Paying your crew without the Sunday spreadsheet
Hourly, per job, or flat rate: how to pick a pay model, track hours honestly, and stop rebuilding payroll every week.
Ask an owner with six employees what they do on Sunday evening and you will usually hear the same answer: they are working out what everyone is owed from texts, memory, and a photo of a timesheet.
Pick the model that matches the work
Most companies need two of these three. That is fine, as long as each person knows which one applies to them.
| Model | Fits | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Hourly | Jobs where time varies with the house | Paying for slow days |
| Per job | Routes where the work is predictable | Rushing, and quality slipping |
| Flat rate | Salaried leads and managers | Overtime creeping in unpaid |
Track hours as they happen
The argument about whether someone was on site at nine is not really about honesty, it is about the fact that nobody wrote it down. GPS clock-in at the job ends that conversation for both sides: the crew gets credit for the time they actually worked, and you stop paying for time nobody can account for.
Nobody has to be believed or doubted if the hours were recorded as they happened.
Keep pay separate from what the customer paid
Your crew should see their own day and their own pay. They should not see what the client was charged. This is not secrecy, it is the same separation any employer keeps, and it prevents a conversation that never ends well.
Final thoughts
- Set the model per person, once, and write it down.
- Record hours automatically, so payday is a number you read.
- Separate pay from pricing, so the crew app is safe to hand out.
Do those three and payroll stops being a task. It becomes a report.
