What KPIs Should a Plumbing Business Track?
The 8 KPIs that predict revenue and profit in a residential plumbing business, with benchmarks and the exact filter to pull each one from your CRM.
Key takeaways
- Residential plumbing close rate runs 55 to 70% when a proper follow-up sequence is in place. Under 45% indicates a speed-to-lead or follow-up gap.
- Plumbing average ticket runs $250 to $550 for service calls and $1,000 to $3,500 for larger repairs and installs
- Revenue per labor hour in residential plumbing should run $200 to $320. Under $150 indicates underpricing or tech inefficiency.
- Drain clearing and diagnostic calls are the highest-margin per-labor-hour jobs in plumbing and should be tracked separately from install work
- Callback rate above 6% in plumbing indicates a diagnostic accuracy problem, not a parts problem
Plumbing is a high-close-rate business when the phone gets answered. A customer with a broken water line or a backed-up drain is not comparison shopping on price. They are calling contractors until someone picks up and can get there today. The KPIs that matter in plumbing reflect this: speed, close rate, and margin per labor hour matter more than long-term relationship metrics.
Here are the 8 KPIs every plumbing business owner should be tracking and the benchmarks to hold them to.
1. Close rate
The percentage of quotes or estimates that convert to booked jobs. In residential plumbing, where many customers have an immediate need, close rates run higher than most trades.
Benchmark: 55 to 70% on service calls. 35 to 55% on larger estimates (repipes, water heater upgrades, drain replacements) where price shopping is more likely.
How to pull it: In your CRM, count completed jobs divided by total quotes or estimates sent in the same period. ServiceTitan shows this in the Sales report. Jobber and Housecall Pro require dividing closed quotes by total quotes sent from the Quotes section.
If your close rate is under 45%, the most likely causes are: slow first response (check your speed-to-lead), no follow-up sequence (see estimate follow-up cadence), or pricing above market in a commodity category.
2. Average ticket
Revenue per completed job. Tracks whether your pricing and job mix are moving in the right direction.
Benchmark: $250 to $550 for residential service calls. $1,000 to $3,500 for larger repairs, drain replacements, and minor install work. $2,000 to $6,000 for water heater installs, repiping segments, and complex repairs.
How to pull it: in your CRM, filter completed jobs by period and calculate average invoice amount.
Average ticket increases through three levers: presenting repair options at multiple price points, upselling from service to preventive fixes (showing the customer the secondary issue you found), and offering service agreements that capture recurring revenue.
3. Revenue per labor hour
Total revenue invoiced divided by total technician hours on-site. The correct measure of technician efficiency.
Benchmark: $200 to $320 per labor hour for residential plumbing. Below $150 indicates underpricing, excessive drive time, or technicians taking too long on jobs they should be completing faster.
How to pull it: requires time tracking at the job level. Export completed jobs with invoice amounts and technician hours from your CRM. Divide total revenue by total hours for the period.
Drain clearing jobs should produce the highest revenue per hour: a $300 drain clearing in 1.5 hours = $200 per hour. Repiping and complex repair work runs lower because of higher parts involvement and longer job duration.
4. Callback rate
Return visits within 30 days to address the same issue.
Benchmark: under 5% is excellent. 5 to 8% is acceptable. Over 8% indicates a training or diagnostic accuracy issue.
What drives high callback rate in plumbing: incorrect diagnosis (fixing a symptom rather than the root cause), incomplete repairs (clearing a line without addressing the underlying cause), or parts quality issues.
The diagnostic accuracy issue is the most common. A drain that gets cleared without identifying the root cause (root intrusion, grease buildup, collapsed pipe) returns within weeks. Investing in camera inspection equipment and training reduces callback rate in plumbing more than any other single tool.
5. Service agreement attach rate
The percentage of service call customers who purchase a maintenance plan or service agreement.
Benchmark: 25 to 45% attach rate on eligible service calls.
Plumbing service agreements (annual inspection + discounted service + priority scheduling) are sold more easily than in HVAC because the product is simpler to explain. A customer with a recent service call is already warm to the business. The attach moment is immediately after the job, before the technician leaves.
How to pull it: count service agreements sold per month divided by service call completions in the same month.
6. Lead source close rate
Close rate broken down by where the lead came from. Not all lead sources produce equal quality.
What to expect in plumbing: Google LSA leads close at 45 to 60%. Angi and Thumbtack leads close at 20 to 35% (more price shopping). Referral leads close at 65 to 80%. Returning customers close at 75 to 90%.
How to pull it: requires lead source tagging in your CRM. Tag every inbound lead at the time of intake. Filter completed jobs by lead source and divide by total leads from that source. This is the most important data-quality investment in your marketing stack.
7. Accounts receivable over 30 days
Outstanding invoices not paid within 30 days.
Benchmark: under 5% of monthly revenue as AR over 30 days is healthy. Over 10% is a collections problem.
Residential plumbing is mostly cash or card at time of service. Commercial plumbing and larger residential projects (repiping, whole-home repipe) produce the most AR aging risk. If a commercial customer's invoice hits 45 days, call personally.
8. Morning brief metrics
Three numbers to start the day: yesterday's revenue vs. target, today's schedule fill by technician, and missed calls from yesterday.
These do not require a report. They should be a 5-minute review before the first job dispatch.
For the complete KPI framework and benchmarks across all trades see the home service KPIs playbook. For profitability calculation by job type in plumbing, see job profitability by trade. For tracking technician performance, see technician performance metrics.
Text Clint: any of the 8 metrics above in plain English. "What was my plumbing close rate last month?" "Which technician had the highest average ticket in March?" "How many jobs did we complete last week?"
How Clint Tracks These Numbers
Calculating these 8 KPIs manually requires pulling separate reports from your CRM, checking your phone system for call data, and cross-referencing accounting for margin. Most plumbing owners track revenue and missed calls and skip the margin and callback rate metrics because pulling them takes too long.
Text Clint the question directly. "What is my close rate on large-scope estimates this month?" or "which technician had the highest callback rate this quarter?" Clint pulls from your connected CRM and returns the answer without configuring a custom report.
Sources
Frequently Asked Questions
4 questions home service owners actually ask about this.
01What is a good close rate for a residential plumbing business?
55 to 70% on service calls. If your close rate is under 45%, the most likely causes are slow first response, no follow-up on estimates, or pricing above competitors in commodity categories like drain clearing. The speed-to-lead case study covers how response time affects plumbing close rate specifically.
02What is the average ticket for a plumbing business?
Residential service: $250 to $550. Larger repairs: $1,000 to $3,500. Water heater installs: $1,200 to $2,500 installed depending on equipment and market. Repiping: $3,000 to $12,000 depending on scope. Average ticket increases through options presentation, upselling from service to repair, and service agreement sales.
03How do I track lead source in Jobber for plumbing?
In Jobber, the lead source field lives on the Client record. It is a custom field by default. You can add a "How did you hear about us?" field to the client record and have office staff populate it at intake. Alternatively, use separate phone numbers per marketing channel (one for Google, one for Angi, one for your website) so the source is captured automatically by call routing.
04How many plumbing techs does it take to do $1M in revenue?
At a $300 average ticket and 4 jobs per technician per day, a single technician produces roughly $280,000 to $320,000 in annual revenue at full utilization. A $1M plumbing business typically runs 3 to 4 field technicians depending on market, service mix, and average ticket.
See Clint in action
Clint is the pre-built AI for home service shops. Connect your CRM, email, and phone system in minutes and the agents run on your real data.