Billable ratio

Definition

The share of a paid technician day that reaches an invoice, after drive time and parts runs.

Why It Matters

A handyman business pays for eight hours and bills five, and the gap is where the trade's thin margins come from. It is also the one thing a new owner can genuinely improve, through routing, stocked vans, and a dispatcher who groups jobs by neighborhood. Ask for billed hours against payroll hours by technician for a full year, and treat any answer given as a percentage without the underlying hours as an estimate.