The agreement lists the indoor units. Your tradie also checks outdoor units and controls, waits for roof keys and resets the same fault on every visit. Air conditioning tradie renewals need a site review before those jobs become another term of unpaid work.
Treat the renewal as a new survey of an existing client. Pull the records. Walk the site. Correct the scope. Then rebuild the price from the work the client is buying now.
Pull the agreement and completed visit records
Start the maintenance client review at your desk. Collect the expired agreement, asset schedule, completed job records, tradie notes, invoices, approved extras and job costs.
Do not start with the old price. It only tells you what you charged. It does not tell you what the crew did, what changed on site or what the account cost to service.
Mark every promise in the old agreement
Read the agreement line by line. Mark each covered asset, planned task, visit, included material, record and exclusion.
Also mark the operating assumptions behind the price:
- Working hours and visit timing
- Parking and unloading arrangements
- Sign-in and induction steps
- Keys, codes and escorts
- Roof or plant access
- Shutdown and restart permission
- Included filters and consumables
- Fault attendance, if any
- Approval for diagnosis and repairs
- When each invoice is issued and which service period it covers
Challenge loose descriptions such as full service, complete maintenance or general system care. Replace them with equipment and tasks that both sides can identify.
An asset schedule should give each unit an identifier, equipment type and exact location. A note such as unit near reception is weak when the tenancy has several reception areas.
Compare the written scope with completed work
Read the visit notes beside the agreement. Look for tasks the tradies perform repeatedly even though the agreement does not mention them.
The agreement may list several indoor units while the tradie is also expected to inspect outdoor units and controls. That work must be added, excluded or separately approved. Do not let habit make the decision.
Check visit durations. Separate planned servicing from diagnosis, repairs, emergency attendance and return visits. Use completed servicing time as evidence only when it covers work comparable to the renewed maintenance visit scope.
Then inspect the time around the tools. Parking, sign-in, induction, collecting roof keys, waiting for an escort, setting up access, shutting down equipment, restarting it, completing records and handing over all use labour.
Compare invoices and approvals with the job notes. Find filters supplied but not billed, extra attendances, failed access, after-hours work and repairs completed on a verbal request. Each mismatch needs a renewal decision.
Make a renewal variance sheet with a column for the old written scope, completed work, current site condition and renewal decision. Keep each row specific. Write unlisted outdoor unit checked at every visit, not scope has changed.
Turn unresolved rows into questions for the site walk. Which controls are covered? Who provides the roof key? Was the unlisted outdoor unit added after the agreement began? Is the recurring fault planned maintenance or separate diagnosis?
Site checks for air conditioning tradie renewals
Book the walk-through before discussing the new price. The records tell you what happened. The site tells you what exists now.
If the client will not allow a review, state which parts of the offer rely on unconfirmed asset and access information. Ask for access before issuing the final offer, or narrow the offer to the assets and conditions you can confirm.
Take the old asset schedule and renewal variance sheet. Follow the route a tradie takes on a normal visit. Bring the person who knows the account when practical.
Match every unit and control to the schedule
Find every covered indoor unit, outdoor unit, control, isolator, filter location, drain point and other service point named in the agreement. Match each item to its asset identifier and location.
Record equipment that has been added, removed, replaced, relocated or made harder to reach. Update model and filter details where the office record no longer matches the unit.
Do not silently add undocumented equipment to the agreement. Include it in the renewed scope, exclude it or quote separate work.
Record visible condition without turning the review into free fault-finding. Note warning displays, damaged panels, blocked drainage access, corrosion, contamination and recurring symptoms against the correct asset. Take photographs if your client arrangements permit them.
If testing or disassembly is needed to find a fault, stop the review. Open diagnostic work instead. Use an air conditioning call-out triage process to collect the symptom, equipment details, site authority and access information before booking it.
Walk the real access route
Start where the van parks. Walk through reception, security, key collection and escorted areas. Continue to the roof, outdoor compound, ceiling space or plant area used during servicing.
Check the working space around each asset. Stored goods may now block an isolator. A new tenancy may control the roof key. An outdoor unit may sit behind a locked enclosure that did not exist when the old price was built.
Check wet-season roof access, the site's peak operating periods and client blackout dates. Write those limits into the visit timing instead of leaving the tradie to negotiate them at the door.
Record the delay and decide who owns it. Ask the client to make access ready before each visit or include the known access time in the labour allowance. Do not leave the answer in a tradie's private notes.
Check the filter size, equipment model and planned consumables at the unit. If the site record and equipment disagree, correct the record before ordering materials.
Choose the renewed maintenance scope
Sort every repeated task into planned maintenance, fault diagnosis, repair or replacement. A task belongs in one place unless you deliberately combine the work and cost the combined promise.
Planned maintenance is the named routine work on the listed assets. Diagnosis finds the cause of a fault. Repair corrects it. Replacement removes and changes equipment.
Suppose the tradie resets the same fault during each visit. The client may now treat that reset as routine servicing. State whether a basic operational reset is included and when recurring or failed operation moves to paid diagnosis.
Use the same method for clearing blockages, supplying filters, attending cooling complaints, checking unrelated equipment and returning after another contractor has changed controls. Repetition creates an expectation. A written boundary controls it.
