One of the more important benefits of unified messaging - the integration of e-mail, voice and fax communications in a single mailbox - is the time savings that it affords users. Here's a stab at quantifying just the voicemail-related benefits of unified messaging:

• Assume that the typical user receives five voicemails per day. During a 250-day work year, the typical user would receive 1,250 voicemails.
• Further assume that a single voicemail accessed by telephone takes an average of 30 seconds to process, while one in a unified mailbox takes only 10 seconds. In the latter case, there are visual cues (e.g., the identity of the number that called you) that speeds the processing time per message.

Using these assumptions, a user would spend 10 hours 25 minutes per year processing voicemails via telephone, or 3 hours 28 minutes per year processing them in a unified messaging system. At a fully burdened annual salary of $80,000 for that user, the savings of nearly seven hours per year translates to a savings of $267 per user per year. In an organization of 2,500 users, that translates to productivity savings of nearly $670,000 annually.