Productive hours exclude leave, training and non-delivery time. Enter employer charges from your own payroll records.
Try this with your own numbersFormula and worked example
Loaded cost = (pay + employer costs + allocated overhead) / productive hours
| Input | Example |
|---|---|
| Annual gross pay | 45,000 |
| Employer benefits and payroll costs | 10,000 |
| Allocated annual staff overhead | 5,000 |
| Productive annual hours | 1,500 |
| Calculated result | 40 per productive hour |
Choose reliable inputs
Include software licences, delivery time, revisions and ongoing support when costing a project. For this graphic design calculation, use project time logs, licence invoices and retainer scopes and a consistent definition of one design project.
- Creative hours: include the portion belonging to this design project or reporting period, and record where the value came from.
- Revisions: include the portion belonging to this design project or reporting period, and record where the value came from.
- Licensed assets: include the portion belonging to this design project or reporting period, and record where the value came from.
Use the same currency for every money input. Do not mix weekly costs with monthly revenue, or count the same expense in both an itemised cost and allocated overhead.
Why is salary divided by paid hours too low?
Productive hours exclude leave, training and non-delivery time. Enter employer charges from your own payroll records.
What if this input changes?
If annual gross pay rises by 10%, this example changes by 3 per productive hour. This shows the effect of one change; it does not predict what will happen.
Open the calculator, save your baseline, then change the input supported by the least reliable estimate in your records. Compare both scenarios before committing to a price or capacity promise.