Set the approval route for faults
Name the client role that can approve work outside planned maintenance. A facilities manager, property manager or site owner may hold that authority. A person standing beside the unit may not.
Tell the tradie what to record when a fault appears: the asset identifier, symptom, visible condition and whether planned work can continue. Follow your safety procedure if the equipment or work area is unsafe.
Send diagnosis and repair work to the authorised client contact. Record the approved scope and price basis before starting work.
When an asset needs replacement, remove that job from the maintenance renewal. Prepare a separate HVAC equipment estimate and replacement quote for the equipment, installation, access, electrical work, commissioning and handover that the job requires.
Write the access assumptions and client responsibilities
Put the site assumptions beside the renewed scope. State the agreed working hours, parking arrangement, sign-in process, keys, escorts, roof access, shutdown permission and clear working space.
Write what happens when access fails. An inaccessible unit has not been serviced. Record the incomplete asset, notify the client and follow the agreed process for another attendance.
List the records due after each visit. Name the service report, asset updates, photographs or other agreed documents. Do not promise general paperwork when the client expects a particular record.
Also state what the client must report before the visit. Equipment changes, tenancy restrictions, unsafe areas and new access controls can change the work before the tradie reaches the first unit.
Check each proposed task before offering it
The expired agreement does not prove that the business or assigned tradie can perform every task in the renewed scope. Check each proposed task before you offer it.
For a Queensland job, compare the proposed work with the Queensland Building and Construction Commission mechanical services licence classes (opens in a new tab). For work elsewhere, ask your state or territory licensing regulator which licence class covers the proposed task and write down the answer.
Check refrigerant work separately. Match the work to the current requirements published by the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water (opens in a new tab) before issuing the renewal. Do not assume planned servicing, electrical work and refrigerant work carry the same requirements.
Ask your state or territory WHS regulator about workplace safety questions. For a NSW site, that body is SafeWork NSW (opens in a new tab). Keep this check about safe work, access and site controls rather than trade licensing.
Record the task that raised each question and the answer received. Brief the assigned tradie before scheduling the renewed work.
Rebuild the price from the corrected scope
Service contract repricing starts with the corrected assets and tasks. Do not apply a percentage to the expired price and call the job done.
Build the price from direct labour, planned materials, account-specific direct costs, allocated overhead and markup. The shared job pricing guide explains the full calculation; the renewal work here is correcting the inputs before you use it.
Estimate labour for each task and visit. Add parking, unloading, induction, key collection, escort waits, access setup, shutdown, restart, service records and handover.
Use your completed visit records where the old and renewed work are comparable. Remove repair, emergency and diagnostic time unless you deliberately include that work in the new agreement.
Build planned materials from the corrected equipment list. Add parking, tolls, travel and hired access equipment where your business assigns those costs directly to the account.
Allocate overhead once using your normal method. Then apply markup to reach the selling price. Markup is added to cost. Margin is profit measured as a share of revenue. Use the profit margin calculator to check both figures without mixing them.
Worked electrical example: keep cost and revenue on the same scope
This is the house electrical example, not an air conditioning job or an Australian rate card. Every amount is a sample currency unit.
R. Chen's job at 14 Oak Street covered a 150mm bathroom exhaust fan ducted through the roof and four LED downlights. Quote Q-1847 was 1,105. Job cost was 850, so profit measured against the original quote was 255.
Margin was 255 ÷ 1,105, approximately 23%. Markup was 255 ÷ 850, or 30%.
The ceiling was lined and the quote excluded chasing. Extra cable and chasing were approved on site as a 160 variation, so invoice INV-1847 was 1,265. The costs of that variation are not given. You cannot combine the 1,265 invoice with the original job cost of 850 to recalculate profit.
Use the same discipline on a maintenance renewal. The costs and selling price in the calculation must cover the same assets, tasks and visits.
Issue an accepted, controlled renewal pack
The client should be able to see what changed without comparing dense agreements line by line.
Send:
- The renewal quote with a version or issue date
- The renewed start date
- The corrected asset schedule
- The planned task schedule
- Visit timing and working hours
- Included materials and records
- Access assumptions and client responsibilities
- Exclusions
- The diagnosis and repair approval route
- Recurring service billing points
- The acceptance method
- The document hierarchy
State which document controls if the quote, schedules and old agreement disagree. Remove superseded asset lists from the live job record so the tradie does not work from the wrong version.
Carry the same GST treatment through the quote, recurring service billing and invoices. Check ABN, GST and BAS questions with the Australian Taxation Office (opens in a new tab). Do not rely on an old invoice setting as tax guidance.
Release the first renewed visit
Treat mobilisation as a release gate. Do not dispatch the job until the accepted scope, current asset schedule and renewed start date are in the live job record.
Confirm that the assigned tradie's required trade licence and refrigerant-work checks match the planned tasks. Confirm access, keys, escorts, shutdown permission, client approval authority and planned materials.
Air conditioning tradie renewals are ready for dispatch only when every gate is closed and the tradie can see the current documents. Yes Foreman can keep the accepted scope, asset schedule, visit record and recurring service billing against the same client account.
If any item is missing, hold the visit. Get the document, answer or client confirmation before the van leaves.