Sustainable Pricing Calculator
What do you need to charge for this to work?
Most rates are set as if every working day were billable. This one starts from time off, admin and tax. Each field explains what to include and shows an example figure, and everything is calculated in your browser.
Hayley Duster — writer and solo business owner
Money you need to reach your personal account after tax. Add the monthly amount you must draw and multiply by twelve.
Example: £3,000 a month × 12 = £36,000
Software, insurance, equipment, accountancy, training, workspace, marketing — everything the business spends in a year.
Example: £500 a month of running costs = £6,000
Your effective rate on business profit, not the top band you touch. Your accountant or last tax return is the best source.
Example: 25% is a common effective rate at this income level
Holiday, public holidays, likely sick days and family commitments. Be honest — underestimating this is the most common pricing error.
Example: 4 holiday + 1.5 public holidays + 1.5 sick and family = 7 weeks
Days you are actually available for client work in a normal week.
Example: 5 days full time, or 4 if you keep Fridays for the business
Hours a client would actually pay for, after admin, sales calls, proposals, invoicing and support. Four to five is realistic for most solo businesses.
Example: 8-hour day − 3 hours admin and sales = 5 billable hours
The share of your genuine billable capacity you expect to sell after quiet periods, sales work and gaps between projects. 80% is a practical planning default.
Example: 80% means selling 900 of 1,125 available billable hours
Days of your time a normal engagement consumes, used only to translate the day rate into a project price.
Example: 8 days for a typical brand or website project
Revenue needed divided by 900 billable hours at 80% utilisation. This is the rate to plan around.
Sustainable hourly rate × 5 billable hours — a full day of client work, not a day at your desk.
Sustainable day rate × project days. Add 10–20% for revisions and scope drift before quoting.
This mathematical floor assumes you sell every available billable hour. It is not the recommended quote at normal utilisation.
Take-home target divided by (1 − tax rate), plus business costs. This is the invoicing figure, excluding VAT or sales tax.
45 working weeks, 225 working days, at 5 billable hours a day. At 80% utilisation, plan to sell 900 hours.
How this is calculated (version 1.1, reviewed 24 August 2026)
- Recommended rate = revenue needed ÷ (available billable hours × utilisation). The capacity floor uses 100% utilisation only to show the mathematical minimum.
- Revenue needed = take-home ÷ (1 − tax rate) + annual business costs. It is a flat effective-rate estimate, not banded tax, and ignores allowances, VAT and dividends.
- Working weeks = 52 − weeks off. Utilisation is the expected share of the resulting billable capacity that you will sell; 80% is the planning default, not a universal benchmark.
- Business costs are treated as a single annual figure with no seasonality or one-off equipment spikes.
- Pension, parental leave and long-term sickness are not modelled — add them to costs or weeks off if they matter to you.
- Project prices are day rate × days, with no contingency, rush premium or expenses included. All calculations stay in this browser; the numbers you enter are not sent to analytics.
A worked example
A freelancer needs £36,000 take home, spends £6,000 a year running the business, assumes a 25% effective tax rate, takes 7 weeks off, works 5 days a week with 5 genuinely billable hours a day and plans for 80% utilisation.
- Revenue needed
- £36,000 ÷ 0.75 + £6,000 = £54,000
- Billable capacity
- 45 weeks × 5 days × 5 hours = 1,125 hours
- Capacity floor
- £54,000 ÷ 1,125 = £48/hour, or £240/day
- Planned sales at 80%
- 1,125 × 80% = 900 hours
- Sustainable rate
- £54,000 ÷ 900 = £60/hour, or £300/day
- 8-day sustainable project price
- £300 × 8 = £2,400
At 100% utilisation, £48 an hour and £240 a day are only mathematical capacity floors. At the 80% planning default, the sustainable figures are £60 an hour and £300 a day. Add an appropriate contingency before quoting.
Reading the result
- These are floors, not target prices. Value-based pricing sits above this number, never below it.
- If the rate looks impossible for your market, the problem is usually the number of billable hours assumed, not the rate.
- Re-run this whenever your costs change or you decide to work fewer days.
This is a planning tool that organises your own figures, not financial or tax advice. Confirm tax assumptions with a qualified accountant.
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