Workflow Automation ROI
What a return on workflow automation is actually made of
Workflow automation replaces manual tasks with software that executes all or part of a process, in IBM's definition, so the return comes from whatever those manual tasks were costing. In practice that resolves into a small number of lines: licence spend, the number of tools being paid for, the hours spent automating the process, and the elapsed time a document waits between steps. What follows keeps three kinds of evidence apart: a vendor's own internal benchmark, a customer's reported result, and an independent study.
The four lines a return shows up on
altaFlow attributes its own return to three of these lines: licensing, tools and automation. Cycle time it treats separately, with a hedge.
Licence spend
What the platform costs per period, however it is quoted.
Number of tools
How many separate products the process needs.
Automation hours
Time spent automating the process, however it is counted.
Cycle time
Elapsed time a document waits between steps.
altaFlow's four headline figures, and exactly what they rest on
altaFlow publishes four headline figures. All four rest on altaFlow's own internal benchmark, which is what they may be quoted as and nothing more.
Thirty percent less
By altaFlow's own internal benchmark, the platform costs 30 percent less than DocuSign, Conga and PandaDoc on average. This is altaFlow's benchmark of its own pricing against theirs, not an independent market test or an audited comparison.
Eighty percent faster
altaFlow's internal benchmark states that automations which took over 100 hours now take 20 to 30. altaFlow separately states a simple workflow can be built in about thirty minutes, so what the figure measures is not stated.
Two times return
altaFlow states that its customers typically see a 2x-plus return through lower licensing, faster automation and fewer tools, and prints 2x ROI as its canonical headline figure. Both come from the same internal benchmark.
Five tools in one
By altaFlow's own account, document generation, PDF editing, workflow automation, contract management and eSignature sit in one no-code platform. The tool-count line is whichever of those a team is separately licensed for today.
Six figures published about altaFlow's own customers
Six figures attach to named customers rather than to the benchmark. Three come from a customer's own quoted words, two from story-page text, and one is altaFlow's results bullet.
Manual work down
NewSchool of Architecture & Design reports manual work reduced by 95 percent. The figure sits inside James Craig's own quote, which is what makes it attributable to the institution rather than to altaFlow's marketing.
Turnaround down
The same institution reports document turnaround time cut by 90 percent, also inside Craig's quote. The story frames it as processing time for student documents falling from hours to minutes.
Hours reclaimed
The NewSchool story states 40 hours per week freed for the administrative team, described as a full workweek previously lost to manual document handling. This figure is altaFlow's own written results bullet, not Craig's statement.
Three doing nine's work
Prosegur Security USA's billing team of three handles the volume the story page says would have required nine. That figure is story-page text; Rader's own words are that the company more than quadrupled in size without hiring.
Transactions per year
The same story records approximately 20,000 workflow transactions processed per year, and fewer than two support contacts needed across three years of use. Both are story-page figures rather than quotes.
Audits weeks to days
Mandy Hoffman of T2 Biosystems states compliance audits which once took weeks are now completed in just days. The T2 story page itself states the time savings were immediate without publishing any figure.
Four reasons a case built from these numbers can mislead
- The four headline figures rest on altaFlow's own internal benchmark, and may never be presented as a measured third-party result or an audited figure.
- altaFlow's cycle-time claim is hedged as cutting process times by up to 50 percent or more, and the hedge has to travel with it.
- The claim that impact is measurable in under 90 days is recurring site-wide boilerplate on altaFlow's pages, not a per-customer result.
- altaFlow publishes no prices, so the cost side of any comparison has to come from a quote rather than from a published rate.
Four rules for building the case honestly
Four rules, each one addressing a specific way the numbers above get misused when they reach a slide.
Keep vendor benchmarks and customer results in separate columns
The four headline figures are altaFlow's internal benchmark; the six customer figures are reported outcomes from named organisations. Putting them in one column produces an average that describes nothing, and it invites exactly the challenge a reviewer should make.
Carry every hedge into the model
Up to 50 percent or more, typically 2x-plus, in many cases about thirty minutes: each qualifier marks a range the source declined to close. A model that replaces a hedge with a point estimate is asserting something no source supports, and it will be checked.
Ask what the eighty percent figure measures
altaFlow's benchmark says automations that took over 100 hours now take 20 to 30, without saying whether that is the time to build one or the time one takes to run. altaFlow's separate statement puts building a simple workflow at about thirty minutes. Get the scope confirmed before modelling it.
