How Much Should a Painter-Decorator Charge in the UK?

TL;DR: Most UK painters and decorators quote a day-rate copied from a mate, then give away the prep, the second coat and the fiddly cutting-in for free. Your price should start from your own costs and an honest read of how long the job really takes, not from a round number. This guide covers the costed day, why prep is the most underpriced hour on site, a worked example with real numbers, and when to price by area instead.

Ask ten UK decorators their day-rate and you will hear a tidy cluster of round numbers: £150, £180, £200. Ask how they costed those figures and most will admit they did not. They picked a number that sounded fair and have been living with it ever since.

The honest answer is: enough to cover your real costs, pay yourself properly, and survive the wet weeks and the jobs that run long. A borrowed day-rate borrows someone else's thin margin without their reasons for it.

Before you quote anything, work out what a working day actually has to earn. This is the figure every quote hangs off, and most decorators have never sat down to calculate it.

Your costed day is not your wage. It covers everything the business pays for, spread across the days you can actually bill:

• Unbillable time. Quoting and site visits, collecting materials, travel, washing out, the books. A working week rarely holds five fully billable days.
• Standing costs. Van and fuel, public liability, dust sheets, brushes and rollers, sprayers, ladders and towers, your phone and software.
• Weather and gaps. Exterior work lost to rain, and the slot between jobs you cannot always fill.

Price the day honestly first, then check it against the area. Round-number-first, costs-second is how a decorator works all summer and still finishes the year tight.

Ask a homeowner what they are paying for and they will say "painting". Ask an experienced decorator where the job is won or lost and they will say "prep". That mismatch is exactly where decorators give time away.

Filling, sanding, caulking, masking, washing down, the first mist coat on new plaster: none of it shows in a photo, all of it takes hours, and customers rarely value it until they have lived with a cheap job that skipped it. If your quote folds prep into "painting the room" without accounting for the hours it really takes, you are doing the hardest part for free.

Price prep as its own time on the job. A room that needs heavy filling and two coats over a dark colour is not the same job as a clean re-coat, even though both end up "one painted room".

Say you want to take home £33,000 a year before tax. That is your wage, not your turnover.

Add the costs the turnover must cover: van and fuel at roughly £5,500, insurance at £600, materials wastage and consumables (sheets, tape, sandpaper, brushes) at £1,400, phone, accounting and software at £1,000. That is around £8,500 of standing cost, so the business needs to bill about £41,500.

Now the days. You will not bill 250 days. After holidays, quoting, weather and gaps, a realistic figure for a solo decorator is closer to 200 billable days a year. Divide £41,500 by 200 and your costed day is roughly £208.

That is the floor before profit. Quote £180 a day because it is the going rate and you are running close to break-even, with nothing for the slow month or the new sprayer. A defensible day-rate that includes a margin lands nearer £230 to £260 once you have done this sum, set by your numbers and not the round figure your mate quotes.

These figures are illustrative; your van, your materials and your billable days will differ, which is why a copied day-rate misleads. To run the sum on your own numbers, a painter and decorator pricing calculator (P05 Pricing Calculator Premium, £14.99) is an 8-sheet Excel workbook that costs in your van, materials, overheads and target margin so the figure you quote is the figure the work actually needs.

Once you know your costed day, how you present the price is a separate decision.

Day-rate is honest for variable work where the scope is hard to pin down, like an old house full of surprises. The risk sits with the customer, which is fair when nobody can predict the filling.

Per-room is what customers ask for, but a "room" is not a unit of work. A small box room with one coat and a large room with heavy prep and a colour change are different jobs. If you quote per room, base each room on its real hours, not a flat "rooms are £X".

By area (per m²) suits big, repetitive jobs like a new-build, a large hallway and landing, or extensive exterior render. Pricing the square metre keeps a large job consistent and quick to quote once you know your rate. Carry the risk on materials by stating them at cost.

Most established decorators use all three depending on the job. The mistake is forcing a complex, prep-heavy job into a flat per-room number out of habit.

Many sole-trader decorators sit under the VAT registration threshold of £90,000 of taxable turnover in a rolling 12 months, so the price you quote is the price the customer pays. Check the current figure on GOV.UK before assuming either way.

Materials are where quotes drift. Paint prices move, and a colour change can double the coats. Quote materials at cost with a clear line ("materials charged at cost; figure reflects supplier pricing at point of purchase") so an honest uplift never looks like a markup sprung after the fact. Keeping that trail clean is exactly what a painter and decorator financial forms bundle (P07 Financial Forms Bundle Standard, £11.99) is for: the invoice, expense and mileage forms that hold the numbers behind your day-rate together.

A calculator gives you a defensible floor, not a number every customer will accept. Local competition, your reputation and how booked you are all move the final figure, and a decorator building a book may sit slightly under full margin on purpose for a season. That is a legitimate different decision when made deliberately with a date to put it right.

What costs you is the accidental version: a round-number day-rate, never costed, quietly underpaying you on every prep-heavy job for years. If you do nothing else, cost one working day and re-check your last three quotes against it.

A day-rate you cannot present cleanly gets haggled on the doorstep. Your quote, your terms and the materials-at-cost note belong in one consistent set: a painter and decorator business document pack (P01 Business Documents Standard, £11.99) carries the quote, estimate, deposit terms and invoice that turn a worked-out rate into a professional quote a customer signs.

The same costing discipline applies across the trades. Our guides on how much an electrician should charge and how much a cleaner should charge walk the same costed-rate logic through different jobs, if you want to see the pattern.

Cost the day first, price the prep honestly second, and quote from your own numbers rather than the round figure down the road. That is the difference between a decorator who is busy and one who is paid.

This article is general guidance, not tax advice or legal advice, written for UK painters and decorators. Verify current VAT thresholds and HMRC rules on GOV.UK before making registration or pricing decisions.