How to Charge for Extras Mid-Job in Australia

While you're here is a new job

You're halfway through the job you quoted and you get the line. While you're here, could you just have a look at the other tap. It's only a quick one. It's not a quick one, and it's not part of what you priced. It's a second job that happens to be at the same address.

The move is the same every time and it takes four minutes: stop, price it, get a yes in a text, then pick the tools back up. Blokes lose money by skipping straight to the tools and sorting the price out at the end, when the work is done and the customer's leverage is at its highest. Say it plainly so nothing is implied: Yeah I can do that, it's not in the quote so let me give you a price first. Nobody's ever been offended by that sentence.

Price it before you do it

Some extras suit a fixed number and some genuinely don't. Getting that choice right is most of the margin.

• •Fixed price when you can see the whole job: swap a tap, add a double GPO, hang a second door, trim the extra hedge. You know the time and the parts, so give one number.
• •Time and materials when the scope is behind a wall, under a slab, in a roof or in an old house: your hourly rate plus materials. Say the rate and give an honest estimate of hours, not a number they'll treat as a quote.
• •Materials on extras go at cost plus a markup. 10% to 25% is typical and it covers the supplier run you're otherwise doing for free.
• •Give the extra its own minimum. Most trades won't touch a small add-on under about $80 to $150 in metro areas in 2026, because it still costs time, parts and often a second trip.
• •If it needs a part you don't carry, price the return visit in or book it as a separate visit. A trip back isn't free just because you were already there once.

If you're not sure, say I can't give you a fixed price on that without opening it up, so it'd be time and materials. That's better than guessing low.

Get the yes in writing

A text is enough. You don't need a contract, a variation form or anything that makes a homeowner feel like they're being lawyered.

• •Send the number and the scope in one message: Second tap in the laundry, $180 including the tapware, adds about 40 minutes today.
• •Wait for the reply. A thumbs up is a yes. Silence is not a yes.
• •One extra, one message. Don't bundle three of them into a lump they can only take or leave.
• •Photograph what you found before you touch it. That photo is the whole argument if the price gets questioned later.
• •Put it on the invoice as its own line, in the same words you sent in the text. DayRoute quotes from the job with ready-made services and you can add line items to the invoice, so the extra shows up on its own instead of vanishing into one number the customer doesn't recognise.

A real extra vs something you should have seen

This is where you keep your reputation. Not everything that surprises you is chargeable, and homeowners talk to each other about the price that jumped.

• •A real extra: work the customer added, a fault genuinely hidden behind a wall or under a floor, something that failed while you were there, or a spec change they asked for
• •A real extra: access or rubbish they described wrong. Nobody mentioned the second storey or the locked side gate
• •Not an extra: something you could have seen on the first look and didn't check. Meter box, switchboard, tap sizes, roof pitch, tile type, gate width, how far it is from where you can park
• •Not an extra: your own hours being optimistic on a fixed price. That's the risk you took when you gave one number
• •Grey area, done honestly: show the photo, explain why it wasn't visible on the first look, give a price before you go on

Charge the first two without flinching. Wear the fourth and check it properly next time.

Mistakes that eat the margin

• •Doing it and hoping. The extra gets done, the price gets argued at the end, and you take the hit to end the conversation
• •Discounting the extra because asking feels awkward. It's the same labour and the same parts as the work you quoted
• •No photos of what you found, so a fair charge looks invented
• •Holding the original price after a site surprise you should have checked on the first look. That one's on you, out of your own pocket
• •Verbal only. You said it'd be about fifty bucks and you've got nothing to hold it against
• •Rolling the extra into the total with no separate line, then arguing about a number the customer can't break down

Stop, price it, get the yes in a text. DayRoute is a 7-day trial, no card, then Pro is $19.99/mo.