SideWRK is a cheap plumbing quote app for plumbers who work on the side.
A plumbing quote app should price the way you do: a service call to show up, then a flat number the customer approves before you cut pipe.
A pinhole leak under a kitchen sink, quoted flat. The full quote is further down, line by line.
The flat-rate menu your quotes start from
Side-work plumbing sells as a price per job, not by the clock. Every plumber starts with this menu in the app. Tap a line in Add work and its name and price fill in. Change the price before you add it, and tick Save as one of my services to keep your own price in the list.
| Job | Starting price |
|---|---|
| Service call | $125 |
| Drain clearing | $200 |
| Leak repair | $240 |
| Faucet replacement | $275 |
| Toilet repair / replace | $300 |
| Water heater install | $1,600 |
| Custom work, by the hour | $110/hr |
The $110 an hour, the $240 leak repair and the $1,600 water heater install are the plumber row of our 2026 Side-Work Rate Report. The rest of the menu is the starting price list built into the app. On a typical plumbing ticket about 60% of the money pays for your time and 40% for parts.
Crediting the service call. If the customer goes ahead with the repair, the Credit service call button takes the $125 off the service-call line. The line stays on the quote and says the $125 was credited to the repair, so nobody argues about it at the truck.
Plumber
The shutoff, the torch, the fitting that finally holds.
Quoted flat. Approved first.
The customer taps yes on the number before you open the wall.
A leak repair, quoted at $240
Pinhole leak in a half-inch copper supply line under a kitchen sink. Both stops are seized, so they get replaced while the water is off.
| Cut out the bad section and sweat in new | $132 | |
| Quarter-turn stop valve, lead-free | 2 × $24 | $48 |
| Half-inch copper and couplings | $36 | |
| Solder, flux and sandcloth | $24 | |
| Total the customer approves | $240 | |
| Parts cost (you), private | −$58 | |
| Est. profit | $182 |
Labor is $132 of the $240, about 1.2 hours at $110. The parts bill at $108 and cost you $58. On a small repair that $50 of parts margin is over a quarter of what you keep.
Which plumbing jobs pull a permit
This is the part of plumbing side work that gets people in trouble, so the quote carries it in plain sight.
- Water heaters, repipes, gas lines, and sewer or water service usually need a permit and an inspection, and most states require plumbers to be licensed. Where a state has a small-job exemption, it often doesn’t cover work that needs a permit. Your building department has the final word.
- A water heater is inspected on the details your local code calls for, such as seismic strapping, the T&P relief valve and its discharge line, an expansion tank on a closed system, a drain pan, and combustion air and venting.
- Gas piping usually takes a permit, a pressure test and an inspection, and many places want a licensed plumber or gas fitter on it.
- Parts that touch drinking water can be marked lead-free on the quote. That mark is your statement that the part meets the NSF/ANSI 372 lead-free standard. SideWRK doesn’t check it.
In the app every job has a permit panel: the number, the office that issued it, and a status that moves from needed to applied, issued, passed and closed, with the rough-in and final inspections dated. Your license number and the permit number print on the quote and the invoice. SideWRK keeps that record. It doesn’t decide whether a job needs a permit or whether you’re licensed to do it.
More on the license question: Do you need a plumbing license for side work?
A water heater install, quoted at $1,600
Like-for-like swap of a 50-gallon gas heater in a garage. The vent is sound and the gas stub is where it needs to be.
| Drain, disconnect, set and fire the new heater | $440 | |
| 50-gallon gas water heater, 6-year tank | $780 | |
| Thermal expansion tank | $75 | |
| Gas connector, water flex lines and fittings | $85 | |
| Seismic straps and drain pan | $60 | |
| Haul away the old tank | $60 | |
| Permit fee, passed through at cost | $100 | |
| Total the customer approves | $1,600 | |
| Parts cost (you), private | −$862 | |
| Est. profit | $738 |
This one is parts-heavy: labor, four hours at $110, and haul-away come to $500, under a third of the ticket, against 60% on a typical plumbing job. The cost line includes the $100 permit. That fee goes on as its own line at exactly what the city charged, so it never pads or eats your profit. $100 is an example; yours is whatever you paid.
What pipe and fixtures run
Bands from our own plumbing calculator. Your supply house beats any table, so treat these as a check on the quote, not the quote. The installed rows are labor and install materials. The fixture itself is usually its own line.
| Material or fixture | Typical range |
|---|---|
| PEX pipe | $0.40–$2 a foot |
| Copper pipe | $2–$8 a foot |
| Faucet, installed | $130–$360 |
| Toilet, installed | $200–$600 |
| Garbage disposal, installed | $250–$720 |
| Kitchen sink, installed | $150–$600 |
| Shower or tub, installed | $800–$2,000 |
| Whole-house repipe in PEX, 1,500 sq ft | $2,500–$5,500 |
| Whole-house repipe in copper, 1,500 sq ft | $5,000–$10,000 |
PEX takes fewer fittings than copper and bends around corners, so a PEX repipe quotes at about half the copper number.
Run a repipe or a water heater through it
$19 a month, or $190 for the year. Five jobs in a rolling year are free, with no card. SideWRK takes no cut of what your customer pays you.
Start freeFive things plumbers ask
Can I credit the service call toward the repair?
Yes. When a quote has a service-call line, the job shows a Credit service call button. It takes the fee off that line and rewrites it to say the $125 was credited to the repair, so the customer sees the credit in writing.
How do I bill a permit fee?
On the job’s Permit & inspections card, type what the city charged you in the Permit fee box and tap Add to estimate. It lands as its own line at cost, with no markup, so your profit on the job stays true.
Does my plumbing license number print on the quote?
Yes. Your license number and the job’s permit number print on every estimate and invoice once you’ve entered them. You type each one once.
Can a line say the part is lead-free, used, or supplied by the customer?
Yes. Every part line takes a condition: new, lead-free, used, reconditioned or customer-supplied. Anything other than new prints on the document next to the part.
What happens when I open the wall and find more?
Add the rotted trap arm or the second leak to the job and send it again. The customer sees the new total and approves it from their phone before you keep going, and the approval is logged with their name, the time and the amount.