The Hidden Cost of ‘Please Send Me an Update’
It is 11 a.m. A customer wants to know whether their order has been dispatched. The sales executive messages the warehouse. The warehouse supervisor calls the packing team. Someone checks a spreadsheet. Twenty minutes later, the customer finally gets an answer.
Nothing went wrong with the order. The delay came from finding out what was happening.
Now imagine similar conversations happening across sales, finance, operations and customer support throughout the day.
“Has the payment arrived?”
“Who approved this?”
“Is the delivery scheduled?”
Each question sounds small. Together, they create work that consumes time without moving the actual task forward.
Why Routine Updates Become Expensive
Asking for an update is reasonable. The problem starts when asking someone is the only reliable way to get one.
Information often lives across emails, WhatsApp conversations, spreadsheets and individual employees’ memories. Each person sees part of the process, but nobody has a dependable view of the whole thing.
Microsoft’s 2025 Work Trend Index research found that 48% of surveyed employees and 52% of leaders described their work as chaotic and fragmented. The report also examined how messages, meetings and notifications disrupt focused work. These findings provide context for why communication deserves attention when improving business operations.
Repeated status requests are one practical place to start.
The Cost Goes Beyond Sending a Message
A follow-up takes more than the few seconds needed to type it.
The recipient must stop, understand the question, locate the information and respond. Sometimes, they need to ask another person first. Meanwhile, the original sender may be unable to proceed.
Consider an illustrative calculation: ten employees each spend fifteen minutes daily chasing or answering routine updates. That adds up to 2.5 working hours every day, or 55 hours across a 22-day working month.
This is an example, not a research estimate. Your organisation’s actual figure may differ. However, measuring even one week of repeated enquiries can reveal how much effort goes into coordinating work.
There are other costs too.
Customers wait longer for answers. Managers make decisions using outdated information. Employees duplicate tasks because ownership is unclear. Approvals sit untouched because everyone assumes somebody else is handling them.
A Dispatch Process With Too Many Stops
Consider a growing distributor managing orders through phone calls and spreadsheets.
Sales confirms an order. Finance checks payment. The warehouse prepares the goods. A logistics partner arranges collection.
Each department completes its part, but the handovers depend on messages.
The warehouse may have finished packing while sales still sees “processing.” Finance may have confirmed payment in an email that nobody forwarded. A missed collection might remain unnoticed until the customer complains.
Adding another group chat may increase communication without resolving the underlying visibility problem.
A shared order record could show payment confirmation, packing status, collection details and the person responsible for the next action. Each update would have a timestamp, helping colleagues judge whether the information is current.
Sales could answer routine questions directly. Exceptions would still require a conversation, but ordinary progress would be easier to check.
What Useful Software Should Actually Do
The purpose of workflow automation software is to make a defined process easier to follow and manage. For status tracking, its usefulness depends on a few practical capabilities.
Show meaningful stages.
Labels such as “in progress” provide limited information. “Awaiting payment verification” or “packed, awaiting collection” explain what is happening and what needs attention.
Make ownership visible.
Every active task should have an accountable person or team. Otherwise, a dashboard simply displays work that nobody is progressing.
Record information where work happens.
An update entered during dispatch is usually more useful than a summary added at the end of the day. Where appropriate, connected systems can capture events automatically.
Highlight exceptions.
A delayed approval or failed delivery needs attention. Routine progress may only need to appear in the shared record. This distinction helps prevent unnecessary notifications.
Control access.
Different roles need different information. A delivery coordinator may need an address and dispatch instructions, while financial records require more restricted access.
A Dashboard Cannot Fix an Unclear Process
Software cannot reliably organise a workflow that the business has not defined.
Before building anything, agree on what each status means, who updates it and what triggers the next step.
For example, does “dispatched” mean the parcel is packed, collected by the courier or scanned into the courier’s network? If departments interpret the same label differently, confusion will continue inside the new system.
Data quality matters equally. A dashboard showing yesterday’s information can create false confidence.
Employees also need a clear reason to use the system. If they must update a spreadsheet, send a message and then enter the same details into another tool, adoption becomes harder. Implementation should reduce repeated entry wherever possible.
Start With One Recurring Question
A useful starting point is the question your team asks most often.
“Where is the order?”
“Who is holding the approval?”
“Has the customer paid?”
Choose one, then trace how the answer is currently found. Identify the information source, the people involved and the points where waiting occurs.
You may find that better use of an existing tool solves the issue. In other cases, custom software development can address specific handovers, approval rules or connections that your current tools do not support.
Begin with a focused workflow rather than attempting to digitize every department at once.
Measure the outcome through fewer status enquiries, shorter approval times, faster customer responses or reduced duplicate entry. These measures show whether the change is helping people complete work.
Give Your Team Time to Move Work Forward
A business will always need conversations. Judgement, customer concerns and unusual situations deserve direct discussion.
Routine status information should be easy to find, with clear ownership and reliable updates. That gives conversations a more useful starting point.
At AppCurators Technologies, we develop business software around operational needs, helping teams bring information, responsibilities and actions into a shared process.
Is your team spending too much time asking what is happening? Connect with AppCurators to discuss a clearer way to manage your workflow.