Set a defensible posted hourly rate. Models real Canadian inputs — CPP, EI, EHT/WSIB and vacation loading — alongside your fixed overhead, wages, and billable efficiency. Updates live as you type.
With a 25% gross margin (revenue share kept as profit).
Federal CPP1/CPP2/EI applied automatically per tech with 2026 caps; effective combined statutory loading 14.0% of gross wages.
Annual wages × (1 + statutory loading + benefits). The statutory bucket combines federal CPP (~5.95%) + EI (~2.32%) + provincial payroll tax + WC/WSIB + vacation accrual.
Rent, utilities, insurance, shop software, signage. These costs don't scale with hours billed, so they have to be recovered across whatever billable hours you actually invoice.
If a tech is paid 2,000 hours/year and you bill 70% of that, you only have 1,400 billable hours to spread costs across. This is the #1 mistake shops make when setting rates.
Break-even pays the bills; margin pays you. Gross margin is the share of every billed dollar kept as profit, so target = break-even ÷ (1 − margin). Most independent Canadian shops target 20–35% to cover write-offs, growth, and owner profit.
Add up your annual technician wages, statutory loading (CPP, EI, provincial payroll tax/EHT, WSIB or equivalent, plus vacation accrual), benefits, and total fixed overhead (rent, utilities, insurance, software). Divide that by the number of billable hours your shop actually invoices in a year — usually 60–75% of paid hours. That's your break-even hourly rate. Then apply a target gross margin (the share of revenue kept as profit, typically 20–35%) using the formula posted = break-even ÷ (1 − margin) to get your posted rate.
Statutory loading is the percentage on top of gross wages that you have to pay by law. The calculator models each component explicitly. Federal: employer CPP1 5.95% on pensionable earnings between the $3,500 basic exemption and the 2026 YMPE of $71,300, plus CPP2 4.00% between YMPE and YAMPE ($81,200), plus employer EI 2.324% (1.4× the employee 1.66%) capped at the 2026 MIE of $65,700. Each is applied per tech and capped at the federal annual maximum, so high-wage techs don't get over-charged. Provincial: payroll tax (Ontario EHT 1.95% above $1M, BC EHT 1.95% above $500k, MB HE Levy 2.15% above $2M, NL HAPSET 2% above $2M — most independents pay 0%; QC HSF defaults to ~1.65%), workers' compensation for the auto-service classification (Ontario WSIB ~2.46%, similar in other provinces), and vacation pay accrual (4% in most provinces, 6% in SK and QC after 3 years).
Most independent Canadian shops bill 60–75% of paid technician hours. Below 60% usually means you have a write-off problem (rework, comebacks, mis-quoted jobs) or a marketing problem (techs idle). Above 80% is rare and usually means flat-rate book hours over actual hours. Use 70% as a reasonable starting point and tune from your shop management system.
The big differences are workers' comp rate (WSIB in Ontario differs from WorkSafeBC, WCB-Alberta, CNESST in Quebec, etc.), provincial payroll tax (only kicks in above thresholds for most provinces), and vacation pay accrual (Saskatchewan grants 3 weeks, ≈6%; Quebec is 4% then 6% after 3 years). The calculator pre-fills a sensible combined statutory loading per province — adjust it if your accountant has a more precise number for your shop.
Two common reasons: (1) Your billable efficiency is lower than you think — shops often bill 60–65% of paid hours, not the 80% they'd guess. (2) Many shops under-recover overhead and quietly subsidize labor with parts margin. The break-even number this calculator returns is the rate where labor pays for itself; if you post lower, you must make up the difference on parts.
No. This is a planning tool. The Canadian statutory numbers are 2026 federal/provincial defaults rolled into a single loading percentage. Your actual CPP/EI maximums, WSIB rate group, and provincial payroll tax exemption status depend on your specific business. Use this to set a defensible starting point, then validate the numbers with your accountant.
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