Missed calls, with the math
How much does a missed call cost a local business?
A missed call costs the value of the job it would have booked, times the chance it would have booked. For a $350 average job and a 30 percent booking rate, each unanswered call is worth about $105; at 10 missed calls a week that is roughly $54,600 a year. Those are worked-example numbers. The formula and the sources are below, so you can run your own.
How do you calculate what a missed call costs?
Cost of a missed call = average job value x share of callers who would have booked. Monthly cost = missed calls a month x that figure. Nextiva publishes the same formula for answering-service buyers (missed calls x close rate x average customer value).
Worked example, labelled as an example: $350 average job, 30 percent would have booked, so $105 a missed call. 10 missed calls a week x 52 weeks x $105 = $54,600 a year. Change any of the three inputs and the answer changes with it; your own call log and calendar are the only real inputs.
What the formula leaves out: the lifetime value of a customer who would have come back, the review they would have left, and the referral. It also leaves out the cost of the time someone spends calling back voicemails. Both push the real number up, not down.
How many calls do local businesses miss?
In a 30-day field study by 411 Locals across 85 small businesses in 58 industries, 37.8 percent of calls were answered by a live person, 37.8 percent went to voicemail and 24.3 percent got no response at all. Seven in ten of those businesses answered fewer than half their calls. That is one study and one sample; a company with someone at the desk all day misses fewer, and a one-truck operation misses more.
Trade-level figures on the Foreman trade pages come from platform and vendor data (Housecall Pro, CallRail and call-handling vendors) and are cited on each page. They are industry estimates, which is why every calculator on this site lets you overwrite them.
What does a missed call cost by trade?
Default figures from the Foreman trade pages, each with its source on that page. Every row is a worked example on industry estimates, not a result.
| Trade | Average value | Would have booked | Per missed call | Missed a week (example) | A week, example |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Restaurants | $134 | 38% | $51 | 15 | $760 |
| Plumbing and HVAC | $1,205 | 40% | $480 | 7 | $3,370 |
| Dental | $1,000 | 40% | $400 | 5 | $2,000 |
| Med spas | $484 | 35% | $170 | 8 | $1,360 |
| Auto | $600 | 45% | $270 | 12 | $3,240 |
| Salons and barbers | $77 | 50% | $38 | 10 | $380 |
Why does speed matter once the call is missed?
Because the caller does not wait. The Harvard Business Review lead-response study found companies that tried to contact a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as companies that waited one hour more. A missed call that gets a text back within a minute is a different event from a missed call that gets a callback at 5 PM.
That is the whole reason Foreman holds to under 60 seconds: text back on the missed call, answer the question, book the slot, and only then let the owner know.
What does it cost to stop missing calls?
Per Nextiva's 2026 guide, a live answering service runs about $100 to $1,000 or more a month, an AI answering service about $50 to $300 a month, and per-minute plans $0.75 to $1.50 a minute. Those answer the phone. Foreman is $495 per location per month and answers by text, voice, email and chat, then follows up on every quote, works the customer list and sends a six-line report every Monday. The comparison is on the AI receptionist vs answering service page.
Questions owners ask
Straight answers.
How much does a missed call cost a local business?
The value of the job the call would have booked, times the chance it would have booked. For a $350 average job and a 30 percent booking rate, each missed call is worth about $105. Ten of those a week is about $54,600 a year. That is arithmetic on your own numbers, not a promise.
How many calls do small businesses actually miss?
In the 411 Locals field study, 37.8 percent of calls to small businesses were answered by a live person; the rest went to voicemail or got no response at all. Rates vary by trade and time of day, and a company with a dedicated receptionist misses fewer.
Do callers leave a voicemail or call back?
Industry estimates say most do not: the figures commonly quoted are around 80 percent who hang up without leaving a message. We could not trace that to a primary study, so treat it as directional. What is documented is speed: a lead contacted within an hour was nearly seven times as likely to be qualified as one contacted an hour later (Harvard Business Review, 2011).
What does it cost to stop missing calls?
A live answering service runs about $100 to $1,000 or more a month and an AI answering service about $50 to $300 a month, per Nextiva's 2026 pricing guide. Foreman is $495 per location per month and includes the answering plus quote follow-up, customer-list work and the weekly report.
How do I find out what my own missed calls cost?
Take the free missed-call audit. We contact your business the way a new customer would, by call, text, web form and email over two days, time every reply and send one page with the money at stake.
Where do these numbers come from?
- 411 Locals, field study of 85 small businesses across 58 industries over 30 days: 37.8 percent of calls answered live, 37.8 percent to voicemail, 24.3 percent no response.
- Oldroyd, McElheran and Elkington, The Short Life of Online Sales Leads, Harvard Business Review, 03/2011: firms that tried to contact a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as those that waited an hour longer.
- Nextiva, Answering Service Cost: What You Can Expect to Pay in 2026: live answering $100 to $1,000 or more a month, AI answering $50 to $300 a month, per-minute plans $0.75 to $1.50 a minute, per-call plans $1 to $11 a call.
Checked 10/10/2026. Vendor studies are directional, not audited. Where a figure is called an industry estimate, we could not trace it to a primary study. Your own phone log beats every number on this page.