Charge for travel beyond your normal area openly, on a line of its own, using one of three methods: a rate per kilometre, travel time at an hourly rate, or a flat fee for each zone of distance from your base. Work out what an hour on the road really costs you, in your time and in the vehicle, decide the radius your normal prices already cover, and charge for everything past it. Then bring the cost down for everyone by grouping regional jobs into planned runs, so one long drive is shared between several customers. Customers in the country expect to pay for distance. What they resent is finding it on the invoice without having been told.
What a regional trip costs you
Two costs add up on every kilometre past your usual area. The first is time: every hour in the ute is an hour you are not billing, at your full hourly cost, including the overheads that rate carries. The second is the vehicle: fuel, tyres, servicing, registration, insurance and the depreciation that comes with high kilometres. Work out your own running cost per kilometre from a year of receipts and the odometer; it is usually higher than people guess, especially towing a trailer or on gravel roads.
Add tolls, ferries and, on long jobs, a night's accommodation and meals. Those are best shown separately at cost.
Choosing a method
- Per kilometre. A rate for each kilometre beyond your free radius, counted both ways. It is precise and customers can check it on a map. It undercharges on slow, winding roads, where the kilometres are few and the hours are many.
- Travel time. An hourly rate for the time beyond your radius. Fairer on slow roads, but customers cannot check it as easily and may question how long the drive really took.
- Zones. A flat fee for each band of distance, such as 30 to 60 kilometres, 60 to 100 and 100 to 150. Simple to quote and easy for customers to understand. Less exact for you, so set the bands where your jobs actually fall.
Many trades price per kilometre, with a rate set high enough to include the time, and quote by arrangement past a set distance. Whichever you choose, publish the method on your website and say it on the phone.
Setting the free radius
Your call-out fee or your normal rates already include travel for most of your jobs. The free radius is the distance that covers them. Look at where your last fifty jobs were. If most sit within 30 kilometres of your base, 30 is your radius, and everything beyond carries a travel charge.
A worked example
Quoll Flat Air is a fictional air conditioning installer based in a regional town. Its technician's time costs the business $105 an hour, and the ute and trailer cost $1.05 a kilometre to run. The free radius is 30 kilometres.
A farm 110 kilometres away wants a split system installed. The trip is about 85 minutes each way on country roads, about 25 minutes of each leg inside the free radius. The travel beyond the radius is therefore about two hours of time and 160 kilometres of road, 80 out and 80 back.
- Time beyond the radius: 2 hours at $105, $210
- Vehicle beyond the radius: 160 kilometres at $1.05, $168
The real cost of the extra distance is $378, which is about $2.36 for each chargeable kilometre. Quoll Flat sets its rate at $2.40 a kilometre beyond 30, so this job carries 160 kilometres at $2.40, $384. Under a zone system the same job would fall in a 100 to 150 kilometre band priced at $380, which comes to almost the same figure with less arithmetic for the customer.
Now the better answer. Quoll Flat has two more enquiries in the same district. It books all three on one day: 110 kilometres out, short hops between the jobs, and 110 home. The run is charged once and split three ways, $128 per customer plus the few kilometres between farms. Each customer pays about a third of what a separate trip would cost, and Quoll Flat earns the same from the day. It now tells customers in that district that it runs out there every second week, and a travel charge shared with neighbours is a strong reason to wait for the run.
Writing it on the quote
Show travel as its own line with the working visible: "Travel beyond 30 km, 160 km at $2.40". A customer who can see the method rarely questions the figure. If the job needs a second visit, say in the note how travel is charged for it: once per visit, or not at all if the return is to fix something of yours.
In Quote Desk, put the rate on your price list with "kilometre" as the unit; quantities are whole numbers, so round the distance to the nearest kilometre. The price list help article shows how units work.
Overnight jobs
When a job is too far to drive home from, say so before the quote and price it in: accommodation and meals as lines at cost, or a set amount per night. Tell the customer the number of nights you expect and what happens if weather or a supplier adds one. A night away that appears for the first time on an invoice is the fastest way to lose a regional customer, and in small towns, everyone hears about it.
Mistakes to avoid
- Charging travel one way only, when the drive home costs exactly the same.
- A per-kilometre rate that covers fuel and nothing else, so every regional job loses money on your time.
- Different travel charges for neighbouring customers with no explanation.
- Hiding travel inside a higher hourly rate for regional customers. They compare rates and notice.
- Return trips for a missing part charged to the customer when the part was your oversight.
What to do this week
- Work out your vehicle running cost per kilometre from last year's receipts.
- Map your last fifty jobs and set your free radius.
- Choose a method and write the one-sentence version for your website and the phone.
- Pick one district you visit often and offer a regular run day.
- Read the guide on minimum charges for small jobs, which uses the same costing for short visits.