Most independent garages in the UK charge between £55 and £90 an hour for labour in 2026. In London and the South East it's often £80 to £120 or more, and main dealers charge £90 to £180. But the going rate in your town doesn't tell you what you need to charge. That depends on your own costs, and most garages have never worked it out. This guide shows you how, with a calculator you can fill in with your own figures.
Average garage labour rates in the UK
Rates vary hugely by region. A What Car? survey of 279 independent garages found an average of £76 an hour, but the range ran from £47 in Huddersfield to £141 in south-west London. Recent surveys put most independents somewhere in the middle of that.
| Where | Typical independent rate | Main dealer |
|---|---|---|
| London and the South East | £80 – £120+ | £150 – £200+ |
| South West, East, Midlands | £60 – £85 | £110 – £160 |
| North of England | £50 – £75 | £100 – £140 |
| Wales and Scotland | £50 – £75 | £100 – £140 |
Use this table to see where you sit. Don't use it to set your rate. The garage down the road charging £60 might be losing money on every hour, or have a paid-off building you don't.
How to work out your own labour rate
Your labour rate has one job: cover everything it costs to keep the doors open, then leave a profit. The sum has three parts.
- Add up a month of costs. Rent, rates, insurance, power, equipment finance, software, waste, accountant. Add your technicians' wages and what you pay yourself.
- Work out the hours you actually sell. Not the hours you're open. The hours that end up on an invoice.
- Divide costs by sold hours, then add your profit. That's your rate.
Step two is the one that catches people out. A technician paid for 40 hours a week doesn't sell 40 hours. Some time goes on holidays, sickness, tidying, waiting for parts, road tests nobody pays for and jobs that overrun. Most garages sell 65% to 80% of the hours they pay for.
Labour rate calculator
Fill in your own figures. The defaults are the example above. Leave VAT out of every number. If you're VAT registered, the rate it gives you is before VAT.
Put in your own numbers. Leave VAT out of everything.
Charge at least£66.06 an hour
Every hour you sell under £52.85 loses you money. This ignores your parts profit, so treat parts as a bonus on top.
Why selling more hours beats a higher rate
Play with the "share of paid hours you charge for" box in the calculator. Going from 65% to 80% drops the break-even rate by almost a fifth. For most garages, that's the cheapest pay rise there is.
Where the unsold hours usually go:
- Time not booked against the job. The extra 40 minutes freeing a seized bolt never makes it onto the invoice. Technicians who log time on the job sheet as they go fix most of this. Our guide to garage timesheets covers how.
- Gaps in the diary. A cancelled MOT at 10am leaves a bay empty for an hour. Reminders and deposits cut no-shows. See how to reduce MOT no-shows.
- Waiting for parts. A car on a ramp waiting for a delivery is a bay earning nothing. Order parts when the job is booked, not when the car arrives.
- Free diagnosis. Twenty minutes "just plugging it in" for free, five times a week, is a whole day a month. Read how much to charge for diagnostics.
Should you charge book time or actual time?
Most independents charge book time for routine jobs. That's the manufacturer's or data provider's standard time for the job, whatever it really takes you. A clutch with 4.2 hours book time is charged at 4.2 hours.
Book time is fair to customers because the price doesn't depend on who does the job. It rewards a fast technician: if they do it in 3.5 hours, you still sell 4.2. Charge actual time only for work with no fair book time: diagnosis, electrical faults and restoration work. Tell the customer before you start, and agree a limit before you go past it.
When and how to put your rate up
If the calculator says you're under, you're not alone. Most garages that do this sum for the first time find they've been charging too little for years. You don't have to jump in one go.
- Raise it once a year, on a set date. Costs rise every year, so a yearly rise is normal. Customers barely notice £3 or £4 an hour. A sudden £15 jump after five years of nothing is what they notice.
- Raise trade and fleet rates separately. Trade work often sits on a discount agreed years ago. Check it still leaves a profit. Our guide to trade customers has more on this.
- Don't apologise for it. A clear estimate and a well-done job matter far more to customers than £5 an hour. The ones who leave over a fair price are rarely the ones you make money on.
- Charge more for specialist work. EV, hybrid, ADAS calibration and diagnostics need training and equipment. Many garages now run a higher second rate for this work.
Labour rate questions garages ask
Should I show my labour rate on my website?
Showing fixed prices for common jobs (MOT, interim service, full service) usually works better than showing an hourly rate. Customers compare totals, not rates, and a fixed price is easy to say yes to.
Do I charge VAT on labour?
If you're VAT registered, yes: labour is standard-rated at 20%. If you're not registered, you must not add VAT or show it on an invoice. Read should a small garage register for VAT? for when you have to register.
What about parts? Don't they make the profit?
Parts profit is real, but it shouldn't be what keeps you afloat. Set your labour rate so labour pays the bills on its own, then treat parts profit as the reward on top. See parts markup vs margin to make sure that profit is what you think it is.
Autex records the time each technician spends on every job and shows the labour and parts on each one, so you can check your real rate instead of guessing. Book a demo and we'll show you on your own numbers.