Estimate Pricing
How does ServeHub price an estimate?
ServeHub prices an estimate from sections. Each section is a named piece of work with a quantity and a unit price, and ServeHub multiplies the two to get that section's client price. The estimate total is the sum of its sections. You fill sections from your saved service items, so you type a price once and reuse it.
That is the whole pricing model — one price per section, quantity times rate. There is no separate cost ledger behind it and no margin calculator to configure before you can send your first quote.
- Add the services and products you sell under Settings › Catalog, each with a name, a unit and a price.
- Start an estimate, pick the customer, and add a section for each part of the job.
- Give the section a quantity and a unit price. ServeHub shows the client price as quantity × unit price while you type.
- Mark any upsell section optional. The customer ticks or unticks it on the estimate and the total updates in front of them.
- Send it. Taxes are applied when you invoice, from the tax rates you saved.
Which pricing record should I use?
Use service items for the work you sell — they fill estimate sections, invoice lines and your website storefront. Use tax rates for anything you charge on top. Catalog items are an older invoice-only list that still works, and service templates are a Pro shortcut for jobs you quote constantly.
| Record | What it holds | Used on | Plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| Service item | Name, unit, price per unit, description, optional photo | Estimate sections, invoice lines, website storefront | Every plan |
| Estimate section | Name, description, quantity, unit price, optional flag | One estimate (not reused across estimates) | Every plan |
| Catalog item | Name, description, unit price, service or product | Invoice lines, including deposit invoices | Every plan |
| Tax rate | Name, percentage, optional registration number | Invoices, and the estimate widget | Every plan |
| Service template | A measured service (area, length, count or flat) with its unit and rate | One-click estimates and the AI estimate widget | Pro only |
If you are starting fresh, you only need service items and tax rates. The other three are optimisations.
What happened to materials, labour rates and machines?
They were retired on 16 August 2026. ServeHub used to let you build a material catalogue, hourly labour rates and machine costs, then cost an estimate against them. Almost nobody used it, so it is gone from the estimate builder. Nothing was deleted: what you already entered is still on file and still readable.
What you can still see: your materials, labour rates and machines appear read-only under Settings › Catalog, in a section marked as retired. It only shows up if you had entered some.
Estimates you built before then: still display their original material and labour cost lines, exactly as they were, read-only. Their totals have not changed.
What you can no longer do: add, edit or delete a material, labour rate or machine, import materials from CSV, set volume price tiers, or put a material or labour cost line on a new estimate.
The overhead setting: your monthly overhead and billable hours are still there and still feed the margin shown on pre-retirement estimates and the dashboard profit trend. They no longer change what a new estimate charges the customer.
Want to know what a job actually cost you? Record expenses and receipts against the job under Transactions, and log crew time on the job itself. That is the honest replacement — real money spent, not an estimate-time projection.
How do I keep my prices current?
Edit the price on the service item under Settings › Catalog. New estimates and invoices pick up the new price the next time you add that item. Estimates and invoices you already created keep the price they were built with, so a rate change never rewrites a quote a customer has already seen.
Same rule for tax rates: changing a rate affects the next invoice you build, not ones already sent.
Related reading
- Building and sending estimates — the full estimate workflow, from sections to e-signature.
- Setting up tax rates — GST/HST, QST and sales tax, and how ServeHub picks the right one.
- Service templates and one-click estimates — the Pro shortcut for jobs you quote every week.
- Job costing, defined — what job costing means, and why ServeHub no longer does it at estimate time.
- Build your service catalogue — step two of the setup playbook, in order.