FOR EVERY DISPATCH-BASED BUSINESS · HVAC · PLUMBING · ELECTRICAL · EQUIPMENT SERVICE · SOLAR O&M · UPS · IT FIELD · SURVEY CREWS
Windshield time is the silent killer.
You pay your tech for 40 hours. You bill maybe 26 of them. Where do the other 14 go? Two hours a day driving between jobs the dispatcher should have routed differently. Four hours a week fixing what shouldn't have failed if the first visit had been done right. Two hours waiting for the supplier to open. Run the math once and the case for routing software, callback elimination, and a tighter dispatch rhythm writes itself.
Utilization
Billable / paid
Windshield
Hours / week
Callbacks
Rework leak
$ / tech / yr
True GP
YOUR TECH ECONOMICS
1
The crew
2
Where the hours go
3
Callbacks & rework
4
The levers
5
Results
STAGE 1 OF 5
The crew
Defaults are typical for a mid-size service company running 8 techs at a $145 billable rate.
Free text — shapes the recommendation narrative, not the math.
Working techs, excluding supervisors who don't carry a route. Lead techs who carry their own routes count.
What you charge the customer per labor-hour. HVAC residential: $110-180. Commercial service: $130-220. Equipment dealer: $145-225. Specialty / certified: $200-300+.
$
Wages + payroll taxes + benefits + truck + tools + phone + uniforms + insurance. Typical: 1.35-1.55x base wage. Tech at $32/hr base ≈ $48-52 loaded.
$
Hours you pay for, including PTO. Standard 40. Some companies pay 45 (built-in OT). Service businesses with heavy after-hours: 42-48.
52 minus PTO, holiday, sick. Typical: 47-49.
Wrench-on-job time per ticket, not including drive. HVAC service: 1.5-2.5. Plumbing repair: 1-2. Equipment PM: 2-3. Complex install / commissioning: 4-8.
What this tool actually measures. The gap between paid hours and billed hours. We split the gap into four buckets — windshield time, callbacks, idle / waiting, and PTO — and tell you the dollar value of each. Then we run the math on the two levers that actually move the number: routing software, and adding one more tech vs. lifting utilization on the techs you have.
STAGE 2 OF 5
Where the hours actually go
Be honest. The mental model is usually 80% billable. The reality, pulled from the time sheets and the dispatch board, is usually 55-65%.
Hours the customer was actually invoiced for. Best-in-class: 32-35. Most operators: 24-28. If you don't measure this directly, divide annual billable revenue ÷ rate ÷ techs ÷ 48.
Time on the road between jobs and to/from yard. Often 1.5-2.5 hours/day in urban; 2-3.5 in rural / sprawled markets. Add to total to find utilization drag.
Waiting on parts, supplier opens, customer no-shows, paperwork at end of day. The "I got nothing to do" hour. Best-in-class: under 0.5. Most: 1-2.
After-hours, weekend, emergency callouts. If you're regularly running 8+ hours of OT per tech per week, that\'s a capacity / headcount signal, not a customer signal.
Working days. Standard: 5. Some operators run 4-day weeks (10s) or 6-day on-call rotations.
1.5x = standard. Some union / California: 2x after 12hr. Doesn't affect utilization but affects the cost picture.
STAGE 3 OF 5
Callbacks & rework
The job you go back to fix. It's labor you ate, parts you ate, a customer who is angry. Most operators don't track it — that's part of the problem.
Trips back to a job within 30 days, not paid by the customer. Best-in-class: under 3% of completed tickets. Most operators: 6-12%.
Including drive. Callbacks usually take longer than the original visit because the tech is reactive and the customer is upset.
Average parts on the rework. Often higher than the original because the original part was wrong or the part broke during install.
$
Total billable jobs closed per week. Used to compute callback rate.
The callback test. A callback rate above 8% almost always traces to one of three causes: (1) techs sent without the right parts (parts truck stocking issue), (2) techs not trained on the equipment line they're being dispatched to, or (3) the first visit was time-pressured because dispatch double-booked. Fix the cause, not the symptom — adding "callback response" headcount makes the leak permanent.
STAGE 4 OF 5
The levers — what would change?
The two questions every dispatch operator is wrestling with: would routing software pay for itself, and would adding a tech actually make money?
ServiceTitan, FieldEdge, Jobber, Housecall Pro, Salesforce Field Service, etc. Includes per-tech license + base platform. Typical mid-size: $8-15K/year for 8 techs.
First-year billable utilization on the new hire. Usually 5-10pts lower than tenured tech (training, ramp). Default 55%.
%
Realistic callback reduction from fixing the systemic cause. Training programs + standardized parts kits + first-time-fix discipline. Default 50%.
%
Parts markup margin (separate from labor). HVAC: 40-55%. Plumbing: 50-65%. Equipment service: 25-40%. Used to value the GP per billable hour.
%
STAGE 5 OF 5
Results — per-tech P&L and the levers
Where the hours go, what each tech generates, and the dollar case for the three levers — routing software, callback elimination, or adding a tech.
—
—
—
Headline metrics
Where the paid hours actually go
Every paid hour is one of these four. The billable green segment is what funds the business. The orange / red / grey is what you're financing for the customer or for the dispatch system.
Per-tech P&L (annual)
The three levers — annual impact
Each card shows what you'd add to annual gross profit by pulling that lever. The numbers are not additive — pick the one (or two) that fit your operation.
Recommendations
PAIRS WITH
CFO & Controller's Guide + Business Operators Blueprint
The CFO Guide covers the labor-utilization-vs-rate framing for service businesses, the headcount-vs-rate-vs-mix decision tree, and how to set the billable-rate floor that covers loaded cost + target margin. The Business Operators Blueprint covers the dispatch-rhythm and field-discipline counterparts: morning dispatch briefing, route optimization, the parts-truck stocking standard, and the first-time-fix culture. Read the Business Operators Blueprint →
HERE, TRY THESE. THEY MAY HELP.
Field tech utilization is one chapter of service ops.
The full crew-and-equipment operating economics live in two practitioner guides and roughly 70 free tools. Read the guides when you have an hour. Run the tools when you have a question. No forms, no gates, no follow-up calls.
Not financial / accounting advice. Operating economics vary by industry, region, contract structure, and customer mix. Use these as decision-support frameworks, not as substitutes for your CFO, controller, or operating partner's judgment.
WANT THE METHODOLOGY BEHIND THIS TOOL?
Read more in the CFO Guide.
The tool gives you the answer. The guide gives you the argument — the case law, the worked examples, the negotiation playbook, the cross-check tables, the exception cases.
The methodology behind this calculator is in CFO Guide + Business Operators Blueprint of the reference guide.