Landscaping
Landscaper Payroll Calculator
Work out total payroll cost for a landscaping crew including seasonal employment costs.
Result
Burden rates vary by state, trade and claims history. Take yours from the accounts rather than the default here, because a ten point error moves every price you quote.
Get a Free Business AuditWhat moves the number
- Employer taxes and workers compensation at the landscaping classification.
- Seasonal hiring costs: recruitment, training and unemployment insurance.
- Overtime during the growing season.
Where this one goes wrong
Ignoring the cost of seasonal turnover. Recruiting and training a crew each spring is a real annual cost that does not appear on a payroll report but is paid for in productivity for the first weeks of every season.
Questions
About this calculator
What does seasonal employment cost beyond wages?
Recruitment, training, and the lower productivity of a crew learning the round. It recurs every season and it is rarely budgeted.
Is it cheaper to retain crews year round?
It depends on whether there is winter work and how hard crews are to replace. Retaining costs money in quiet months; not retaining costs money every spring.
How should overtime be budgeted?
As a premium on the burdened rate during the peak growing weeks, which is when it concentrates. It is predictable enough to plan for.
The formula
cost = (wage x hours + wage x multiplier x overtime) x (1 + burden%)
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How to use this calculator
- People. Enter your own figure; the page starts at 6.
- Hourly wage ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $21.
- Normal hours per week. Enter your own figure; the page starts at 40.
- Overtime hours per week. Enter your own figure; the page starts at 4.
- Overtime multiplier. Enter your own figure; the page starts at 1.5.
- Labour burden (%). Payroll tax, insurance, holiday, training.
The result updates as you type, so you can try a figure, see what it does to payroll per week, and change it back. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere or saved.
A worked example
These are the figures the calculator opens with. Every number in the results column below is produced by the same calculation the page runs, so you can follow it through before putting your own figures in.
What goes in
| Input | Value |
|---|---|
| People | 6 |
| Hourly wage | $21 |
| Normal hours per week | 40 |
| Overtime hours per week | 4 |
| Overtime multiplier | 1.5 |
| Labour burden | 28% |
What comes out
| Result | Value |
|---|---|
| Payroll per week main result | $7,419 |
| Payroll per year | $385,782 |
| True cost per hour | $28.10 |
| Overtime per year | $50,319 |
Payroll is $7,419 a week, $385,782 a year. A $21.00 wage really costs $28.10 an hour, and overtime alone accounts for $50,319.
How sensitive the answer is
Holding everything else steady and changing only hourly wage, this is what happens to payroll per week. It is worth knowing which of your inputs the answer actually hinges on, and which barely move it.
| Hourly wage ($) | Payroll per week |
|---|---|
| $10.5 | $3,709 |
| $15.75 | $5,564 |
| $21 example above | $7,419 |
| $31.5 | $11,128 |
| $42 | $14,838 |
Every other input is held at the example value while this one changes, which is not how a real job behaves. Treat it as a guide to which number matters most, not as five separate quotes.
What each figure means
- People
- A number, between 0 and 500, starting at 6.
- Hourly wage ($)
- A money amount, starting at $21.
- Normal hours per week
- A number, between 0 and 80, starting at 40.
- Overtime hours per week
- A number, between 0 and 60, starting at 4.
- Overtime multiplier
- A number, between 1 and 3, starting at 1.5.
- Labour burden (%)
- Payroll tax, insurance, holiday, training.
What the results tell you
| Result | What it is |
|---|---|
| Payroll per week | The headline result. A money figure. |
| Payroll per year | A money figure. |
| True cost per hour | A money figure. |
| Overtime per year | A money figure. |
Seasonality is not in this
Coverage and material figures assume the area you enter. Slope, access for machinery, existing growth and the time of year all affect both quantity and labour, and none of them appear in a calculation like this.
Estimating is the easy part
The jobs you never hear about cost more than the ones you mis-measure. BDEVY builds the marketing, systems and automation that bring them in.