Key takeaways
- Traffic control job costing compares what you billed with everything the shift really cost: paid hours, vehicle, equipment, office time and a share of overheads.
- The gap between billed site hours and paid depot-to-depot hours is where short jobs quietly lose money.
- Use your own loaded labour cost, built from the award, super, workers' compensation, leave and other on-costs, never a guess.
- Fix losing jobs through quote terms such as travel, minimums and equipment charges, and through better scheduling, not by cutting safety.
- Cost a sample of real jobs from signed dockets every month, because averages hide the losers.
Traffic control job costing answers one question: after paying the crew, running the ute and handling the paperwork, did this shift make money? To find out, compare billed revenue with paid hours at your loaded labour cost, vehicle and equipment costs, office time and a share of overheads. Short jobs with long travel are where profit usually disappears.
This article walks through two example shifts with the full arithmetic, then shows which quote terms and scheduling changes fix a losing job. For setting the rate in the first place, read our guide on how to calculate your traffic control charge-out rate.
What goes into the cost of one shift
A shift costs more than the hours on the docket. List every cost before you start:
| Cost | What it includes | Where the number comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Labour | Paid hours for every crew member, including travel, loading, pre-start and pack-down where paid | Timesheets and award or agreement |
| On-costs | Super, workers' compensation, payroll tax where it applies, leave, allowances | Accountant and payroll records |
| Vehicle | Fuel, tyres, servicing, rego, insurance, finance or depreciation, per day | Fleet records |
| Equipment | Wear and replacement of signs, cones, stands, batteries | Equipment register and purchases |
| Specialist plant | TMA, arrow board, VMS, lights, if used | Hire costs or internal day rate |
| Office time | Allocation, client calls, docket checking, invoicing | Estimate per job |
| Overheads | Rent, insurance, software, training, management, per billed hour | Annual overheads divided by billed hours |
Most of these come straight from the running costs of your fleet and your payroll. The hard part is being honest about paid hours.
Example 1: the short job that looked fine on paper
Example scenario: a builder books a team leader and two traffic controllers for a concrete pour on a residential street. Booked site hours are 6:30 am to 12:30 pm. The quote, using a hypothetical rate, bills $85 per person per hour for site hours only, with no travel charge. The site is 45 minutes from the depot.
What actually happens. The crew meets at the depot at 5:30 am to load the ute and do the vehicle pre-start, drives to site, sets up and opens the docket at 6:30 am. The pour finishes on time. Pack-down is done at 12:45 pm and the crew is back at the depot, unloaded, at 1:45 pm. Under this company's arrangements, paid time runs depot to depot: 8.25 hours each.
Example calculation, hypothetical figures:
| Line | Calculation | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue | 3 people × 6 h × $85 | $1,530.00 |
| Labour (loaded) | 3 people × 8.25 h × $62 hypothetical loaded cost | $1,534.50 |
| Vehicle | Hypothetical daily cost | $120.00 |
| Equipment wear and consumables | Hypothetical | $40.00 |
| Office time | 1.5 h × $50 hypothetical | $75.00 |
| Direct cost | $1,769.50 | |
| Result before overheads | −$239.50 |
The job loses money before a single dollar of rent or insurance is counted. Nothing went wrong on the day. The quote simply did not match the way the crew is paid.
Example 2: the full-day local job
Example scenario: the same crew works a full day on a lane closure 15 minutes from the depot. Billed site hours are 6:30 am to 3:00 pm (8.5 hours). Paid depot to depot is 9 hours.
| Line | Calculation | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue | 3 × 8.5 h × $85 | $2,167.50 |
| Labour (loaded) | 3 × 9 h × $62 | $1,674.00 |
| Vehicle | Hypothetical daily cost | $120.00 |
| Equipment and consumables | Hypothetical | $40.00 |
| Office time | 1.5 h × $50 | $75.00 |
| Direct cost | $1,909.00 | |
| Result before overheads | $258.50 |
Now add overheads. Suppose, hypothetically, annual overheads divided by annual billed hours comes to $8 per billed hour. Example 2 carries 25.5 billed hours, so $204.00 of overhead, leaving $54.50 profit. That is a thin margin even on a good day, and one overrun at penalty rates could erase it.
The lesson from both examples: the ratio of billed hours to paid hours matters more than the headline rate. You can run the same arithmetic for your own crew with the free shift cost calculator.
