How do I work out my day rate as a tradesman?

Add what you want to earn before tax to every yearly cost of the business (van, fuel, insurance, tools, phone, accountant and so on). Then count the days you can actually charge for, after holidays, weather, illness, quoting and travel. Divide the first figure by the second.

What's the average tradesman day rate in the UK?

Rates vary by trade, area and experience, so an average won't tell you what you need to charge. Work out your own from your costs and the days you can actually bill. If it comes out well above what others charge locally, look at your costs and your unpaid days before you cut the rate.

Do tradesmen charge VAT on labour?

Only if they're VAT registered. GOV.UK says a VAT-registered business must charge VAT on the goods and services it sells unless they're exempt, usually at the standard rate of 20%. Some building work has a zero or reduced rate, such as building new homes. If you're not registered, you can't charge VAT.

How much markup should I put on materials?

Enough to cover the time spent ordering and collecting, wastage, returns, and the risk of putting right anything that fails. There's no set figure: pick one, use it on every job, and be ready to explain it if a customer asks.

How long is a quote valid for in the UK?

As long as you say it is. Put a date on every quote, such as 30 days, so a customer can't hold you to an old price after your material costs have gone up.

What's a standard deposit for building work?

Set it to cover the materials you'll have to buy for that job, especially anything made or ordered specially. On longer jobs, use staged payments tied to finished stages of the work, and put the whole arrangement in writing on the quote.

How to price jobs as a tradesman

Pricing is where good tradespeople can lose money without noticing. The work is done well, the customer is happy, and at the end of the year there’s less in the bank than there should be. Often it’s not that the jobs were too cheap on the day. It’s that the price never covered the van, the insurance, the evenings spent quoting, and the weeks it rained.

Here’s how to work out a price you can stand behind, and put it in a quote that wins the work.

Day rate or job price?

You need both, and they’re not rivals.

A day rate is what a day of your time costs a customer. It’s the right way to charge for work where you can’t see the end: repairs, maintenance, jobs where you won’t know what’s behind the plaster until it’s off.
A job price (a fixed quote) is one figure for one clearly described job. Many customers like it, because they know where they stand. You carry the risk if it takes longer.

Even when you give a fixed price, build it from your day rate. “Three days at my rate, plus materials” is a price you can check. A number that just feels about right isn’t.

Step 1: work out your day rate

Start from the year, not the day. These figures are made up. Put your own in.

What the business has to make in a year

	Per year
What you want to earn, before tax	£35,000
Van: finance, road tax, MOT, servicing, tyres	£5,500
Fuel	£3,400
Insurance: public liability, van, tools	£1,600
Tools, new and replacements	£1,200
Phone and software	£600
Accountant	£900
Workwear, sundries, trade memberships	£800
Total the business has to make	£49,000

Go through last year’s bank statements for costs you’d forgotten. Any cost that isn’t in your price comes out of your wage.

The days you can actually charge for

There are about 260 weekdays in a year. You won’t be paid for all of them.

	Days
Weekdays in a year	260
Holidays and bank holidays	minus 28
Too wet or too cold to work	minus 10
Ill	minus 5
Quoting, pricing and paperwork (about half a day a week)	minus 24
Travel and collecting materials you don’t charge for	minus 12
Days you can charge for	181

The sum

£49,000 ÷ 181 days = £271 a day, or about £34 an hour over an eight-hour day.

That’s the least you can charge and still hit your target. It assumes every one of those 181 days is booked and nothing overruns. So add a margin for the job that takes an extra afternoon and the week the phone goes quiet. In this example, 10% takes it to about £298, and you might round to £300 a day.

If you’re VAT registered, VAT goes on top of that (see below).

If your figure comes out higher than you expected, look hard at the unpaid days, especially quoting. Hours spent pricing jobs that never go ahead have to be covered by the paid days. A phone call or a few photos before a site visit can save a wasted evening.

Step 2: price the job

A job price is your time, the materials, and anything you hire in. A made-up patio job:


Your labour: 4 days at £300	£1,200
A labourer: 4 days at £150	£600
Materials at cost	£1,400
Markup on materials at 15%	£210
Skip hire	£280
Price before VAT	£3,690

Materials and markup

Charging more for materials than you paid isn’t sharp practice. It pays for real things: the time spent ordering, collecting and returning, the offcuts and breakages, the money you’ve laid out before the customer pays, and the risk of coming back to put right a product that failed. The 15% in the example is made up. Choose a figure that covers those costs, use it on every job, and if a customer asks, explain it plainly.

Step 3: VAT

From GOV.UK, checked 2 October 2026:

You must register if “your total taxable turnover for the last 12 months goes over £90,000 (the VAT threshold)”, or if you “expect your taxable turnover to go over £90,000 in the next 30 days”.
You can register voluntarily below that: “You can choose to register for VAT if your turnover is less than £90,000.”
You can’t charge VAT until you’re registered: “You must register for VAT to start charging VAT.”
Once registered, “you must charge VAT on the goods and services you sell unless they are exempt”, and you “usually charge standard rate of VAT (currently 20%)”.

