Content hub
How to Price and Quote Trade Jobs Profitably
A complete guide to pricing trade jobs profitably, working out your true hourly rate, recovering overheads, and quoting so the business survives the year.
Work out what a job actually costs you, then price it so the business survives the year.
Start here
Most trade businesses that feel busy but broke have a pricing problem, not a work problem. The rate was set years ago, or copied from someone down the road, and it has never been tested against the real cost of running a van, an evening of paperwork and a week of rain.
This hub takes you from true hourly rate, through materials markup and travel recovery, to a quote you can defend on a doorstep — and the discipline to walk away from jobs that only look profitable.
What this hub covers
Topic clusters
Written in the order the decisions actually arrive.
Know your real cost
Everything you must recover before a penny is profit.
Choose a pricing model
Fixed price, hourly, day rate or call-out — and when each one hurts you.
Materials, markup and margin
Markup and margin are not the same number. Mixing them up is expensive.
Quotes that hold up
Presentation, validity, contingency and change control.
Markus on this hub
What matters most here
The three things that change the numbers fastest in this part of the business.
Start from billable hours, not the hours you work
A 45-hour week is not 45 chargeable hours. Quoting, supplier runs, invoicing, waiting for deliveries and driving between jobs are all real hours that no customer pays for directly. In most one-van trade businesses the honest figure lands between 26 and 32 chargeable hours a week once holiday, sickness and weather are taken out.
Divide the money you need — your wage, van, insurance, tools, phone, accountant, training and a reserve for the quiet months — by those chargeable hours. That number is your true hourly rate. If the rate you quote is below it, every job pushes you further behind however hard you work.
Markup and margin are different numbers
Adding 20% to a £100 material cost gives you £120 and a margin of 16.7%, not 20%. Trades lose thousands a year to that single confusion because they set markup as if it were margin and then wonder where the money went.
Decide the margin you need on materials, then work the markup back from it: markup = margin ÷ (1 − margin). A 25% margin needs a 33.3% markup. Put the number in your quote template once so you are not doing the arithmetic on a customer's driveway.
Price the risk, then hold the price
Old properties, unknown pipework, and anything behind plaster deserve a contingency line rather than optimism. A 5–10% contingency on labour is not padding; it is the difference between a variation conversation and eating the cost.
Give every quote a validity period — 14 or 30 days is normal — and say plainly that material prices are re-checked if the customer accepts later. Then hold the price you wrote. Discounting on the doorstep teaches the customer your first number was invented.
Tools
Calculators for this area
- calculatorJob Pricing CalculatorBuild a job price from labour, materials, travel, equipment, overhead and risk.
- calculatorTrue Hourly Rate CalculatorFind the hourly and day rate that recovers a full year of costs and non-billable time.
- calculatorQuote Profitability CheckerTest a quote you have already written before you send it.
- calculatorMaterials Markup CalculatorConvert cost, markup and margin — including wastage and your collection time.
- calculatorMinimum Job Charge CalculatorSet a floor for short jobs that still covers travel, set-up and admin.
- calculatorCall-Out Fee CalculatorPrice attendance, travel, disruption and a minimum period on site.
- builderQuote BuilderAssemble a professional, printable quote with terms, validity and deposit.
Templates
Paperwork for this area
- CSVProfessional Trade Quote TemplateA quote structure that answers the questions customers ask before they say yes: what is included, what is not, when it happens, what it costs and how payment works.
- CSVVariation Approval FormOne page per change. Priced, dated, signed, before the work happens.
- CSVSite Visit ChecklistThe survey record that means you never price from memory or make a second trip.
Straight answers
Common questions
- How do I know if my hourly rate is too low?
- Work out your true hourly rate from annual costs divided by realistic chargeable hours, then compare it with what you actually charge. If you are busy every week and still cannot pay yourself properly or build a tax reserve, the rate is too low — not the workload.
- Should I charge for quoting and site visits?
- Charge for surveys that take real time, involve access equipment or produce a specification the customer could use elsewhere. Quick look-and-price visits for local work are usually best kept free but qualified on the phone first, so you are not driving 40 minutes to price a job with no budget.
- What contingency should I add to a fixed-price job?
- For straightforward work in a modern property, 5% on labour is usually enough. For pre-1930s buildings, unknown services or anything you cannot inspect before starting, 10% plus a written list of what the price excludes is safer.