HVAC and trades
Trades companies make money one job at a time and lose it the same way. Margin leaks in unbilled changes, callbacks, idle hours and quotes built from last year's prices. Cash sits between the day the equipment is bought and the day the homeowner pays. We bring job-level numbers to owners of HVAC, plumbing, electrical and other trades companies across British Columbia, alongside their CPA.
How the money works
- Revenue is seasonal and installs cluster in heat waves and cold snaps, so cash in the quiet months depends on the buffer built in the busy ones
- Equipment and materials are paid before the job is invoiced, so growth consumes cash unless deposits and progress billing are standard
- Labour is the largest cost and the least measured, with drive time, callbacks and warranty work hidden inside the technician's day
- Quotes are often built from memory and old price lists, so margin drifts down as supplier prices rise
The moves we make
- Job costing with labour burden and overhead allocated, so every install and service call shows its real margin
- Deposits, progress billing and invoice-on-completion built into the quoting and dispatch process
- A weekly scorecard of booked jobs per technician, average ticket, gross margin by job type and days to collect
- A 13-week cash flow with the seasonal pattern modelled, so the slow season is funded in advance
Ali's agencies have built more than 150 live HVAC websites and publish their marketing results at hvac.agency/case-studies, including CombiBoiler.ca at 300% ROI and 300+ monthly leads and HVACDeal.ca at 500+ leads and 12:1 ROI. Those are marketing results from the agency side of Ali's work, which is why the finance work here starts from an understanding of how a trades company wins and prices its jobs.
Where cash and margin leak
The install that was quoted at a healthy margin and finished at a loss is the story of most trades companies. The difference is in hours that ran over, a part that cost more than the price list said, a change the homeowner asked for and nobody billed, and the callback a month later. None of these appear on the income statement as a line. They appear as a gross margin that is lower than the owner believes it should be.
Cash leaks in the same places. Equipment bought on a supplier account, labour paid every two weeks, and the invoice sent when the office gets to it.
The numbers to watch every week
Booked jobs per technician per week tells you whether next month is full. Average ticket by job type tells you whether pricing is holding. Gross margin by job type, calculated after labour burden and the share of the truck, tells you which work to sell more of. Quoted hours against actual hours tells you where the estimating is wrong. Days from job complete to cash received tells you whether the office is doing its part.
These five numbers, on one page, reviewed every Monday, change how a trades company is run more than any annual statement.
How pricing works in the trades
Pricing in HVAC and trades is a cost-plus calculation that is rarely done honestly. The cost of a job is the technician's loaded hourly rate, including benefits, vehicle, tools and idle time, times the real hours, plus materials at today's price, plus a share of overhead. The margin goes on top of that, not on top of the parts alone.
Flat-rate pricing books work when they are rebuilt from this calculation every year. Service agreements and maintenance plans smooth the seasonal cash and raise the lifetime value of a customer, which is why they belong in the pricing model and not only in the marketing plan.
Questions from hVAC and trades owners
Do you understand how a trades company actually runs?
Yes. Ali's agencies have marketed for HVAC, plumbing and trades companies across BC for years, with results published at hvac.agency. The finance work here starts from how those companies win jobs, price them and get paid, not from a textbook.
What software should a trades company use for job costing?
The field service product you already use usually has job costing that nobody has set up. We configure it to carry labour burden and material cost and connect it to your accounting system so the margin by job flows into the monthly pack without re-keying.
How do we stop the slow season from draining cash every year?
Model the seasonal pattern in a 13-week cash flow, set a buffer target to reach by the end of the busy season, sell maintenance plans that bill year-round, and time equipment purchases and owner draws to the right side of the trough.
Start with a finance review.
Ninety minutes with Ali on your cash, margin and pricing. You leave with the four numbers to watch and the two or three moves that change them, whether or not we work together.