How do you price bookkeeping services? Hourly, fixed or value-based, and how to quote

The short answer

Price regular bookkeeping as a fixed monthly fee for a written list of work, and keep an hourly rate for jobs you cannot measure in advance. Look at the client's records before you quote. Put the fee, what it covers and what costs extra in an engagement letter. Review every fee once a year, and whenever the work grows.

There is no standard rate to copy, and this guide does not give one. We could not find a published UK benchmark we would trust, and a figure from another bookkeeper tells you nothing about your own costs or your own clients. What follows is a method: choose a pricing model, find your floor, scope the work, quote in writing, and raise prices on a timetable.

Hourly, fixed or value-based

There are three ways to price bookkeeping, and most businesses end up using more than one. Each suits a different kind of work.

• Hourly. You charge for the time the work takes. It is easy to explain and it protects you when nobody can say how big the job is. The drawbacks are real, though. The client cannot budget, every invoice invites a question about the hours, and you earn less as you get quicker or automate more. Use it for one-off work and for anything outside an agreed scope.
• Fixed monthly fee. You charge the same amount each month for a defined list of work. The client knows the cost, you know your income, and the gain from better software or a better process stays with you. The risk moves to you: if the work turns out bigger than you thought, you carry it until the fee is changed. That is why the scoping step below matters. Use it for all regular work.
• Value-based.You set the fee by what the result is worth to the client, not by your hours. For bookkeeping that usually means the owner's own time handed back, VAT returns filed on time, and figures they can use to make a decision each month. It pays best where the work is specialised or the client's problem is costly. It needs a proper conversation about what the client wants before you quote, and it does not suit a client who only wants the cheapest compliant service.

These are not rival camps. A sensible set-up is a fixed monthly fee for the routine, an hourly rate for the unexpected, and a value-based price for the few pieces of work where the outcome is clearly worth more than the time. ICAEW's helpsheet on fee information, written for chartered accountants, makes the same point about time: it says fees are a commercial decision, and that time records alone are not a justification for a particular fee.

Know your floor before you quote

Your floor is the lowest hourly figure the business can run on. Work it out once, and never quote below it, whichever pricing model you use. Add your target income to your yearly costs, then divide by the hours you can really bill after admin, training, marketing and holidays are taken out. Our guide to starting a bookkeeping business walks through that sum in step 7.

The floor is not your price. It is the test every price has to pass. A fixed fee divided by the hours the client takes should come out above it. If it does not, the fee is wrong or the scope is.

Scope the work before you name a price

Never give a price on the first call. A quote made without seeing the records is a guess, and with a fixed fee the cost of a wrong guess falls on you. Say you will send a written quote once you have looked at the books, then ask for read-only access to the software or a recent month of bank statements and paperwork.

These are the things that decide how long a client takes.

• Volume. How many bank and card transactions a month, across how many accounts. How many sales invoices and supplier bills.
• VAT. Whether they are registered, which scheme they use, and how often they file.
• Payroll. How many people, how often they are paid, and whether pensions are included.
• The state of the records. Up to date or months behind. Receipts kept or missing. Bank feeds connected or not.
• Who does what. Whether the client raises their own invoices, chases their own debts and uploads their own receipts, or expects you to.
• How often they want it. Weekly, monthly or quarterly updates, and whether they want a report or a call each time.
• Anything unusual. Foreign currency, stock, several sales channels, grant funding, or more than one business in one set of books.

Turn the answers into an estimate of hours a month. Add a margin for the things you have not seen yet, because a new client always takes longer in the first quarter. Then check the result against your floor.

Turn the scope into two or three packages

Offer a small number of packages, not a new price for every client. Packages make quoting quicker, make your prices consistent, and give a prospect a choice between your options instead of a choice between you and someone else.

• Keep it to three at most. For example: the books kept up to date each month; the same plus VAT returns and a monthly report; the same plus payroll and a regular call.
• Set limits on each one. A number of transactions, bank accounts or employees up to which the price holds. Without a limit, a growing client gets more work from you at the old fee.
• Say what the client must do. For example, upload receipts by an agreed day each month. A package price assumes records that arrive on time.
• Decide whether to publish prices.A "from" price on your website saves you calls with people who were never going to pay it. If you publish one, make it a price you would really charge, and say what it includes.

When you send the quote, show the package you recommend and the one above it. Explain the difference in terms of what the client gets, not the hours you spend.

Put the fee basis in writing

Every client should have the fee, the scope and the extras in writing before you start. For many bookkeepers this is a rule, not just good practice, and the professional bodies are specific about it.

