Still managing user accounts with spreadsheets and good intentions? You’re not alone. A surprising number of growing companies are stuck in the manual provisioning twilight zone—too big for the “just wing it” approach, but not quite ready to tackle enterprise-grade identity management solutions that require consultants and six-month implementations.
Here’s the thing: while you’re busy manually creating accounts and hoping you remember to disable them when people leave, your “simple” approach is quietly bleeding money. A lot of it.
Let’s crunch some numbers and figure out exactly how much your manual user provisioning is really costing—because the results might surprise you (and definitely justify that automation project you’ve been putting off).
The Real Cost Calculator: Manual Provisioning Edition
Time Costs (The Big One)
New Employee Onboarding:
- Average time to fully provision a new user: 3-4 hours
- IT staff hourly rate: 250-300 SEK/hour
- Cost per new hire: ~900 SEK
Here’s the breakdown of that 3.5 hours (because we know you’re wondering):
- Creating accounts across 8-12 systems: 90 minutes
- Setting up appropriate permissions: 60 minutes
- Coordinating with department managers: 45 minutes
- Fixing the inevitable mistakes: 45 minutes
- Documentation (if you’re disciplined): 30 minutes
Role Changes and Updates:
- Average time per role change: 2 hours
- Annual role changes per employee: 1-2 (promotions, lateral moves, temp access)
- Cost per employee per year: ~600 SEK
Employee Offboarding:
- Time to properly remove all access: 2-3 hours (when done correctly)
- Reality check: Only 60% of companies properly remove all access
- Cost per departure: ~700 SEK
Quick Math Check: For a 200-person company with 20% annual turnover:
- 40 new hires × 900 SEK = 36,000 SEK
- 200 employees × 1.5 role changes × 600 SEK = 180,000 SEK
- 40 departures × 700 SEK = 28,000 SEK
- Annual time cost: ~245,000 SEK
Security Costs (The Scary One)
Orphaned Accounts: Manual processes miss things. Studies show that 80%+ of former employees still have access to company systems after leaving.
- Average security incident cost for SMBs: 500,000-2,000,000 SEK
- Risk of incidents from compromised credentials: Significantly higher
Even a smaller security incident can be costly and disruptive.
Compliance Issues:
- GDPR violation penalties: Up to 4% of annual revenue
- Internal audit remediation: 50,000-200,000 SEK per major finding
- Compliance consultant rates: ~1,000 SEK/hour
Manual provisioning makes compliance audits feel like a game of Russian roulette with regulatory fines.
Hidden Productivity Costs (The Silent Killer)
Day-One Delays: When new hires can’t access their tools on day one, productivity suffers:
- Average delay for full system access: 2-3 days
- Lost productivity cost: ~2,000 SEK per day per new hire
- New hire frustration factor: Priceless (and not in a good way)
Help Desk Tickets: Manual processes generate more support requests:
- Additional password reset tickets: 15% increase
- Access request tickets: 25% increase
- Average ticket cost: ~200 SEK
For that same 200-person company: ~15,000 SEK annually in extra help desk costs.
Manager Time Tax: Don’t forget about the time managers spend:
- Reviewing access requests: 30 minutes per request
- Annual access reviews: 4 hours per manager
- Manager hourly rate: 400-600 SEK/hour
The “We’ll Deal With It Later” Premium
Here’s where manual provisioning gets expensive: the compound interest of technical debt.
Delayed Projects: When your IT team spends 30% of their time on manual provisioning tasks, strategic projects get pushed:
- Digital transformation delays: 6-12 months
- Security initiative postponements: 3-6 months
- Lost competitive advantage: Hard to calculate, impossible to ignore
Scaling Friction: Manual processes don’t scale linearly—they get exponentially worse:
- At 50 employees: Manageable nuisance
- At 100 employees: Daily headache
- At 200+ employees: Full-time job requirement
How to Calculate Your Specific Impact
Ready to see your real numbers? Use this formula:
Annual Manual Provisioning Cost =
- (New Hires × 900 SEK) +
- (Total Employees × 1.5 × 600 SEK) +
- (Departures × 700 SEK) +
- (Compliance Risk × 100,000 SEK) +
- (Security Risk × 50,000 SEK) +
- (Help Desk Premium × 15,000 SEK)
Conservative Example (200 employees, 20% turnover):
- New hires: 36,000 SEK
- Role changes: 180,000 SEK
- Departures: 28,000 SEK
- Compliance risk: 100,000 SEK
- Security risk: 50,000 SEK
- Help desk premium: 15,000 SEK
- Total: ~410,000 SEK annually
And that’s the conservative estimate that doesn’t include opportunity costs, manager time, or the inevitable security incident.
The Automation ROI Reality Check
Now let’s talk solutions. A modern identity lifecycle management platform like Adcyma typically costs 30-80 SEK per user per month. For our 200-person company, that’s 70,000-190,000 SEK annually.
ROI calculation:
- Manual provisioning cost: 410,000 SEK
- Automation cost: ~130,000 SEK (average)
- Net savings: ~280,000 SEK
- ROI: 215%
Even if you cut our estimates in half (because you’re optimistic about your manual processes), you’re still looking at 300%+ ROI in year one.
The “But We’re Too Small” Myth
“We only have 50 employees—automation is overkill.”
Let’s check that math:
- 50 employees, 15% turnover
- Manual cost: ~120,000 SEK annually
- Automation cost: ~32,000 SEK annually
- Net savings: ~88,000 SEK
Still overkill? We didn’t think so.
What Automation Actually Looks Like
Modern identity lifecycle management isn’t the complex, consultant-heavy monster you’re imagining. Platforms like Adcyma can be deployed in days, not months, and integrate with your existing HR systems through simple REST APIs. Check out our comprehensive documentation to see how straightforward the setup process really is.
Day-one benefits:
- New hires get access automatically on their start date
- Role changes trigger immediate permission updates
- Departing employees lose access company-wide instantly
- Compliance reports generate themselves
- Your IT team gets their lives back
The Bottom Line: Your Move
Manual user provisioning might feel “simple,” but it’s expensive, risky, and doesn’t scale. The question isn’t whether you can afford to automate—it’s whether you can afford not to.
Every day you delay is another day of:
- Paying the manual provisioning tax
- Rolling the security dice
- Frustrating new hires
- Burning out your IT team
The good news? Fixing this doesn’t require a six-month project or a team of consultants. Modern solutions like Adcyma are designed for companies exactly like yours—big enough to need automation, smart enough to want simplicity. Our getting started guide shows you exactly how to deploy enterprise-grade identity lifecycle management without the enterprise complexity.
Ready to see what those savings look like in your environment? Calculate your specific ROI with Adcyma and discover why growing companies are choosing automated identity lifecycle management over manual headaches.
Your IT team (and your budget) will thank you.