What staff turnover costs you
Each departure leaves behind an empty post, a recruitment process, a learning curve and hours of training. Adjust the figures for your workforce and see the real cost.
In the group you want to analyse (a plant, a department or the whole company).
Leavers in a year as a share of average headcount. In industry it is usually between 10% and 25%.
We add 30% for employer social security contributions.
From the moment someone leaves until the new person starts.
Cost of finding the person (external or internal), as a % of gross annual salary.
How long a new starter takes to do the job unaided.
How much of the work they get done, on average, while they learn.
Time colleagues and managers spend teaching the job.
Percentage points less annual turnover.
Indicative estimate. It does not include severance pay, overtime or the impact on customers or the team.
Annual cost of staff turnover
365,760 €
per year · 21.6 leavers per year · 16,933 € per leaver
- Empty post
- Work that doesn’t get done while nobody is in the role.
- 4,255 €
- Recruitment
- External cost or internal time spent finding the person.
- 4,800 €
- Learning curve
- Productivity lost in the first few months.
- 6,933 €
- Training
- Other people’s hours spent teaching the job.
- 945 €
Annual savings from reducing turnover by 3 points60,960 €
Want to bring that number down?
We study your case: we analyse why people leave and design a strategic HR project to retain talent and stabilise your teams.
How it is calculated
- 1.Annual total employment cost: gross salary × 1.3 (employer social security contributions). Cost per working day: annual cost ÷ 220; per hour: ÷ 1,760.
- 2.Empty post: cost per day × days to fill it × 50% (we estimate that half the work goes undone or is delayed).
- 3.Recruitment: the percentage of gross salary you enter.
- 4.Learning curve: monthly cost × months to full productivity × (100% − average productivity during those months).
- 5.Training: hours of support × cost per hour.
- 6.Annual cost: cost per leaver × headcount × turnover. The savings apply the same cost to the leavers you avoid.
Frequently asked questions
How much does it cost when an employee leaves?
With this calculator’s default values (€32,000 gross, 45 days’ vacancy, 4 months’ learning curve), each leaver costs around half of their gross annual salary. For hard-to-fill technical profiles it can exceed a year’s salary.
What counts as high staff turnover?
It depends on the sector. In industry and technical services, anything above 15% to 20% a year starts to become a problem; in hospitality or logistics the usual figures are higher.
How do you reduce staff turnover?
First, by understanding why people leave: early departures, below-market pay, managers who struggle to manage people, shift patterns or workload. With that diagnosis you design a strategic HR project (onboarding, development, pay and leadership) to retain talent and stabilise your teams.
How can Behum help me reduce staff turnover?
We study your case: we analyse your workforce data, talk to the people who stay and those who have left, and design a tailored strategic HR project with you, covering onboarding, career paths, management training and pay policy.