In short
- Work out your break-even hourly cost before you set a single price.
- Use UK rate guides to sense-check that number once you have it.
- A quote that spells out scope and assumptions protects your margin when the job grows.
Start with what an hour costs you
Most gardeners who undercharge took their rate from a competitor or a price guide. Start from your own costs instead: everything the business spends in a year, including your own wage, divided by the hours you can bill.
Say the van, fuel, insurance, tools, phone and software come to £12,000 a year and you want to pay yourself £30,000. That's £42,000 to cover. Work 46 weeks at about 30 billable hours a week (once travel, loading and admin come out) and you have 1,380 hours, so you need roughly £30 an hour just to break even.
Your hourly rate is that figure plus a margin. A fixed price is your time estimate at that rate, plus the costs below, plus some slack for the job running long.
- Travel: time and fuel to reach the site, especially outside your usual patch.
- Waste: tip fees and green waste disposal, which add up fast on clearances.
- Materials: anything you supply, marked up for the trip to collect it.
- Risk: overgrown, steep or awkward gardens always take longer than they look.
What gardeners charge in the UK in 2026
These are the ranges UK price guides were quoting in 2026. London and the South East sit well above the rest of the country, and a guide rate can still lose you money if your travel or overheads run high.
- General garden maintenance
- Typical price£20 to £35 an hour, or £35 to £50 in London and the South East
- A full day, one gardener
- Typical price£150 to £300
- Hedge trimming, standard hedge
- Typical price£60 to £150 a job, plus £20 to £50 to take the clippings away
- Landscaping, one person
- Typical price£200 to £350 a day, up to about £500 in London
- Landscaping, two-person team
- Typical price£380 to £550 a day
Write the quote like a job sheet
'General garden tidy' invites an argument. 'Cut and edge front and back lawns, trim the east boundary hedge to 1.8m, remove all clippings' does not. Say what's in, what's out and what the price assumes, such as wheelbarrow access down the side of the house.
If an assumption turns out wrong, you have a fair reason to revisit the price. If the scope was vague, you do the extra work for free.
You build the quote in Fieldfare as lines of work with a quantity and rate, download the PDF and send it from your own email, so it arrives from an address the client knows (Fieldfare doesn't email quotes itself). When they accept, it becomes a scheduled job without retyping.
Fieldfare
Turn your quotes into booked jobs
Regular visits and the drive between them
A fortnightly lawn cut takes longer per visit than a weekly one because the grass has had twice as long to grow. Price each visit for the pattern you've agreed, and write that pattern into the maintenance contract.
A client twenty minutes outside your usual area costs forty minutes of unpaid driving every visit. Set a minimum charge or a travel supplement for anything beyond your core patch.
On Fieldfare's map of the day's jobs, that client is the pin out on its own, and the one to add a travel charge to.
Check the jobs you regret
For a few months, compare quoted time with actual time. Patterns show up quickly: hedges that always overrun, clearances that need a second tip run, a 'quick tidy' that is never quick.
If staff clock in and out on the Fieldfare app and mark each job done, you have the real hours to set against each quote.
Then put prices up a little every year, with notice. Small annual rises are far easier for clients to accept than one big jump after three years of rising costs.
Pricing questions gardeners ask
How much do gardeners charge per hour in the UK?
Most charge about £20 to £35 an hour outside London and £35 to £50 in London and the South East. Tall hedges, tree work and landscaping are usually priced higher, by the day or by the job.
Should I charge hourly or a fixed price?
Use both. Hourly suits uncertain work like overgrown clearances, while fixed prices suit clearly defined jobs once you trust your own timings.
How much should I charge for hedge cutting?
Price guides put a standard hedge at £60 to £150 a job, plus £20 to £50 to take the clippings away. Height, length and access move the price more than anything else.
How often should I put my prices up?
Once a year suits most clients, with a few weeks' notice. Recalculate your hourly cost at the same time so the rise comes from your own figures.