March 9 (Bloomberg) -- The National Collegiate Athletic Association basketball tournament, which begins next week, might cost U.S. employers more than $1.2 billion in lost productivity before the winner is crowned on April 2, according to a study.

The event, also known as ``March Madness,'' has 32 games scheduled for March 15 and 16. Since it begins around noon New York time, fans who should be working will be stealing glimpses of the action on television or the Internet, and tracking the progress of their office pools.

Those two days of the 65-team tournament might cost employers as much as $260 million in wages to unproductive workers, Chicago-based consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said. Company President John Challenger said even with the potential loss of productivity, employers can make the NCAA tournament a ``good buy'' by seizing a chance to boost morale.

``It's a ready-made event to create community and develop relationships,'' Challenger said in a telephone interview. ``It's an opportunity to take advantage of the distraction to build camaraderie among staff.''

A related Challenger survey of 100 human-resource executives found that 23 percent of companies plan to conduct office pools, encourage workers to wear their favorite college basketball team's apparel, or have televisions in break rooms or conference rooms so employees can watch games. Only 6 percent of those surveyed planned to block workers from accessing Web sites with NCAA tournament information.

``Companies today ask people to work on vacation, on weekends, on their commutes,'' Challenger said. ``Work time has really blurred into personal time. The same should work in reverse. It's not about how much time someone puts in at the office, it's about their output.''

Statistics

The company's report considers the percentage of Americans with Internet access at work who are college basketball fans based on Gallup Poll findings, the average hourly salary according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the average time visitors spent on ESPN.com, which was one of the most popular sports Web sites during last year's NCAA tournament.

If the estimated 22.9 million working college basketball fans with Internet access spent 13.5 minutes during the work day checking scores or getting NCAA tournament information, the daily cost to employers would be $86.6 million in unproductive wages, the Challenger report said.

The cost over the entire tournament, which concludes with the championship game in Atlanta, would be an estimated $1.1 billion over the 13 work days.

``There's some shock value to the number,'' Challenger said. ``But we're hoping that employers who might get caught up in how the world used to work -- management meant looking over people's shoulders -- will see this as an opportunity.''

Last year's tournament featured teams from 31 states and the District of Columbia. Ohio State is the current No. 1 team in both major college basketball polls, while Kansas, Wisconsin, UCLA, Memphis and defending champion Florida are among the other highly-ranked schools entering the tournament. The field will be set on Sunday.

Plus Video

The report said there might be an additional $86 million in lost productivity because of fans watching games online over the first two days. The NCAA and CBS Corp. are offering streaming video of 56 games for free at NCAAsports.com.

During last year's tournament, 77 percent of the 14.9 million online video feeds delivered during the first two days originated from work locations, according to data from Reston, Virginia-based research firm ComScore Networks Inc.

``Every year you think the attention and excitement is going to pretty much reach its limit, but it keeps getting bigger and bigger,'' CBS Sports President Sean McManus said in an interview. ``It's an amazing phenomenon.''

To contact the reporter on this story: Erik Matuszewski in New York at matuszewski@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: March 9, 2007 00:26 EST