The Admin Time-Cost Checklist
Twenty-one places trade and service businesses lose hours every week — to re-typing, chasing, double entry and paperwork that assembles itself nowhere. Tick every one that happens in your business, jot the rough hours per week beside it, and add it up at the end. Most owners who do this honestly land somewhere between 5 and 20 hours a week.
Job intake & quoting
- Job details arrive by email or voicemail and someone re-types them into the job system.hrs/wk
- Customer and site details get copied again from the job system into the quote.hrs/wk
- Missing info — site address, access, contact number — gets chased by phone or text.hrs/wk
- Quotes are written from scratch instead of assembled from priced templates.hrs/wk
- Quote follow-ups only happen when somebody remembers.hrs/wk
Scheduling & job admin
- Techs get their jobs by text or phone call rather than straight from the system.hrs/wk
- A job change means updating the calendar, the job system and the whiteboard separately.hrs/wk
- Site photos and notes live on someone's phone instead of on the job record.hrs/wk
- Timesheets come in by text or paper and get typed in later.hrs/wk
- Knowing whether a job is finished and ready to invoice means asking around.hrs/wk
Invoicing & payments
- Invoices are built by hand from job cards at the end of the week or month.hrs/wk
- The same job gets entered twice — once in the job system, again in Xero or MYOB.hrs/wk
- Overdue invoices get chased manually — or don't get chased at all.hrs/wk
- Supplier invoices are typed into accounts line by line.hrs/wk
- Progress claims and variations get assembled from emails scattered across the month.hrs/wk
Reporting & the office
- The weekly numbers get copy-pasted into a spreadsheet — the Friday ritual.hrs/wk
- "How are we tracking this month?" is answered by gut feel, not a live number.hrs/wk
- The same customer question — "when's the tech coming?" — gets answered by phone, many times a week.hrs/wk
- Compliance certs and job paperwork get assembled manually, job by job.hrs/wk
- The email inbox is the to-do list, and jobs live in someone's head until they don't.hrs/wk
- Only one person knows how the admin actually works — and everything stops when they're away.hrs/wk
Add it up
Under 5 hours a week: your admin is tighter than most. The items you ticked are still worth a look — they're usually the ones that break first when the business grows.
5–15 hours a week: this is the normal range, and it's real money. One or two workflows — usually job intake or invoicing — typically pay for themselves inside a quarter.
15+ hours a week: that's a part-time wage going to re-typing. The fix isn't hiring more admin — it's making the information move between your systems on its own.
A rule of thumb: hours per week × your admin hourly cost × 48 weeks. Ten hours a week at $45/hour is over $21,000 a year spent moving information a workflow could move for you.
The free 60-minute workflow review walks your actual week through this checklist — which of these are costing you most, which are worth automating, and which aren't. You'll be talking with Chris Olanda, the founder who designs and builds the work. No obligation, and nothing is charged before a scope is agreed.
Book your free 60-minute review →
On paper? Go to kontrolai.com.au and hit "Book my free review".