Maintenance plans are the most valuable thing a small HVAC business can sell: predictable revenue, a schedule filled in the shoulder months, a technician in front of aging equipment before it fails, and a customer who calls you rather than searching. They are also routinely underpriced, because the plan is priced against what competitors charge rather than what the visits cost. This page is for the owner of a US HVAC contracting business pricing and selling HVAC maintenance plans: how a HVAC service plan is priced from the visit up, what turns a list of plans into a service agreement program that renews itself, and how the commercial HVAC maintenance plan differs. The service agreement template on this site produces the plan document from your own scope and price.
Price the visit before the plan
A plan is two visits a year plus a discount and a priority promise. Price each visit as its task time at your billing rate plus the consumables: the filter, the cleaning materials, the drive time. Add the cost of the discount you will give on repairs, estimated from your agreement customers' repair history. The plan price has to cover that with margin; if it does not, every plan you sell is a subscription to losing money.
What the HVAC service plan includes, in writing
The number of visits and their seasons. The tasks per visit by system type. The priority response promise and what it means in hours. The repair discount and what it applies to. What is excluded: parts, refrigerant, repairs found. The renewal terms and the price change notice. Write it as the customer will read it, because the plan document is the sales tool and the dispute-settler at once.
Tiers, like everything else
Offer two or three plan levels: the basic two visits, a mid tier with a larger discount and filters included, a top tier with priority and no diagnostic fee. Customers choose a tier more readily than they decide yes or no, and the top tier makes the middle one look sensible. Price each from the visit cost so every tier carries margin.
The service agreement program is the machine around the plans
Plans renew when someone remembers to ask. A program is the set of habits and software that remembers for you: the due list by month, the visits booked in bulk, the renewal notice sent before the anniversary, the card on file charged automatically, and the technician reminded to offer the plan on every repair. The plan is the product; the program is what makes it revenue rather than paperwork.
The commercial HVAC maintenance plan
Commercial plans are per site and per asset: quarterly or monthly visits, tasks per unit type, filters and belts by the asset list, response times in the contract, and reporting after each visit. They are priced per asset from the same visit arithmetic and billed monthly or quarterly in advance. The maintenance checklist tool on this site builds the per-unit checklist the plan promises.
Questions people ask about hvac maintenance plans
How much should HVAC maintenance plans cost?
Whatever your visits cost plus the discount you fund plus the margin you need. Work it from your billing rate with the tools here; the market is a check, not a source.
How many plans should a small shop have?
Two or three tiers. More than that and the customer cannot choose and the technician cannot explain.
What renewal rate should a service agreement program achieve?
Track it monthly and treat a lapse as a lost customer, because it usually is. The program's job is to renew before the customer has to decide.