• AAT. The Client Care Policy applies to members in public practice who hold an AAT licence. It says a member must provide a letter of engagement to all clients before any professional work is undertaken. The letter must include the scope of the work and the basis, frequency and rate of charge, with the treatment of expenses. Where no fixed fee is agreed, the member should give an estimate of fees including hourly charging rates. Any taxes payable on top of the fee should be specified, so say whether your prices include VAT.
• ICAEW. Its Code of Ethics binds ICAEW members, and it is a sound standard for anyone. The fee information helpsheet quotes paragraph R330.5: a professional accountant shall provide fee quotes or details of the basis of fees in writing, normally in the engagement letter. It adds that a firm that sets a fixed fee will be expected to honour it, that a firm must be clear about the extent of the work a fixed fee covers, and that an estimate should be labelled as an estimate and not a fixed fee.
• ICB. ICB provides a Letter of Engagement template to its Practice Licence holders. Its member update on the 2026 template says members should use the new template for all new clients and new engagements, and that it keeps a fees section with more flexible wording.

Whichever body supervises you, the fee section of your letter should answer five questions. What is the fee and how often is it charged. What work it covers, with the limits from your package. What is not covered and how that is charged. When the fee will be reviewed. What happens if an invoice is not paid. AAT's policy asks for that last point too: the letter should set out the action that will be taken if a fee remains unpaid.

Charge for work outside the scope

Extra work is where fixed fees leak. A client asks for a quick job, you do it, and nothing is billed because raising it feels awkward. The fix is to agree the rule before the work exists.

• Name the hourly rate for extras in the engagement letter. Then an extra job is the agreed terms at work, not a new negotiation.
• Say so before you start. A one-line email is enough: this is outside your monthly package, it will take about this long, and it will be billed at the agreed rate.
• Warn early if an estimate will run over.ICAEW's helpsheet says that where it becomes apparent a quote or estimate will be exceeded, the firm should inform the client in advance.
• Show it on the invoice. List the extra work on its own line. The helpsheet says that where an additional fee is charged for work the firm believes is not covered by a fixed fee, this should be made clear.

If the same extra comes up three months running, it is no longer an extra. Move the client to the next package.

When and how to raise your prices

Raise prices on a timetable, not when you finally lose patience. A fee that is reviewed every year in small steps is accepted far more easily than one that jumps after five years of silence.

These are the times a fee should be looked at.

• Once a year, for every client. Pick a month and put it in the engagement letter. Your own costs for software, insurance and membership change from year to year, and the fee should be checked against them.
• When the work has grown. The client has passed a package limit, registered for VAT, taken on staff or added a bank account.
• When the fee is below your floor. Divide the last three months of fees by the hours you spent. If the answer is under your floor, act now and do not wait for the annual review.
• When you are full. If you are turning work away, your prices for new clients are too low. Raise them for the next quote first, then bring older clients up over time.

How you do it matters as much as the amount. Honour the fee you agreed for the period you agreed it, and change it from the next one. Give notice in writing, and get the client's agreement in writing too. Check what your own body expects when terms change:

• AAT. The Client Care Policy says that where new services are to be undertaken or any terms are required to be changed, the member shall issue a new engagement letter and amend terms with the client.
• ICB.The 2026 Letter of Engagement template adds an optional fee review clause. ICB's update says members may not need to issue a completely new letter every time fees increase, provided the engagement already contains suitable review wording and the revised fee is agreed in writing.

Red flags: clients who only buy on price

Some prospects will never be worth the fee they are willing to pay. It is cheaper to spot them at the quote than six months in. Watch for these.

• Price is the first question, before any detail. They ask what you charge before they have told you anything about the business.
• They will not show you the records. A prospect who wants a fixed price but refuses access to the books is asking you to take all the risk.
• They have changed bookkeeper often. Ask why they are moving. If every previous bookkeeper was too expensive or too slow, you will be next.
• They ask for a discount with nothing in return. A lower fee should mean a smaller scope. If the scope stays the same, the price does too.
• They pay other suppliers late. You will see this in the books. It usually applies to you as well, so ask for payment by direct debit or in advance.
• They want it done yesterday. Urgent, behind and cheap do not go together. Urgent work costs more, not less.

When a prospect says someone else is cheaper, do not match the price. Compare the scope. If they still want the lower price, offer the smaller package. If that does not suit them either, let them go politely. A full diary of clients at the wrong fee is worse than a gap in it. There is one more check before you take on anyone: your anti-money laundering duties apply whatever they pay, and a client who is evasive about their records is a concern for more than your pricing.

Prices hold when enquiries keep coming

It is much easier to quote a fair price, and to walk away from a bad client, when another enquiry is on its way. A bookkeeper with an empty pipeline discounts. So pricing and marketing are one job, and the marketing has to keep going while you are busy. Our guide to how bookkeepers get clients covers where enquiries come from.

What you post also shapes the price people expect to pay. A page that explains deadlines, shows what tidy books make possible, and says plainly who you work with attracts prospects who are choosing on quality. A silent page leaves them only the price to compare. If keeping that going is the part that slips, Pillr drafts a month of posts for bookkeepers from your own website, in your voice, and schedules them to LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram once you have approved each one. Paste your website address on the home page to see the posts it drafts, or look at plans and pricing first.

This guide is general information, not advice on your own circumstances. Rules and templates change, so check each linked page, and ask your professional body if you are unsure what its rules require of your engagement letters.

Questions bookkeepers ask about pricing