Desktop PC-based solutions allow each PC user to filter spam and allow only desired email to reach your inbox. Individuals may use these types of products effectively to achieve the desired result. One such product I have used in the past and costs around $20 per PC is "I Hate Spam" available from the following web site:
http://www.sunbelt-software.com/Home-Home-Office/iHateSpam

For businesses that run their own email servers, several solutions come to mind. One is service-based where another host company filters your email prior to sending it to your company's email server. For example, http://www.exchangedefender.com has that type of service available. That particular solution has a 35 user minimum, costs $65/month and requires a third party to receive and then forward all email.

For businesses with security concerns that want to directly receive their email, the server-based solution where a separate server is charged with the tasks of scrubbing all spam and viruses before it even reaches the company's email server works best. Server-based solutions may be the best yet also may carry price tags that range from the cost of a separate PC for open source solutions to several thousand dollars and up for commercial solutions.

From an accounting point of view, it makes sense to do something about spam. Time is money. For the no budget individual, check your email a few times per day instead of leaving it on all the time. Then, select all the email you receive at those specific times. Go back and un-select the few you actually want to read. You will cut down drastically the amount of time it takes to process email and spam.

For businesses with more than one employee, you can quickly calculate the cost of not addressing the issue. One of our customers has 20 people and recently received 3060 emails in one day. On that day, 99% was spam and was caught by our server-based solution. Without that solution, that spam would have cost the customer their wage multiplied by the time is takes to manually delete each piece of spam. For a $100,000/yr employee with fringe benefits, hourly costs may be ($200,000/yr)(1 yr/12 mon)(1 mon/22 business days)(1 day/8 hours) or $95 per hour. For 3060 emails per day with 99% spam, it may take a few seconds to recognize an email is spam and to delete it. (3060 emails/day)(.99 spams/email)( 3 sec/spam)(1 hr/60 min)(1 min/60 sec) yields 2.5 hrs per day. Therefore, it costs that one customer $238 per business day to manually process spam.

Hour		Blocked: Rate Control		Blocked: Bad Recipient		Blocked: Spam		Blocked: Virus		Quarantined		Allowed: Tagged		Allowed		Total Received
00		0		7		1		0		0		0		0		8
01		0		108		44		0		0		0		0		152
02		0		132		56		0		0		0		1		189
03		0		88		7		0		0		0		0		95
04		0		87		40		0		0		0		1		128
05		0		104		7		0		0		0		2		113
06		0		90		14		0		0		0		3		107
07		0		107		37		0		0		0		6		150
08		0		95		40		0		0		1		5		141
09		0		100		48		0		0		0		3		151
10		0		93		24		0		0		0		1		118
11		0		61		13		0		0		0		4		78
12		0		75		18		0		0		1		7		101
13		0		115		63		0		0		0		0		178
14		0		111		31		0		0		0		0		142
15		0		66		34		0		0		0		0		100
16		0		85		17		0		0		0		1		103
17		0		107		61		0		0		0		0		168
18		0		99		51		0		0		0		1		151
19		0		120		60		0		0		0		1		181
20		0		112		44		0		0		0		3		159
21		0		117		50		0		0		1		0		168
22		0		73		14		0		0		0		1		88
23		0		72		18		0		0		0		1		91
Total		0		2224		792		0		0		3		41		3060

The server-based solution entails an investment in a $3000 stand-alone spam firewall and $500/year subscription to an update service. A $3500 investment eliminated a $238 per day business expense, and the customer realized return on investment after merely 15 days. Aside from cost, the server-based solution provides direct control over email at the customer site without involving any third party intervention or delay. Server-based solutions also give customers the ability to send and receive email internally even when the Internet connection goes down.