Is this HVAC call actually paying you? Free, no signup.
Each task: your part cost (not price) and your labor minutes.
Assumes every call pays and costs like this one.
HVAC calls die on time and materials. A fast tech gets penalized: the diagnostic fee looks fine while refrigerant, drive time, and parts sold at cost quietly eat the margin, so this calculator builds the call from parts, labor, and travel. Start with your bar: the minimum dollars per hour you will work for (100), a minimum call fee ($149), and a daily take-home goal. Enter the diagnostic fee quoted, drive round-trip minutes and miles, and vehicle cost per mile. Tick the after-hours box for nights and weekends, with an editable premium percent (50 default). The repair-tasks card takes each task as its own row, with your part cost and labor minutes, seeded with a capacitor example, plus refrigerant pounds times cost per pound and a parts markup percent (50 default). Results show a line-item breakdown, the recommended quote (subtotal rounded up to $25, never below your minimum), true cost, profit, and your effective hourly rate on committed hours. Verdicts are PRICED RIGHT, CLOSE BUT LEAKING, WORKING TOO CHEAP, or LOSING MONEY. The gut check grades your instinct quote, and the day planner turns your goal into calls. No signup; runs on your phone.
Example only, not typical pricing. Defaults at a $100 bar: capacitor task, 45 minutes and $15 in parts. Refrigerant is 0 lbs. Parts at 50 percent markup: 15 x 1.50 = $22.50. Labor is 0.75 hrs x 100 = $75.00, drive is 40 minutes = 0.667 hrs x 100 = $66.67, travel is 24 x $0.67 = $16.08. Subtotal = 89 diagnostic + 22.50 parts + 141.67 labor and drive = $253.17, rounded up to the nearest $25 = $275, above the $149 minimum, so the quote is $275. True cost = 15 + 141.67 + 16.08 = $172.75, so profit = $102.25. Effective rate = (275 - 15 - 16.08) / 1.4167 = $172.18 per hour, which clears the bar, so the verdict is PRICED RIGHT. Tick after-hours at 50 percent and the quote becomes $400. An $800 daily goal needs 800 / 102.25 = 7.82, rounded up to 8 calls, which is 11.3 committed hours.
**Q** Why does the tool add a markup to parts I already bought?
Because your cost is not your price. The markup covers warranty risk, inventory, and the run to get the part. The tool defaults to 50 percent, which is a common trade starting point.
**Q** How should I price refrigerant?
Enter pounds added times your cost per pound, and the markup applies to it like any other part. Undercharging refrigerant is one of the classic trade leaks, because the price per pound keeps climbing.
**Q** When should I charge the after-hours premium?
Nights, weekends, and holidays. The tool applies it to the whole subtotal so you can see exactly what a waived premium costs you on that call.
**Q** Why is drive time billed at my full rate?
Because an hour in the van is an hour you cannot sell to another customer. The tool values drive at your bar so the quote reflects the real cost of reaching the job.
**Q** What does the day planner tell me?
How many calls like this one reach your daily goal, and how many committed hours that means. Past 50 hours it flags the plan, because at that point you raise the call fee, not the call count.