For building work, GOV.UK’s VAT Notice 708 (last updated 26 August 2026) says “the construction of a new building and work to an existing building is normally standard-rated”, with zero rating for building new qualifying homes and a 5% rate for some conversions and renovations of empty homes. If any of your work might fall into those, check the notice or ask your accountant before you quote.

Two practical points:

Say clearly whether your price includes VAT. “£3,690 plus VAT” and “£3,690” are very different numbers to a householder.
Watch your turnover as you get near the threshold. Once you’re registered, your prices to householders go up by a fifth, or your margin goes down. Talk to your accountant before you get there, not after.

Step 4: deposits and staged payments

A deposit protects you from buying materials for a job that’s then cancelled. Staged payments keep money coming in on a longer job so you’re not funding the whole thing yourself.

Set the deposit to cover materials you’ll have to buy for that job, especially anything made to measure or specially ordered.
On longer jobs, tie payments to finished stages you can both see: groundwork done, walls up, roof on.
Final payment on completion, with a clear list of what “complete” means.
Put it all on the quote, so there’s no argument later.

One legal point if you agree jobs in customers’ homes. Business Companion, published by the Chartered Trading Standards Institute, says that where a contract is agreed somewhere other than your business premises, “for example, in a consumer’s home”, the customer gets “14 days, starting the day after the day on which the contract was made” to cancel a service contract. If you’re to start within those 14 days, it says the customer must have “expressly requested” it on “a durable medium”. If you don’t give the cancellation information, the cancellation period can be extended by up to 12 months. Read their guide on off-premises sales and get your paperwork right, especially before taking a deposit.

Step 5: write a quote that wins

A quote is the customer’s first look at how you work, and a clear one is easier to say yes to. A word-for-word example (the names and number are made up):

Fenwick Paving · 07700 900418 · 12 Meadow Lane, Highworth

Quote for: Mrs Adeyemi, 4 Orchard Close
Date: 2 October 2026 · Valid for 30 days

The job
Lift and remove the existing patio (about 20 square metres) and lay a
new sandstone patio on a full mortar bed, with a 1:60 fall away from
the house.

Included
- All labour, two people, about 4 days
- Sub-base, sand, cement and sandstone slabs
- Skip hire and removal of all waste
- Pointing, and a full clean when finished

Not included
- Moving the drain cover (quoted separately if needed)
- Any work to the fence or the back step

Price
£3,690 plus VAT at 20%: £4,428 in total

Payment
£1,400 deposit to order materials, the rest on completion

Start
Week of 19 October, weather permitting

To go ahead, reply YES to this message or ring me on 07700 900418.
Craig Fenwick

What makes it work:

What’s included, line by line. The customer can see what they’re paying for, and it’s harder to compare you on price alone with a firm whose quote is one line.
What isn’t included. This is what saves the argument on day three.
How long it’s valid for. Material prices move. A date stops anyone holding you to a price from last spring.
How to say yes. Make accepting as easy as replying to a text.

Step 6: putting your prices up

If your costs have gone up and your price hasn’t, you’ve taken a pay cut. Check your day rate sum once a year, and whenever a big cost changes.

New customers: just quote at the new rate.
Regulars: give them notice, and a reason if there is one. A short text is enough:

Hi Sue, Craig from Fenwick Paving. Just to let you know my prices are
going up from 1 January, as materials and fuel have gone up this year.
Anything booked before then stays at the old price. Thanks as always.

If you’re always booked weeks ahead and winning almost every quote, that can be a sign your price is low.

Step 7: follow up every quote

A quote that’s sent and never chased is a lot of unpaid work. Customers can get busy, get three quotes, and forget which was which. A short, friendly follow-up a couple of days later keeps you in front of them.

What we have seen

Gane Access, a scaffolding firm in Newport, Wales, for whom we run the enquiry system, got about 12 real enquiries a month in the 60 days to 11 September 2026, and not one contact went cold in those 60 days. How we work with scaffolders.

Every one of those enquiries got an answer, either way. The word-for-word follow-up texts, and when to send them, are in how to follow up a quote. If you’re paying to get enquiries in the first place, how much should a trade spend on getting work shows how to tell whether it’s paying for itself.

How we do it, and why it works

A good price only earns you money when the quote turns into a job. That’s the part we take on.

Found: your Google listing set up and worked every week, a review asked for after every job, and a website built to be called.
Answered: calls ring you as they always have; we never answer your phone or book your diary. A missed call from a mobile gets a text back in your name, every form and message gets a reply in your name, anyone who goes quiet is followed up, and every quote is chased to a yes or a no.
Counted: after each enquiry a text asks whether you won it and for how much. Once a month, one page: what came in, what you won, what it was worth.

It works because the quotes you’ve already spent evenings pricing get chased to a yes or a no instead of going quiet, and because you can see, month by month, which jobs you’re winning and at what price.

You pay nothing until you’ve won £500 of work through us. Then it’s from £500 a month, any month the work you win through us comes to less than £500 is free, and there’s no contract, just 30 days’ notice. The free check shows who Google lists for your trade in your town and where you sit.