Set your minimum charge at the true cost of a visit where the work itself takes only a few minutes: the drive, finding a park, setting up and packing down, the short job, the invoice, plus your margin. Then write it as one sentence that says what it includes, say it when the job is booked, put it on the quote, and apply it every time. A minimum that is calculated, stated before you arrive and applied consistently is rarely argued about. A minimum that first appears on the invoice nearly always is, and it is the small jobs that generate the most disputes per dollar.
Why small jobs lose money
Follow a fifteen-minute job from start to finish. Twenty-five minutes of driving. Five minutes to park and walk in. Five minutes to set up and get the customer to show you the problem. Fifteen minutes of work. Ten minutes to pack up, take payment or send the invoice. That is an hour, and only a quarter of it is the work. Charge for fifteen minutes and you have given away forty-five, plus the fuel.
Do that four times in a day and you have worked a full day for a morning's pay. The minimum charge exists to stop it.
Working out your figure
Use your own numbers, not someone else's.
- Take your last ten or twelve small jobs and estimate the time each took that was not the work itself: travel, parking, setting up, packing up and paperwork. Average it.
- Decide how much work time the minimum should include. Thirty minutes is common, because it covers most small repairs and gives the customer something for their money.
- Add the two and multiply by your hourly rate.
- Add the vehicle cost of an average visit: kilometres there and back times your own running cost per kilometre.
- Round to a figure that is easy to say on the phone.
Three ways to structure it
Pick one structure and stick to it, because mixing them confuses customers and staff.
- A single minimum that includes some work. "$170 minimum, which covers getting to you and the first 30 minutes." Simple, and the easiest to explain.
- A call-out fee, then labour in set increments. The fee covers attendance and labour is charged from the start of work. This is fairer on long jobs and harder to explain on short ones. The guide on call-out fees covers it.
- Fixed prices for your most common small jobs. A tap washer, a power point, a rekey, a door adjustment, each priced to include attendance. Customers like these best because the price is known before you arrive, and the minimum is built into each one.
Many trades use the third for their ten most common small jobs and the first for everything else.
Saying it so it is accepted
Say the minimum on the first call, with what it covers, in one breath: "Our minimum is $170. That covers getting to you and the first half hour, and most small jobs are done within it." Then put it in writing before you go. A customer who has been told twice and has said yes in writing does not argue at the end.
Turn the minimum into a reason to book more, too. Tell customers the minimum includes half an hour, so if they have other small jobs, now is the time. A customer who adds a loose door handle and a dripping tap to the job you came for is getting better value, and your visit earns more.
A worked example
Ampwell Electrical is a fictional sole-trader electrician charging $112 an hour. Until now, Ampwell has charged a flat one-hour minimum of $112 for any small job, travel included.
Looking back at the last twelve small jobs, the time spent not working averages 48 minutes a visit, and the average round trip is 22 kilometres. Ampwell's own vehicle running cost is about $0.95 a kilometre, so each visit costs $20.90 in the vehicle. To include 30 minutes of work, the minimum needs to cover 78 minutes of time: 78 minutes at $112 an hour is $145.60. Add $20.90 for the vehicle and the true cost of a short visit is $166.50. Ampwell sets the minimum at $170, covering attendance and the first 30 minutes, with labour after that at $112 an hour in 15-minute steps.
In the first month at the new figure, 14 small-job enquiries come in. Two customers decide not to go ahead when they hear the minimum. The other 12 pay $170 each, which is $2,040. At the old minimum, all 14 would have paid $112, which is $1,568. Ampwell earns $472 more from two fewer visits, and has about two and a half hours back for better-paid work. Four of the 12 customers add a second small job inside the half hour.
The minimum is one item on Ampwell's price list, so a small-job quote is a single line, sent in Quote Desk before the van leaves the yard; the customer accepts it on their phone and the minimum is agreed in writing.
When to bend it
A minimum works because it is consistent, but a few exceptions earn their keep. The second job in the same street on the same day costs you no travel, so a reduced minimum for neighbours who book together is easy to justify and fills your day in one place. Regular commercial clients with several small jobs per visit can be priced on your full hourly rate from arrival. And a genuine mistake of yours, such as a part that failed within days, should be fixed without any charge at all.
What should not change the minimum is a customer who argues. Waive it for one and you will be asked to waive it for the next.
Mistakes to avoid
- A minimum set by guessing what customers will accept, not by what a visit costs.
- Hiding the minimum until the invoice.
- A minimum that includes no work at all, which feels to the customer like paying for nothing.
- Different minimums for different customers with no stated reason.
- Forgetting the vehicle. On a short job, the fuel and running costs can be a third of the bill.
What to do this week
- Time the non-work part of your next five small jobs.
- Work out your vehicle running cost per kilometre.
- Calculate your minimum with the five steps above.
- Write the one-sentence phone script and use it on every small-job call.
- Price your ten most common small jobs as fixed items that include attendance.