--- title: "What a field technician hour really costs | attendo" description: "The math behind a field technician’s hourly cost: what it takes to employ them, the hours you can actually bill and how to get from cost to hourly rate." url: "https://attendo.me/en/blog/true-cost-of-a-technician-hour" lang: "en" --- # What a technician hour really costs Many service companies set their hourly rate by looking at the competition, and few have done the math. Those who do usually find the same thing: they charge less than it costs them. - By the attendo team - Published September 27, 2026 - 3 min read **In this article** 1. The starting mistake: dividing the wage by the hours 2. Step 1. The fully loaded cost 3. Step 2. The hours you can bill 4. Step 3. The real cost per hour 5. Step 4. From cost to rate 6. The two levers 7. Run the numbers with your own data ## The starting mistake: dividing the wage by the hours A technician earning $55,000 a year, divided by 2,080 paid hours, comes to $26.44 an hour. That number is useless for setting a rate, and it is the one many people use. Two things are missing: **what it really costs to employ them** and **the hours you can really bill**. ## Step 1. The fully loaded cost Example | Item | Per year | | --- | --- | | Wages | $55,000 | | Payroll taxes and insurance: Social Security, Medicare, unemployment, workers’ comp | $6,600 | | Benefits: health insurance and retirement | $12,000 | | Vehicle: lease, fuel, insurance and maintenance | $12,000 | | Tools, safety gear and uniforms | $1,200 | | Phone and software licenses | $900 | | Training and certifications | $1,000 | | Share of overhead: office, dispatch and admin | $9,000 | | **Total** | **$97,700** | The real cost is almost double the wage. Overhead is the item people forget most, and it pays for whoever dispatches, invoices and answers the phone. ## Step 2. The hours you can bill ``` Paid hours (52 weeks × 40 h) 2,080 h − Holidays and paid time off −160 h − Sick days and absences (average) −40 h − Training −40 h − Travel you cannot bill −400 h − Shop time, paperwork and meetings −300 h = Billable hours 1,140 h ``` Out of 2,080 paid hours, 1,140 are billable: about 55%. That percentage is the most important number in this article, and few companies know their own. ## Step 3. The real cost per hour ``` $97,700 ÷ 1,140 h = $85.70 an hour ``` That is your **break-even point**. Charging $80 an hour is not a thin margin: it is losing money on every hour. ## Step 4. From cost to rate On top of cost you need to add margin and a buffer for **the work that never gets billed**: repeat visits, hours nobody recorded and hours recorded wrong. | Item | Amount | | --- | --- | | Cost per hour | $85.70 | | Target margin (25% on cost) | $21.43 | | Buffer for unbilled hours (10% on the above) | $10.71 | | **Hourly rate** | **$117.84** | Run the numbers with your own data Cost per hour and hourly rate Change the inputs and the result updates. The math runs in your browser: nothing is sent anywhere. ## The two levers **Raising your rate** is hard: the market sets the price and customers compare. **Raising billable hours** is in your hands. Going from 1,140 to 1,254 hours, 10% more, brings the cost per hour down to $77.91. Those hours are usually in four places: - **Work orders that are not filled in, or filled in badly.** Compared with a timer, the gap usually goes down. - **Repeat visits** because of a missing part or missing information. - **Poorly planned travel.** See [how to plan your technicians’ routes](https://attendo.me/en/blog/technician-route-planning). - **Office time** that could be done on the phone, on site. ## Run the numbers with your own data Pick one technician and pull their real costs for the last 12 months and the hours actually billed. It takes an afternoon. The conclusion is often uncomfortable, and it is always useful. If your hourly rate is below cost, you have two options, and neither is to carry on as before. And if you cannot do the math because hours are not logged, that is the first thing to fix. Last updated: September 27, 2026 ## How attendo handles it In attendo, the timer in the app tracks the hours of each job, and parts and mileage go on the work order. Everything is charged to the customer and the contract, and profitability by customer and by contract compares those costs with what you billed in the sales documents that go to your ERP. The ERP issues the invoice: attendo is not an ERP or accounting software. - [attendo Field Service](https://attendo.me/en/field-service) - [Contracts and SLA](https://attendo.me/en/modules/contracts-and-sla) - [Time tracking](https://attendo.me/en/modules/time-tracking) ## More on field service Customers and sales ### How to calculate the profitability of a service customer Almost every company knows how much it bills each customer. Far fewer know how much it costs to serve them. And the business lives in the gap between those two numbers. 3 min read ### The hidden cost of paper work orders Paper costs nothing. What costs money is everything that happens between the technician filling in the form and the cash landing in your account. Here is the math for an example company with 20 technicians, and how to do yours in an afternoon. 4 min read ### How to plan your technicians’ routes Everyone wants the button that optimizes routes. Almost nobody has sorted out what that button needs first, and without it the button is of little use. 4 min read [All blog articles](https://attendo.me/en/blog) ## Shall we look at it with your operation? Tell us how you work today and we will show you attendo with your own data. If it is not a fit, we will say so. - With your operation, not a generic demo - A real person from our team replies - No cold calls afterwards Would you rather talk first? - Phone [+34 910 053 530](tel:+34910053530) - Email [sales@attendo.me](mailto:sales@attendo.me) - Monday to Thursday 9:30 AM to 6:30 PM and Friday 9:30 AM to 2:30 PM (Spain time)