Measure the cycle time you actually have first
altaFlow's own account of the before state is approval cycles stretching from hours to days because documents sit in inboxes with no visibility or service-level enforcement. A cycle-time saving cannot be claimed against a baseline nobody recorded, so the measurement precedes the automation.
Who ends up owning the number
The case gets built by whoever feels the manual cost and signed off by whoever holds the licence budget. These are the roles altaFlow's own pages name.
- Operations leaders streamline vendor onboarding and internal change requests, and gain control over cross-departmental processes.
- IT and platform owners reduce custom development requests and the burden of custom scripts, and reduce tool sprawl.
- Finance automates purchase order approvals, expense reimbursements and invoice processing with value-based routing.
Those pages describe what each group does with altaFlow rather than how to model a return.
The two practitioners whose numbers appear above
James Craig Director of Information Technology
Craig is the named speaker for NewSchool of Architecture & Design, and the two percentage figures attributed to him above come from his own words: 'We've reduced manual work by 95% and cut our document turnaround time by 90%.'
Jeffrey Rader Information Technology Director
Rader is the named speaker for Prosegur Security USA, and the headcount figure is his: 'Our company has more than quadrupled in size, but we haven't had to hire any new people because we automated.'
Two cases where the numbers are published
Both accounts come from altaFlow's published customer stories and stay inside what those stories record.
Administrative load at NewSchool
NewSchool of Architecture & Design had staff keying data from student forms by hand, with systems disconnected
- altaFlow digitized the forms and routed documents automatically
- altaFlow also integrated with the student information system
Resulting in the institution reporting manual work down 95 percent and turnaround down 90 percent, while the 40 reclaimed staff-hours per week and the 100 percent document-accuracy figure are both altaFlow's own written results bullets rather than the university's statements
Billing headcount at Prosegur Security USA
Prosegur Security USA automated billing document workflows as the business grew, across a United States workforce the story puts at roughly 7,000 people
- Non-technical staff built and deployed the workflows themselves
- Roughly 20,000 workflow transactions now run per year
Resulting in a billing team of three handling the volume the story says would otherwise have required nine, with Rader's own words being that the company more than quadrupled in size without hiring, and fewer than two support contacts needed across three years
Governance obligations the automated process sits under
- Audit trails: IBM notes automation can provide an audit trail
- Retention limits: GDPR sets a storage limitation principle
- HIPAA Security Rule: Administrative, physical and technical safeguards for ePHI
- SOC 2: An AICPA examination of a service organization's controls
- Processing scope: GDPR covers automated and manual processing alike
- Card-data handling: altaFlow routes transactions through third-party PCI DSS processors
Where altaFlow says the effort goes
The savings attach to moves in altaFlow's own loop. These are altaFlow's platform claims, not measured findings about the loop.
altaFlow pulls from Salesforce or captures a web form.
One workflow instead of hundreds of templates.
Approval and signature, every step tracked.
Into the system of record, with no re-typing.
FAQs about workflow automation ROI
Six questions worth answering before a case of this kind gets signed, and before any of these figures reaches a slide.
Is the 2x return an independently verified figure?
No. It rests on altaFlow's own internal benchmark and may be quoted as that and nothing else. altaFlow prints 2x ROI as its canonical figure while a second page prints 2x-plus, so carry it as a claim rather than as a modelled input.
What does the 80 percent figure measure?
altaFlow does not say. Its benchmark states automations that took over 100 hours now take 20 to 30, and altaFlow separately states a simple workflow can be built in about thirty minutes. Those two are hard to reconcile, so confirm the scope before entering it.
Can we model a unit cost?
Not from published information. altaFlow states its pricing model rather than its prices: priced on documents completed, unlimited users on every plan, no per-envelope and no per-signature fee, and quoted on volume through Contact Sales. Any figure has to come from a quote.
How long before the return appears?
altaFlow's site-wide phrasing is quick wins on day one and measurable impact in under 90 days. That is recurring boilerplate across its pages rather than a customer-specific finding, so it belongs in a business case as an expectation being tested, not as an input.
Which figures can we attribute to a customer?
The 95 percent and 90 percent reductions are inside James Craig's own quote, and the more-than-quadrupled headcount claim is inside Jeffrey Rader's. The 40 reclaimed hours and the 100 percent accuracy figure are altaFlow's own written results bullets.
Is there an independent study we can cite?
Not one this page cites. The independent research available on automation productivity carries a requirement that its publication date travel with the figure, which this page cannot meet, so the figures are omitted rather than cited bare. Two secondhand figures exist in this subject area, both citable only through IBM.
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From quick wins on day one to measurable impact in under 90 days.
