How much do missed calls cost a tradie?

The short answer

More than most tradies think. A missed call from a new customer is rarely just a missed call. Most people who ring a tradie they found on Google don't leave a voicemail. They hang up and ring the next business on the list.

So the real cost of a missed call is the job that went to someone else.

The formula

You only need three numbers, and you know all of them better than anyone:

• How many calls you miss in a week
• Your average job value
• How many of those callers would have booked if you'd answered (be honest, it's never all of them)

Missed calls a week × 52 × booking rate × average job value = what walks out the door each year.

Example: 4 missed calls a week × 52 weeks × 30% booking rate × $600 average job comes to $37,440 a year. Even if you halve every number, that's still more than $4,000.

Worked examples by trade

These use made-up but realistic numbers. Swap in your own using the calculator on our home page.

• Plumber: 5 missed calls a week, 30% would book, $650 average job. About $50,700 a year.
• Electrician: 4 missed calls a week, 30% would book, $550 average job. About $34,300 a year.
• Roofer in storm season: 10 missed calls a week for 8 weeks, 25% would book, $1,200 average job. About $24,000 in one season.
• Builder: 1 missed renovation enquiry a month, 1 in 5 goes ahead, $8,000 average job. About $19,200 a year.

Why new callers don't wait

Someone with a burst pipe, no power or a leaking roof wants to know help is coming. If the first tradie doesn't answer, calling the second one takes ten seconds. Voicemail feels like a dead end to them, and most won't bother.

Existing customers will usually wait for you. New customers, the ones you pay for through ads, Google and word of mouth, usually won't.

What you can do about it

• Hire someone to answer the phone. It works, but an office admin costs thousands a month.
• Use an answering service. They take a message, but you still call back hours later, and it costs a few hundred dollars a month.
• Use missed-call text back. Every missed caller gets a text from your business within seconds, so they know you got the call and they wait for you.

Missed-call text back is the cheapest of the three and the only one that replies instantly. LeadBack does it for $79 a month, and one saved job usually covers a year of it.