What Is Technician Utilization Rate?
The percentage of a technician's available work hours spent on billable, revenue-generating tasks versus non-billable time like travel or admin.
Technician Utilization Rate Explained
Technician utilization rate is the key efficiency metric for home services, auto repair, HVAC, plumbing, and other field service businesses. It measures how much of a technician's day generates revenue versus how much is spent on travel, paperwork, waiting, and other non-billable activities.
The formula divides billable hours by total available hours. A technician working 8 hours who completes 5 hours of billable work has a 62.5% utilization rate. Industry benchmarks range from 50% to 75%, with top performers hitting 80%.
Improving utilization by even 10 percentage points has a dramatic revenue impact. A company with 20 technicians averaging $100/hour in billable rate: moving from 55% to 65% utilization adds 2 hours per tech per day, which equals $4,000/day or roughly $1M per year in additional revenue.
The primary levers for improving utilization are route optimization (less travel time), dispatch efficiency (less waiting between jobs), reducing paperwork (AI automation), and better scheduling (fewer gaps in the schedule).
Why Technician Utilization Rate Matters
Technicians are the most expensive and scarce resource in field services. Every hour a tech spends on non-billable work is lost revenue. Improving utilization from 55% to 70% can add $50K+ in annual revenue per technician.
How to Calculate Technician Utilization Rate
Utilization Rate = Billable Hours / Total Available Hours x 100Common Mistakes
- 1
Not tracking utilization at all, which makes it impossible to improve
- 2
Measuring utilization by jobs completed instead of hours, which hides time waste
- 3
Focusing only on billable time without optimizing travel routes and dispatch efficiency
Related Terms
Service Dispatch Optimization
Using technology and data to assign the right technician to the right job at the right time, minimizing travel and maximizing billable hours.
Revenue Per Employee
Total annual revenue divided by the number of full-time employees, measuring operational efficiency and how effectively a company uses its workforce.
Process Optimization
Analyzing and improving business processes to increase efficiency, reduce costs, and eliminate waste, often combined with AI automation.
How Attainment Helps
Related Services
Industries We Serve
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a good technician utilization rate?
Industry average is 55-60%. Good performance is 65-70%. Top performers hit 75-80%. Above 85% usually indicates technicians are overbooked and quality is suffering. The sweet spot balances revenue generation with quality work and technician wellbeing.
How does AI improve technician utilization?
AI optimizes dispatch routing (less travel time), automates scheduling (fewer gaps), handles post-job paperwork (less admin), and manages customer communications (tech focuses on the work). Companies using AI-optimized dispatch report 10-15% utilization improvements.
Ready to Put This into Action?
Book a Discovery Call. We will show you how Attainment can help with technician utilization rate and more.
Book a Discovery Call