Installers are the face of your business. The last company representative the customer sees. The one they spend the most time with and the one they associate with your brand. So, it’s remarkable how often businesses get fitter pay wrong. The way you pay your fitting teams can have a profound effect on productivity, quality, and profitability.
Some pay too little and lose good fitters to competitors. Some pay too much, without getting the productivity in return. Some choose the wrong pay model altogether, encouraging corner-cutting that leads to costly revisits and damage to reputation.
In this article, we’ll look at the key considerations around how to pay your fitting teams: from employment status to incentive structures – and how to find the sweet spot between fairness, efficiency and quality.
Employed vs Self-Employed: What’s Right for You?
First, let’s address the status question: do you take on your fitters as employees or subcontract the work to self-employed tradespeople?
Self-employed fitters are common in the industry – and for good reason. They offer flexibility, no payroll overheads, and fewer employment obligations. You pay for work completed, and they handle their own tax and National Insurance.
But there are drawbacks:
- You lose control over their time – they can work elsewhere.
- You can’t manage them in the same way as an employee.
- If HMRC decides they’re ‘disguised employees’, you risk penalties and unpaid taxes.
- Quality and loyalty can be harder to maintain.
Employed fitters, by contrast, give you more control and consistency. You set the terms, the hours, and the expectations. They represent your brand and your values and you can invest in training. They can be dressed in your uniform, drive your vehicles, and uphold your standards. There’s also more stability – employed staff are less likely to disappear during busy periods or when a competitor offers them £10 more a day. You also avoid status risk with HMRC.
The downside? More admin. You’re on the hook for sick pay, holiday, pensions, and employer’s NI. And if the work dries up, they’re still on the payroll.
Self-employed fitters typically supply their own tools and van – saving you further cost. But there are downsides.
First, the HMRC risk. If you control the fitter’s schedule, supply their materials, expect them to wear a uniform, or provide a van, you may be inadvertently creating an employment relationship. This brings potential exposure to backdated tax, NICs, and penalties. If you do provide a van to a self-employed fitter, it’s good practice to charge them a rental fee, even if below market value, to help demonstrate commercial separation and reduce status risk.
Second, there’s the brand perception. Self-employed fitters often turn up in unbranded vans of varying quality and appearance. That may undermine the professional image your marketing is working so hard to build. In contrast, employed fitters can be provided with liveried company vans – promoting your brand with every job.
Finally, control and consistency are easier to maintain with employed teams. You can set clearer expectations around conduct, appearance, quality standards, and paperwork.
That said, many installers run highly successful businesses with self-employed fitters – but the model must be managed carefully, and contracts should be reviewed regularly.
Fixed Salary, Day Rate or Piece Rate?
Once you’ve decided on status, you need to set a pay structure. There are three main methods:
- Fixed Salary
Paying a regular salary offers security and consistency. It’s great for employed teams – especially in slower periods – and helps with forecasting.
But the risk is obvious: no link to productivity. If there’s no output target, performance can slip.
- Day Rate
Paying a daily rate is simple and commonly used with subcontractors. It links pay to attendance, but again – not necessarily output. Fitters could take their time and still earn the same.
In a recent meeting, we discovered a window company’s fitters were being paid a generous day rate. The teams were dragging out jobs unnecessarily to make the work last. This distorted the company’s view of how long jobs should take – and led them to schedule future work based on incorrect assumptions. Worse still, the business was using extra labourers on many jobs when the standard two-person fitter team would have sufficed. This not only drove up costs but diluted accountability and quality.
- Piece Rate (Pay Per Frame)
Paying per window or door fitted introduces a strong incentive to work quickly. It’s popular in high-volume settings.
But it comes with risks:
- Rushed work and corner cutting on finishing
- Increased snagging and revisits.
An allowance for revisits is rarely priced into the original margin – a common mistake – and each one hits the bottom line.
Introducing Performance Targets
To combat these issues, a good option is to introduce performance targets. A commonly quoted benchmark is £20,000 fitted per team, per week. This will vary by product, region, and business model – but it’s a good starting point. Figure out what is right for your business. Factors that affect it may include:
- Product mix (much easier to achieve a higher fitted value with aluminium)
- Access and install conditions (e.g. prepared v unprepared openings)
- Experience and skill level.
If your teams are falling short, it’s worth investigating why.
Consider linking bonuses to:
- Number of completed installations.
- Revenue fitted.
- Customer satisfaction scores.
- Number of revisits or service calls avoided.
The key is to measure output consistently across teams – and compare it to gross margin generated. Just chasing top-line install value can lead to poor prioritisation. A £25k week full of discounted or snag-prone jobs is not a success.
Bonus Schemes: Linking Pay to Performance
A well-designed bonus scheme can balance the needs of the business and the fitter. But it must include both productivity and quality measures.
One model is to introduce an accruing bonus, which builds over time and pays out quarterly (or at another interval). This gives fitters a reason to think long-term – not just about this week’s earnings.
You can also use this pot as a quality buffer. If remedial work is required due to poor fitting, the cost can be deducted from the bonus before it’s paid. That way, fitters still feel fairly paid day-to-day, but there’s a clear financial incentive to get things right the first time.
It also builds loyalty. If the bonus only pays out quarterly, people are less likely to jump ship halfway through.
Practical Tips for Implementation
- Track job-level performance: Know what each team installs, how long it takes, and what it costs.
- Log remedial visits accurately: Don’t just absorb these as business-as-usual.
- Hold weekly review meetings: Share data and feedback with teams.
- Start simple: Don’t over-engineer the scheme. Fitters need to understand it at a glance.
- Involve your teams: Get their input before rolling anything out. You’ll get more buy-in.
Final Thoughts
Paying your fitting teams isn’t just a question of what the market rate is. It’s a strategic decision that affects profitability, quality and customer experience.
Whether you employ or subcontract, incentivise or standardise, your pay model sends a message. It sets expectations. It shapes culture.
By designing a pay structure that rewards the right behaviours – and punishes the wrong ones, without being punitive – you’ll build a stronger, more reliable installation operation.
And in a market where margins are tight and reputation is everything, that can make all the difference.