Guide
Two names for a fee that pays for the same visit, and one decision that quietly moves your close rate and your margin in opposite directions. Here's how to set the number and the policy.
A trip fee, on its own, covers getting a truck and a tech to the address — nothing more. A diagnostic fee covers that same trip plus the time spent figuring out what's wrong and pricing a fix. Most small service businesses don't charge both separately; they pick one combined fee and call it whatever their trade usually calls it (plumbers tend to say "service call fee," HVAC techs say "diagnostic fee," electricians often just say "trip charge").
What matters isn't the label. What matters is that the fee is sized to actually cover the visit, and that you've decided in advance what happens to it if the customer says yes to the repair.
These are general ranges, not a price book — use your own loaded labor rate, not a competitor's number. As a starting point, many shops in 2026 land around:
Rule of thumb: your fee should cover loaded labor for the diagnostic time (tech pay plus payroll tax, workers' comp, and benefits — often 1.4x-1.7x their hourly wage) plus your real vehicle cost per trip, plus a small margin. If it doesn't clear that, you're subsidizing every call that doesn't convert.
1. Flat, non-refundable. The customer pays it no matter what. Simplest to administer, easiest to defend on tire-kickers and multi-quote shoppers, but it's also the version customers push back on hardest — "so I pay you just to tell me the price?"
2. Fully credited if they book the repair. Removes the customer's main objection and reads as fair. The catch: it only helps you on jobs the customer was likely to book anyway. On a $600 repair, waiving an $89 fee is a rounding error against your margin. On a $180 repair, it can be a third of your profit on the job.
3. Conditional credit, same-visit only. You credit the fee only if they approve the repair on the spot, during that visit — not if they "think about it" and call back next week. This is the version most profitable shops in the trades actually run, because it protects against the fee being used as a free-quote generator while still removing the objection for a genuinely ready buyer.
Say your diagnostic fee is $89 and your loaded labor plus vehicle cost per visit runs about $45. Out of 100 diagnostic calls in a month, suppose 55 convert into a booked repair and 45 don't.
Run your own numbers with your actual close rate and fee before picking a policy — a job profitability calculator makes it quick to see how a credited fee moves the margin on a specific job, and a hourly rate calculator will tell you what your loaded labor really costs before you set the fee in the first place.
If your diagnostic fee is fully and unconditionally refundable, you've effectively created a free estimate with extra steps — and free estimates are exactly what trains customers to shop you against two other companies before deciding. The businesses that get burned worst are the ones who advertise "diagnostic fee waived with repair" without a same-visit condition, then watch people use the visit to get a real number and go compare it elsewhere.
If your team is already stretched thin remembering which quotes are pending and who needs a follow-up call after a diagnostic visit, that's exactly the kind of repetitive admin work worth automating rather than absorbing personally — it's the kind of thing we build for clients at Hire Us.
Whatever you decide, write it down and say it out loud on the phone before the tech shows up: "There's an $X diagnostic fee to come out and give you a firm price — if you decide to move forward with the repair that day, we apply it to the job." That one sentence, said consistently, prevents almost every argument on-site. Put it in your price book next to the repair prices themselves so it never varies tech to tech.
Check state and local rules before advertising a fee as "free" or "waived" under any conditions — some states regulate that language for home repair contractors, so confirm with your accountant or a local attorney rather than assuming it's fine everywhere.
A trip fee covers the cost of sending a truck and tech to the address, regardless of what happens once they're there. A diagnostic fee covers that same trip plus the time spent figuring out what's actually wrong and pricing a fix. Most service businesses charge one combined fee rather than stacking both, and call it whichever term their trade uses most.
Only if the credit is conditional on the customer accepting the repair that day or within a short window, and only if your price book already has enough margin built in to absorb it. A flat, no-strings credit mostly benefits people who were going to hire you anyway and costs you money on everyone who declines.
Typical 2026 ranges run about $75-$100 for plumbing, $89-$149 for HVAC, and $125-$175 for electrical, with after-hours or emergency calls commonly running 1.5x-3x the standard rate. Set yours from your own loaded labor and vehicle cost rather than copying a competitor's number.