How to quote commercial cleaning jobs by the hour or the visit?
Short answerBuild a commercial cleaning price from the labor time per visit, the supplies and equipment, overhead and your margin, then present it as a flat monthly price or a per-visit price. Per-hour quoting exposes you to disputes. Flat pricing tied to a written scope is easier for a manager to approve.
The explanation
Start with time. Walk the space and estimate minutes per area: restrooms, offices, floors, trash. Multiply by the number of workers and visits per month. If you have no history, clean the space once while timing yourself, and use that figure.
Add what the contract requires: labor at your loaded rate, supplies and paper if you provide them, equipment wear, travel, insurance and supervision. Then add margin. A price that only covers wages leaves nothing for missed days or a replaced vacuum.
Choose the format. Per hour is simple but invites a manager to watch the clock. Per visit works when the scope is defined. A flat monthly price suits recurring contracts, though you should include a clause for scope changes. Whatever you choose, tie it to a written task list.
Steps
- Time each area in the space or clean it once to measure.
- Multiply by workers and visits per month.
- Add supplies, equipment, travel, insurance and supervision.
- Add your margin before choosing a format.
- Tie the price to a written task list and a change clause.
What to watch for
- Quoting by the hour for open-ended scope.
- Leaving supplies out of the price.
In residential cleaning (maid service)
Commercial cleaning usually means evening or early-morning recurring visits under a contract. Scope clarity matters more than the hourly rate, because disputes arise over what counts as included. All residential cleaning (maid service) scheduling questions.
How Apex does it
Rolling out
The screen and the rules are built and tested. Saving real customer data is not connected yet. Status as of 2026-10-07; the badge shows the least-built feature involved.
Apex is designed to support budget-based estimating, recurring service plans, service agreements sold and renewed, and auto-renew with a price escalator. All of these are demo screens and are not yet saving live data.
- ES14Budget-based estimating (labor, materials, overhead margin)(Rolling out)
- RC01Recurring service plans (weekly/monthly)(Rolling out)
- CT03Service agreements / contracts sold and renewed(Rolling out)
- CT04Auto-renew and price escalator(Rolling out)
Apex Flow Scheduler is in early access. See how we label status.
Where this question comes from: owners type it, or a close variant, into search boxes. It was returned by public search suggestions (Google, Bing or DuckDuckGo) when we collected them on 2026-10-06; the exact phrase seen was “how to quote commercial cleaning jobs?”. We do not have search volumes.