Most plumbers price a job by guessing, matching the last quote, or copying what someone else charges. That is how you end up busy and broke. A price that works is built from four simple parts. Add them up and you know the job pays.
The four parts of a price
Every fair price is just these four things stacked together:
- ✓Labor. Your hours on the job times your hourly rate. Count drive time and cleanup, not just the wrench time.
- ✓Materials plus markup. What you paid for parts, plus a markup. The markup pays you for buying, hauling, and standing behind the parts.
- ✓Overhead and trip fee. A slice of what it costs to run the business (truck, tools, insurance, phone, software) and your drive to the job.
- ✓Profit margin. A percentage on top so the business grows. Profit is not your wage. Your wage is already in the labor line.
Set your hourly rate first
Your rate is the number most plumbers get wrong. They think about the wage they want per hour and stop there. But your rate has to cover the wage, the overhead, and the profit. If your truck, tools, insurance, phone, and software cost money every month, that has to come out of your billed hours, not your pocket.
A quick way to sanity check it: take everything the business must pay in a month, add the pay you want, then divide by the hours you can actually bill (not the hours you work, since a lot of your week is driving, quoting, and admin). That is your floor. Charge under it and you lose money on every job.
Mark up your materials
Do not pass parts through at cost. When you buy, haul, and warranty a part, that is work, and a markup pays you for it. If a customer buys their own part and it fails, guess who they call back for free. A markup also protects you when supplier prices jump between the quote and the job.
Quote it flat rate, not by the hour
Once you know your true cost, quote the whole job as one flat price. Flat rate is easier for the customer to say yes to, and it rewards you for working fast instead of punishing you. Hourly billing does the opposite: the better you get, the less you earn. Work out the cost by the hour in private, then present one clean number.
Do the math (free calculator)
Put your real numbers in below. It adds your labor, your materials plus markup, and any trip fee, then adds the margin you want. Nothing is saved or sent. Rates vary by market, so treat the result as a starting point and price for your area.
Your numbers
It only does math on your numbers. Nothing is saved or sent. Rates vary by market, so treat this as a starting point and price for your area.
What to charge
suggested price for this job
Common plumber pricing mistakes
- Charging by the hour, so getting faster means earning less.
- Passing materials through at cost with no markup.
- Forgetting drive time, so far and small jobs quietly lose money.
- Setting the rate on wage alone and never covering overhead.
- Never raising prices, so a raise in your costs comes straight out of your profit.
Price it once, reuse it forever
The math above is the same on every job. You should not redo it by hand each time. In Jobflo, you save your rate and markup once and your price builds into every quote and invoice. You send it by text, the customer pays by card with no Jobflo cut, and you see the second it is paid, all at one flat price with no per-worker fees.