The 5 Numbers Every Workshop Manager Should Check Every Week

You can’t manage what you don’t measure. Most workshop owners have a reasonable gut feel for how things are going — but gut feel isn’t a management system. Five numbers, checked consistently each week, will tell you almost everything you need to know about the health of your business.

1. Technician Efficiency Rate

Calculate it: Hours billed ÷ hours clocked in × 100

Benchmark: 85–100% is healthy. Below 80% warrants attention. Below 70% is a problem.

A low efficiency rate usually points to scheduling gaps, parts delays, or comebacks eating into productive time. It rarely means your technicians are lazy — it more often means a process problem upstream. Read more: What Is Technician Efficiency

2. Labour Gross Profit %

Calculate it: (Labour revenue − technician wage cost) ÷ labour revenue × 100

Benchmark: 60–70% is the target range. Below 55% needs investigating.

Your single most important profitability metric. If your LGP% is low, the causes are usually a labour rate that hasn’t kept pace with wage growth, poor job time management, or high technician costs relative to revenue. Read more: What Is a Good Labour Gross Profit Margin?

3. Average Repair Order (ARO)

Calculate it: Total revenue ÷ number of repair orders completed

Benchmark: $350–$600 for most general servicing workshops. Significantly below this usually means jobs are being underquoted or work isn’t being fully presented.

ARO tracks the quality of your quoting and job presentation process. It’s one of the fastest levers you can pull to increase revenue without adding a single new customer. Read more: What Is a Good Average Repair Order?

4. Parts Gross Profit %

Calculate it: (Parts revenue − parts cost) ÷ parts revenue × 100

Benchmark: 30–40% for most independent workshops.

This metric tends to drift quietly in the wrong direction — supplier cost increases not passed on to customers, flat-rate pricing that doesn’t adjust as costs change. Checking it weekly keeps you in front of the creep.

5. Comeback Rate

Calculate it: Jobs returning within 30 days for a related complaint ÷ total completed jobs × 100

Benchmark: Below 2% is good. Above 4% needs attention. Above 6% is a quality problem.

Comebacks are expensive three ways: parts and labour absorbed, bay time lost to non-revenue work, and customer trust damaged. Tracking this weekly — and reviewing each comeback when it happens — is one of the highest-leverage quality management habits in a workshop.

Where to Find These Numbers

Your workshop management software should surface all five. If it doesn’t, that’s worth raising with your provider — these aren’t exotic analytics, they’re the fundamentals of a well-managed workshop.

The goal is a weekly review habit: 15 minutes on Monday morning, five numbers, any significant changes from last week, one thing to address. That rhythm, maintained consistently, will improve your business faster than almost any other management practice.

3 Things You Can Do This Week

• Write down your estimate for each of the 5 numbers before you look them up — the gap between gut feel and reality is your starting point.
• Check the actuals in your workshop software and identify which number is furthest from its benchmark.
• Block 15 minutes every Monday morning to review these five numbers — then protect that block.

Want a full picture across profitability, productivity, and management? The Workshop Health Score gives you a structured benchmark in under 10 minutes.