What is job costing and why does HVAC need it?
Job costing means adding up everything a specific job consumes: equipment, materials, labor hours, trip time, and a share of overhead. HVAC work varies so much from one job to the next that averages lie. Job costing replaces the guess with a real number.
What gets missed without it?
When you price by feel, these costs hide in the margin and eat your profit.
- Real labor hours, including diagnostics and callbacks
- Drive time and fuel between calls
- Equipment and material cost changes you did not pass along
- Warranty and comeback work done for free
- Overhead each job should carry, like the office and the trucks
Why do similar jobs make different money?
Two installs that look the same on paper can differ by hours of labor, harder access, or a tougher changeout. Without job costing you treat them the same and lose money on the hard ones. Costing each job shows you where the profit really is.
How do you start job costing?
Pick a handful of recent jobs and add up the true cost of each: labor at real hours, materials, equipment, trip time, and overhead. Compare that to what you billed. The pattern that emerges tells you exactly where to fix your pricing.