The transmission of voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP) network traffic is used in an increasing variety of applications and settings. Many of these applications involve communications where VoIP systems are deployed under unpredictable conditions with poor network support. These conditions make it difficult for users to configure and optimize VoIP systems and this creates a need for self configuring and self optimizing systems. To build an autonomic system for VoIP communications, it is valuable to be able to measure the user perceived utility of a system. In this paper we identify factors important to the estimation of user perceived utility in task dependent VoIP communications.