How Much Does Customer Support Cost Your Shopify Store? A Calculator With 3 Examples

Below you'll find the formula, three worked examples, the costs the formula misses, and how to compare your number with the price of a support tool. If you want the same math as a live calculator, use Relay's Support Cost Calculator.

The support cost formula

Tickets per month × minutes per ticket ÷ 60 × hourly cost = monthly support cost. The formula has three inputs. Use your own numbers, not averages from the internet.

• Tickets per month. Count them in your inbox or helpdesk for the last full month. Count your peak month separately.
• Minutes per ticket. Time yourself on ten typical tickets. Start the clock when you open the ticket and stop it when you hit send. Include the time spent finding the order in Shopify, checking tracking and reading your return policy.
• Hourly cost. What you pay a support person per hour, including taxes and benefits. If you answer tickets yourself, use what your hour is worth on other work.

Worked examples: 500, 1,000 and 2,000 tickets a month

The hourly rate below is only an example. Replace it with yours. Example inputs: $20 an hour, 4 or 6 minutes per ticket.

• 500 tickets: 33 hours / $667 at 4 minutes, or 50 hours / $1,000 at 6 minutes.
• 1,000 tickets: 67 hours / $1,333 at 4 minutes, or 100 hours / $2,000 at 6 minutes.
• 2,000 tickets: 133 hours / $2,667 at 4 minutes, or 200 hours / $4,000 at 6 minutes.

What the table tells you:

• 500 tickets. About one to two working days a week. Usually the founder or someone on the team answers them between other tasks.
• 1,000 tickets. About 40% to 60% of a full-time job. One full-time person works about 173 hours a month (40 hours × 52 weeks ÷ 12). This is the point where many stores start thinking about their first support hire.
• 2,000 tickets. At 6 minutes per ticket, that's 200 hours, which is more than one full-time schedule. You'd need more than one person.

Two extra minutes per ticket make a big difference. Going from 4 to 6 minutes adds 50% to the bill. Time yourself before you trust the estimate.

What the formula doesn't count

The formula gives you a minimum. Your real cost is higher.

• Peak months. Black Friday and the holidays bring more orders and more "where is my order" tickets, then more returns in January. Run the formula on your busiest month, not your average one.
• Slow replies. When tickets pile up, customers wait. They send the same question twice, open a chargeback or leave a review about your response time. Every repeat ticket goes back into your count.
• Hiring and training. A new support hire takes time to recruit and to learn your policies. Someone else keeps answering tickets in the meantime.
• Founder time. If you answer tickets yourself, those hours aren't going into product, ads or suppliers.

Which tickets you can take off your desk

Sort a sample of last month's tickets into two groups. Some can be settled with your Shopify data and one of your rules: order status, returns, size swaps, address changes and cancellations. Others need a person: an upset customer after a damaged delivery, a request outside your policy, or anything that calls for judgment. The share in the first group is what you can realistically take off your desk.

Compare your cost with the price of a tool

You now have a monthly cost. Compare it with what a support tool would cost at the same volume. Hours saved = tickets the tool resolves × minutes per ticket ÷ 60. Money saved = hours saved × hourly cost − price of the tool.

Here is an example of the math. At 1,000 tickets, 6 minutes each and $20 an hour, a tool that resolved 400 tickets in a month would save 40 hours, or $800. If the tool costs less than $800 at that volume, it pays for itself. This shows how to run the numbers. It is not a result to expect. Use the resolution numbers you see during a trial.

When you compare tools, check three things:

• How the price is calculated. Check whether you pay per resolved conversation or per ticket tier. With per-conversation pricing, the bill goes up every time your volume does. With a tier, you know the bill in advance as long as you stay inside it.
• The cost in your peak month. Price the tool at your normal volume and at your Black Friday volume. That's where the gap between pricing models shows.
• What counts as resolved. If the tool answers but the customer writes back, does that ticket still count as resolved? Ask before you sign.

How Relay fits into the calculation

Relay works like a support employee for your Shopify store. It reads each ticket, finds the order, applies your store's rules and takes the actions you allowed: refund, discount code, cancellation or address change. When a ticket needs a person, it goes to your team. It also sends automatic follow-ups and keeps a knowledge base. The dashboard shows resolution rate, time saved and payroll saved. That's the formula above, filled in with your own tickets instead of estimates.

Pricing is a monthly subscription based on your ticket volume tier. Annual billing gives you 2 months free. The 14-day trial lets you run the calculation on your real inbox before you pay.

FAQ

How do I calculate the cost of customer support for my Shopify store? Multiply your tickets per month by the minutes each ticket takes, divide by 60, then multiply by the hourly cost of the person answering. Do it for your average month and for your peak month.

How many minutes does a support ticket take? It depends on your store and your mix of tickets. Time yourself on ten typical tickets, including the time spent finding the order in Shopify. Use that average, not a figure from someone else's store.

Can an AI support agent issue refunds on its own? Yes, if you allow it. With Relay, refunds, discount codes, cancellations and address changes depend on the permissions you grant. Anything outside your rules goes to a person on your team.

How is Relay priced? Relay is a monthly subscription based on your ticket volume tier. You get 2 months free with annual billing, and there's a 14-day trial.