Fixing a losing job: the levers that actually work
Once you can see why a job loses money, the fix is usually in the quote or the schedule, not the site.
| Lever | How it helps Example 1 | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Charge travel | Billing 1.5 h travel per person at $85 adds $382.50, revenue becomes $1,912.50 | State it clearly in the quote |
| Minimum charge | A 4-hour minimum protects very short jobs; check whether yours covers depot-to-depot time | Explain minimums up front |
| Charge the ute | A vehicle line covers fuel and wear on long trips | Clients compare total cost |
| Pair jobs | An afternoon job nearby shares the travel and fills the paid day | Fatigue limits and realistic timing |
| Start from home | Where agreements allow, crew who live near the site meet there | Check the award and your agreement on travel |
| Reprice the client | Clients with mostly short, distant jobs may need a different rate | Back it with your costing |
Example 1 re-costed with a travel charge (hypothetical figures): revenue $1,912.50, direct cost $1,769.50, result before overheads $143.00. With 18 billed site hours plus 4.5 travel hours at $8 overhead per billed hour ($180.00), the job now loses $37.00. Better, but still not good enough. Adding a paired afternoon job, or a vehicle charge, would be the next step.
Our explainer on traffic control minimum hours is useful to share with clients who question why short jobs cost what they do.
When to reprice or decline a job
Sometimes no lever works. A one-off two-hour job a long way from the nearest depot may never cover its travel at a rate the client will accept. In that case, say so early and offer options: a later date when you have other work nearby, a quote that shows the travel and minimums openly, or a referral to a provider closer to the site. Declining a job politely is cheaper than running it at a loss, and clients usually respect a clear explanation more than a price that changes on the invoice.
Building your loaded labour cost
The loaded labour cost drives everything above, so build it carefully with your accountant:
- Start from the actual rates your people are paid under the applicable award or agreement, for each time band.
- Add superannuation at the current guarantee rate.
- Add workers' compensation premium as a percentage of wages.
- Add payroll tax if your business is above the threshold in your state.
- Add leave entitlements for permanent staff, and casual loading for casuals.
- Add allowances your people are entitled to.
- Spread training, refresher courses, PPE and medicals across paid hours. Course units and approved providers can be checked on training.gov.au.
- Allow for unproductive paid time, such as standby and training days.
Do this separately for ordinary hours, overtime, nights and weekends. A loaded cost that only reflects weekday ordinary time will make every night and weekend job look better than it is. Our guide to paying traffic controllers correctly explains how awards and penalty rates work.
A monthly job costing routine
Averages hide losing jobs. Once a month, cost a sample in detail:
- Pick ten jobs: a mix of short, long, local, regional, day and night.
- Pull billed hours from invoices and paid hours from signed dockets and timesheets.
- Apply your loaded labour cost for the right time band.
- Add vehicle, equipment, plant, office time and overheads.
- Sort by result. Look for patterns by client, job type, distance and time of day.
- Pick one fix for the worst pattern and track it next month.
Track one number over time: billed hours divided by paid hours. In Example 1 it was 18 ÷ 24.75, about 0.73; in Example 2 it was 25.5 ÷ 27, about 0.94. If the ratio drops across your jobs, margin follows. Our list of traffic control KPIs includes it alongside other numbers worth watching.
Common job costing mistakes
- Using the pay rate instead of the loaded cost. On-costs are real money.
- Ignoring depot-to-depot time. The crew is paid for it, so the job must cover it.
- Forgetting office time. A job that needs five calls to confirm costs more than one that books itself.
- Costing from the booking, not the docket. Overruns, waiting time and variations change the result.
- Assuming busy means profitable. A full board of short, distant jobs can lose money every day.
Next steps
Take last month's dockets, pick ten jobs and run the costing above with your own figures. If you want booked, worked and signed hours in one place so costing takes minutes rather than days, TrafWise keeps rostering, digital timesheets and client dockets together for each job.
Frequently asked questions
What is job costing in traffic control?
Job costing works out what a single shift or project actually cost to deliver and compares it with what was billed. It includes paid labour hours with on-costs, vehicle and equipment costs, consumables, office time for allocation and invoicing, and a fair share of overheads. The result shows which jobs and clients are profitable.
Why do short traffic control jobs lose money?
Short jobs carry the same fixed effort as long ones: travel, loading, pre-start, set-up, pack-down, allocation and invoicing. If the client is billed only for site hours while the crew is paid from depot to depot, the gap can wipe out the margin. Minimum charges and travel terms exist largely to cover this.
What is a loaded labour cost?
It is the full hourly cost of employing a worker, not just their pay rate. It adds superannuation, workers' compensation, payroll tax where it applies, leave, allowances, training, PPE and unproductive time. Build it from your actual award or agreement rates and your accountant's figures, then review it whenever rates change.
How often should a traffic control company check job profitability?
Check a sample of jobs every month using signed dockets and actual paid hours, and check every new client's first few jobs. Review again after award increases, fuel price changes or new equipment purchases. Monthly checks catch losing patterns before they become a habit across many shifts.
Should a traffic control company charge for travel?
Many companies do, especially for regional or outer-suburban work, either per kilometre, per hour or as a flat fee. Whatever the method, state it in the quote so the client can compare fairly. If you choose not to charge travel, make sure the hourly rate or minimum covers it.