TrashCanBossPro Blog — Billing & Payments

Per Visit or Monthly? Choosing How to Bill Trash Can Cleaning Customers

Every bin cleaning company has to answer one question early: do you charge the customer each time you clean, or a set amount each month? Both work. Both have trade-offs. The wrong choice is not picking one and ending up with a mix nobody can explain.

Two Models, One Decision

If you charge on completion, as described in Auto-Charge on Completion: Getting Paid Before the Trailer Leaves the Street, you are already leaning toward per-visit billing. But it is worth looking at both models before you lock in.

Per visit means each cleaning is its own invoice. Clean the cans, bill the cans.

Monthly means the customer pays a set amount for the plan, no matter how many trash days fell in that month.

The Case for Per Visit

Per-visit billing is the easiest to explain. "We clean your two cans every other week, and it's $25 each time." The customer understands it, and the invoice matches what happened.

It also handles the messy weeks well. If the cans were not out and the tech skipped the stop, there is no invoice. If the customer added a deodorize treatment on one visit, it is on that visit's invoice. Nothing needs to be prorated or credited later.

In TrashCanBossPro, per-visit billing is what happens naturally when the tech taps Complete: the invoice is created for that cleaning, and the card on file can be charged.

The downside is that the customer sees a charge every visit. For a weekly plan, that is four or five charges a month. Most customers do not mind, but some prefer one predictable amount.

The Case for Monthly

A flat monthly price is easy to budget for and easy to advertise. "$35 a month for two cans, cleaned every other week." Your income is steadier, because a rained-out week does not change what you collect.

The catch is that months are not all the same length. An every-other-week plan lands two cleanings in most months and three in a few. A weekly plan lands four in some and five in others. If you charge flat, you need a clear rule for what the customer is buying: a number of cleanings, or a month of service.

You also need a rule for misses. If the cans were not out, does the customer still pay the monthly price? Most companies say yes, as long as the crew showed up on the scheduled day. Put that in writing on your sign-up page.

How Plans Come Due Either Way

Whichever way you bill, the cleaning schedule works the same. Weekly, every-other-week and monthly plans are set by minimum days between visits: 7, 14 or 28. Cleanings show up on the Waiting List when they come due, with pins colored for not due yet, due now and overdue. You route them around the city trash day.

That means the billing model does not change how the route runs. It only changes when and how the customer is charged. You can bill per visit and still sell a "monthly plan" that means one cleaning every 28 days. For more on how the three plan types bill, see Billing Weekly, Every-Other-Week and Monthly Bin Cleaning Plans.

Accounts That Should Always Be Monthly

Some customers want one bill a month no matter how you bill residential homeowners. HOAs, property managers, apartment communities and businesses with dumpster pads all fall into this group. They often need to approve invoices, and forty small charges make that hard.

In TrashCanBossPro, set these accounts to Monthly. They get one statement each month covering every address they own, with each line labeled with the address. The work is still recorded visit by visit, so the statement shows exactly what was cleaned where, but the customer pays it once.

A Simple Way to Decide

Ask yourself three questions:

• Can I explain my price in one sentence on my website?
• Do I have a written rule for what happens when the cans are not out?
• Will my office have to calculate anything by hand at month end?

If per visit gets you three good answers, use per visit. If monthly does, use monthly. Many companies end up with per-visit billing for homeowners and Monthly statements for HOAs, managers and businesses, which keeps both groups happy without exceptions.

Whatever you choose, give it a full season before changing it. Switching billing models every few months confuses customers and makes your month-to-month numbers impossible to compare. Pick one, write it down, explain it the same way to every new customer, and only revisit it once you have real results to look at.

The Short Version

Per visit is the simplest to run and fits charging on completion. Monthly is easier for customers to budget and steadier for you, but needs written rules. HOAs and commercial accounts belong on Monthly statements either way. For the rest of the billing guides, return to the trash can cleaning billing software page.