allows you to create custom digital forms that employees can fill out and submit directly from their mobile devices. This ensures real-time data collection, reduces errors associated with manual entry, and speeds up processing times. Automated notifications and approval workflows keep everyone in the loop, making your processes more efficient than ever.
Download these premade forms or create your own and start saving on paper costs
Shift Swap Request Form
Employee Emergency Contact Form
Drug and Alcohol Testing Consent Form
Event Incident Report Form Template
Employee Disciplinary Form
Suggestion Box Form
With the Documents feature, you can securely store all important files in one centralized, cloud-based location. Sharing policies, procedures, and updates becomes seamless, and you can track who has viewed or signed each document to ensure compliance. This not only keeps your team informed and accountable but also enhances collaboration across your organization.
Ready to start saving?
Try Connecteam for free today and discover the benefits of going paperless for your business, your employees, and the planet.