Free tool
Sustainable Rate Calculator
Work backwards from the income you need to the rate you must charge.
Most rates are set by looking sideways at competitors. This works forwards from target income, real overheads and the number of days you can genuinely bill.
Last reviewed:
Your result
£500
Minimum sustainable day rate
Rounded up to the nearest £25. This is a floor, not a ceiling.
- Genuinely billable days per year
- 140 days
- Revenue required
- £68,000
- Unrounded day rate
- £486
- Equivalent hourly rate
- £69
- Revenue at 10% fewer billable daysThe cost of one quiet month
- £61,200
This is the rate at which the business merely works. Pricing at exactly this figure leaves nothing for investment, a bad debt or a slow quarter.
If the number looks uncomfortably high, the honest options are fewer non-billable days, lower overheads, or a different service mix — not simply hoping for more volume.
Assumptions this tool makes
- Billable days exclude holiday, illness, admin, marketing and unpaid proposal work.
- Tax is covered with a conservative planning percentage, not a computation.
- Overheads are annual business costs that exist whether or not you win work.
The formulas used
- billable_days = (52 - holiday_weeks - admin_weeks) x days_per_week x utilisation
- required_revenue = (target_take_home / (1 - tax_planning_rate)) + overheads
- day_rate = required_revenue / billable_days
Estimates only. This is a planning aid, not regulated financial advice, tax advice or a personal recommendation. Figures are rounded deliberately to avoid false precision. Your answers stay in your browser: nothing you type here is sent to us, to a partner or to an advertising platform. Read the full disclaimer.