Missed Call Math: What Unanswered Calls Really Cost You
A fill-in worksheet to put a dollar figure on the calls that go to voicemail — plus five ways to stop the leak.
What's inside
- Your numbers
- Worked example
- How to find your real numbers
- Five ways to stop the leak
- What to do with your number
Every call that goes to voicemail while you're on a roof, under a sink, or asleep is a homeowner who probably called the next contractor on the list. Fill in the blanks below with your own numbers to see what that's worth each month.
Your numbers
Missed-call calculator
Step 1 of 4
How many calls come in during a typical week?
Count every inbound call — new customers, emergencies, callbacks.
About how many of those go unanswered?
Your best honest guess — include nights, weekends, and when you're on a job.
Of the calls you answer, how many turn into a booked job?
What's your average job worth?
Worked example
These numbers are made up for illustration — use your own above.
A contractor gets 25 calls a week and misses about 30% of them while crews are on jobs. That's 7.5 missed calls a week. They normally book 50% of calls they answer, so that's about 3.75 lost jobs a week. At an average ticket of $400, that's $1,500 a week, or roughly $6,450 a month — about $78,000 a year — from calls that were already coming in.
How to find your real numbers
- Your phone carrier or VoIP app usually shows a call log with missed calls — look at the last 30 days.
- Check a busy week and a slow week. Missed calls tend to spike exactly when you're busiest.
- Count calls after hours and on weekends separately — emergencies don't wait for Monday.
- Close rate: of the last 20 calls you did answer, how many became a booked job?
Five ways to stop the leak
- Call forwarding to a second person. Route calls to an office manager or a family member when you're on a job. Cheap, but only works while that person is free.
- Missed-call text-back. An automatic text ("Sorry we missed you — what do you need help with?") keeps the lead talking instead of dialing your competitor. Many phone systems and CRMs can do this.
- Call-back windows. Block two short windows a day to return every missed call. Better than nothing — but emergency callers won't wait hours.
- Answering service. A human takes a message 24/7. Helps, but most can't book the job or answer questions about your services.
- AI receptionist. Answers every call day or night, knows your services and service area, can book the appointment on your calendar, and texts you the lead instantly.
What to do with your number
If line H is bigger than what it would cost to cover your phones, missed calls are one of the cheapest problems in your business to fix — because you already paid to make those calls happen.
The rest is free
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Questions
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