Item-based quoting sounds logical until you’ve tried to explain to a customer why their three-seater sofa is a different price to their two-seater, or spent ten minutes on the phone discussing whether a chest of drawers counts as large furniture.
There’s a better way to price man-and-van work. It’s simpler to explain, fairer to charge, and it removes most of the arguments before they start.
The Problem with Pricing by Items
The idea behind item-based quoting is reasonable: more items means more work, so charge more for more. But the execution falls apart quickly.
First, customers don’t know what they have. Ask someone to list their furniture and you’ll get either a wall of text or a one-line answer that misses half the house. “2-bed flat, not much stuff” can mean anything from a minimalist studio to a full family home that’s been accumulating since 2008.
Second, items alone don’t predict job time. A three-seater sofa in a ground-floor Victorian conversion is a different job to a two-seater on the fourth floor of a building with no lift. The items are fewer but the work is harder.
Third, it creates arguments at the point of delivery. The customer didn’t mention the chest freezer. Or the “small” wardrobe that turns out to be an antique double. Or the boxes they packed last night. By the time you’re on-site and counting things, the atmosphere is already tense.
The Access Problem Makes It Worse
Some drivers add access questions to their quoting process — floors, lifts, parking, stairs. This is understandable but it creates a different problem: the quote becomes a questionnaire.
Customers are already doing the mental work of organising a move. Asking them to fill in a detailed form to get a price creates friction. Some don’t bother. Some give inaccurate answers because they don’t know their building well. Some see it as a reason to go elsewhere to a driver who will just give them a number.
And even with access information, the quote is still an estimate based on inputs that might be wrong.
Why Time-Based Quoting Is Different
The core principle is simple: you’re charging for your time, not for a list of items. Calculate the job using two inputs — route time (how long the drive takes from collection address to delivery address) and loading time (a realistic estimate of how long loading and unloading will take given the job size). Add them together and apply your hourly rate.
This approach has several advantages.
It’s easier to explain. Customers understand paying for time — it’s how most tradespeople charge. “This job is estimated at 2.5 hours at £50 per hour” is a straightforward conversation.
It absorbs variation. If there’s an extra box or a chair that wasn’t mentioned, it doesn’t matter — it’s coming out of the same time budget. The price only changes if the job takes significantly longer than estimated, which is a natural conversation rather than a dispute about items.
It removes the access argument. Access does affect the quote — a fourth-floor no-lift job takes longer to load — but it’s captured in the loading time estimate, not as a separate surcharge. Customers don’t feel like they’re being penalised for where they live.
It’s consistent. The same job, quoted the same way, produces the same number. No guesswork, no variation based on who’s doing the quoting on which day.
What Actually Goes Wrong with Time-Based Quotes
It’s not a perfect system. If you consistently quote 45 minutes loading for jobs that take 75, you’re undercharging. The fix is calibrating your estimates based on actual job data, not intuition.
Loosely packed boxes, furniture with no protective wrapping, and items that need disassembly on-site all extend loading time in ways that are hard to predict. Being clear upfront about what adds time protects both sides.
Very short local jobs also need a minimum charge. A 0.5-mile single-item move doesn’t have much route time, so the time calculation produces a low number. A minimum of 1.5 or 2 hours is reasonable and easy to communicate.
These are manageable edge cases, not reasons to abandon the model.
The Conversation Gets Easier
“Why is it £30 more than last time?” becomes “the job was larger and took longer.” “You didn’t say you’d charge extra for the stairs” doesn’t come up, because the stairs were already in the time estimate. “My mate quoted me £20 less” is still a conversation you’ll have, but at least your price is grounded in something you can explain.
Van Manager is built around this approach — quoting by route time plus loading time, not by items or access questions. If you’re quoting dozens of jobs a week, having a tool that applies the same logic consistently saves real time. You can see how it works on the Van Manager page.
One Change Worth Making
If you’re currently quoting by items or by gut feel, the easiest first step is to start tracking your actual job times. Not estimates — actual start and finish times, per job.
After a few weeks you’ll have real data on how long different job types take. That data makes your time-based quotes more accurate, which makes them easier to defend, which makes the whole process less stressful. It’s a small operational shift. But for most drivers who make it, it’s one they don’t go back from.
