How to Build a Plumbing Price Book (Flat Rate, Step by Step)

A plumbing price book, in short, is a list of your common jobs, each with a set price built from three numbers: the hours the task takes, your cost per billable hour (wages, burden, truck and overhead) and the materials. Add them up and divide by one minus your target margin; at a 30% margin, $1,570 of cost becomes about $2,245. Start with the 30 jobs you do most.

More on this topic: Pricing, estimates and getting paid, every guide in one place.

Most small plumbing shops price from memory: the owner knows roughly what a toilet rebuild or a water heater should cost, and the techs guess a little lower so the customer won't argue. A price book fixes that. Every tech quotes the same price, the customer sees it before work starts, and you can tell whether a job made money. This guide shows how to build one from your own numbers, not a competitor's, with a worked example you can copy into a spreadsheet. If you're still deciding between flat rate and hourly, read our flat rate vs time and materials guide first.

Key takeaways

• Start from cost, not the market. Your cost per billable hour, not the wage, is the number every price rests on.
• Paid hours aren't billable hours. ServiceTitan puts billable time at only 40% to 50% of a plumber's workday.
• Use the margin divisor: price = total cost ÷ (1 − margin). A 30% markup is not a 30% margin.
• Begin with about 30 tasks that cover most of your calls; add the rest as they come up.
• Write a plain-English description for each task that says what's included, so the price holds up at the door.
• Review every year, and sooner when a supplier raises prices or a task keeps running long.

What is a plumbing price book?

A plumbing price book is the list of tasks your shop does, each with a description, the labor hours it usually takes, a materials allowance and one price the customer pays, whatever the job actually takes. It replaces hourly billing for routine work (drains, toilets, faucets, water heaters) and leaves hourly or custom quotes for jobs you can't scope until you open a wall.

How do you work out your cost per billable hour?

Your cost per billable hour is everything it costs to keep a tech and truck working, divided by the hours you can actually bill. Work it out once a year from last year's books:

1. Loaded wage. Hourly wage plus payroll taxes, workers' comp, benefits and paid time off. Take the burden from your own payroll records; the example below uses 30%.
2. Billable ratio. Hours billed to customers ÷ hours paid. Drive time, supply-house runs, meetings and callbacks aren't billable. ServiceTitan's plumbing pricing guide puts billable time at 40% to 50% of a workday; the example uses 50%.
3. Truck. Payment, insurance, fuel and maintenance per year ÷ billable hours.
4. Overhead. Office wages, rent, phones, software, marketing, insurance and licensing per year ÷ billable hours.

The example assumes 2,000 paid hours, of which 1,000 are billed. Housecall Pro's flat-rate template uses the same method: total costs divided by the billable hours you expect in a year. Replace every number with yours. The wage is only an example: the BLS May 2025 median for plumbers, pipefitters and steamfitters was $30.67 an hour, and your local rate may be well above or below it. The free labor rate calculator runs the same four lines on your own wage, burden, billable ratio, truck and overhead.

How do you price each task?

Price each task by adding its labor cost and materials, then dividing by one minus your target net margin. Use this margin divisor rather than a simple markup, because a markup always gives a lower margin than its percentage suggests:

Price = (task hours × cost per billable hour + materials at cost) ÷ (1 − target margin)

Worked example, the 50-gallon gas water heater, at a 30% target net margin:

If you'd added a 30% markup instead, the price would be $2,041 and your margin about 23%; the free markup vs margin calculator shows what any markup really earns. Some shops mark up materials separately, often by more than labor on small parts; whichever you choose, write the rule down and use it on every task.

The same formula gives small jobs a sensible floor. A toilet fill valve at 0.75 hours and $18 of parts costs $148.65; at 30% margin that's about $215. If that sounds high for your market, the fix is in your costs or your hours, not in a lower margin on every small job.

Which tasks should go in the price book first?

Start with the 30 or so tasks that make up most of your calls. Pull last year's invoices, count the jobs by type, and price the top of the list first. A typical residential starting set:

Leave rare and unpredictable work (repipes, slab leaks, sewer replacement) as custom quotes until you have enough of them to know the hours.

Should a plumbing price book have good, better, best options?

Yes, for the tasks where customers really choose: water heaters, toilets, faucets, drain work with or without a camera, and repairs versus replacement. The options can differ in equipment, warranty and what's included. Our guide to good, better, best pricing shows how to build the three tiers so the middle one sells. To rough out three tiers from hours, parts and markup, and see the margin each one leaves, try the free flat-rate price calculator.

How often should you update a plumbing price book?

Rebuild the whole book once a year, when you rework your cost per billable hour, and check prices more often: Sera's 2026 plumbing pricing guide says to review them at least quarterly. Update single tasks whenever a supplier price moves or a task keeps running long. Compare estimated against actual hours on the jobs you've done; if a task that's priced at 1.5 hours averages 2.2, fix the hours, not the tech. Our job costing guide shows how to check profit per job.

Mistakes that make price books lose money

• Pricing from a competitor's book. Their wages, trucks and overhead aren't yours.
• Using paid hours instead of billable hours. It understates your cost by a third or more.
• Vague descriptions. “Replace water heater” invites arguments about the expansion tank and the haul-away.
• Letting techs discount at will. Set who can discount, by how much, and record why.
• Never updating. A price book that's two years old is a discount you didn't decide to give.

Where CrewRobin fits

CrewRobin's price book and maintenance plans holds labor, parts and flat-rate services on every plan, and you add them to good, better, best quotes the customer picks and signs online. The AI receptionist only quotes the price range you set for each job type and says the technician confirms on site, so the phone and the price book agree. It doesn't track inventory. See how it works for plumbers.

Frequently asked questions

What is a flat-rate plumbing price book?

It's a list of your common plumbing tasks, each with a description of what's included and one fixed price the customer pays, whether the job takes more or less time than planned. The price is built from task hours, your cost per billable hour, materials and a target margin.

How do you calculate a flat rate for a plumbing job?

Multiply the task's typical hours by your cost per billable hour, add materials at cost, then divide by one minus your target margin. At a 30% margin, a task costing $500 is priced at about $714.

How many tasks should a plumbing price book have?

Start with the 30 or so tasks that make up most of your calls, which you can find by counting last year's invoices by job type. Add the rest as they come up, and keep rare or unpredictable work as custom quotes.

What markup should plumbers use on materials?

There's no single rule, and published figures vary widely. Many shops mark up small, cheap parts more than expensive equipment. Whatever you use, check that the task's total price still reaches your target margin with the margin formula.

How often should a plumbing price book be updated?

Rebuild it once a year when you recalculate your cost per billable hour, review prices at least quarterly, and update individual tasks when supplier prices change or actual hours keep beating the estimate.

Put it to work this week

Put your price book behind every quote, booking and phone call so every customer hears the same price. CrewRobin is free until your first 10 booked jobs, no card up front. Start free or see pricing.

Sources

Figures from outside CrewRobin were checked against these pages in October 2026. Most industry benchmarks come from vendors and agencies, so treat them as ranges, not rules.

• ServiceTitan: Plumbing cost estimator guide (July 2025)
• Housecall Pro: Plumbing flat rate pricing template
• Sera: Plumbing pricing guide (August 2026)
• BLS: Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2025, Plumbers, pipefitters and steamfitters (47-2152)