How to use the capacity calculator
- Describe your team. How many cleaners you have, how many work together on a job, their paid hours per day and days per week, and time lost to breaks and admin.
- Describe an average job. Time on site with the whole crew, and the drive to get there.
- Enter your volume. Jobs booked this week, the volume you want to reach and the utilization you plan for (85% leaves room for the unexpected).
- Read the results. Maximum jobs per week, how full the schedule is, how much of your team's paid time is spent cleaning, and how many cleaners you need to hire for your target.
How capacity and utilization are calculated
Crews = cleaners ÷ cleaners per crew (rounded down)Jobs per crew per day = (paid minutes − breaks) ÷ (job minutes + drive minutes), rounded downMax jobs per week = crews × jobs per crew per day × working daysSchedule booked = jobs booked ÷ max jobs per weekTechnician utilization = jobs × time on site × crew size ÷ total paid hoursCrews needed = target jobs ÷ (jobs per crew per day × days × target utilization), rounded up
Schedule booked tells you how full the calendar is. Technician utilization tells you how much of the time you pay for is spent on clients' jobs — the rest goes to driving, breaks and gaps. The two can look very different: a fully booked schedule with long drives might still have utilization near 60%.
Jobs per day are rounded down, because a crew can't start half a job. The leftover time per crew shows where a short add-on or a smaller job could fit.
Typical capacity numbers for cleaning crews
Typical ranges for residential cleaning in the US and Canada. Job length depends on home size, condition and service type — check your own job history for the real average.
| Measure | Typical range |
|---|---|
| Standard clean, crew of two, average home | often 1.5–3 hours on site |
| Jobs per crew per day, residential | often 2–4 |
| Drive time per job | often 15–35 minutes |
| Technician utilization (time on jobs ÷ paid time) | often 60–80%; above 80% is very efficient |
| Planning target for schedule fill | often 80–90%, leaving room for surprises |
Worked example
A company has 6 cleaners working in crews of two, 8 paid hours a day, 5 days a week, with 30 minutes for breaks and loading. An average job takes 2 hours on site plus 25 minutes of driving. It has 32 jobs booked this week and wants to reach 60, planning at 85% utilization.
- Crews: 6 ÷ 2 = 3.
- Each crew has 480 − 30 = 450 minutes; each job uses 120 + 25 = 145 → 3 jobs a day, with 15 minutes to spare.
- Max capacity: 3 crews × 3 jobs × 5 days = 45 jobs a week; at 85% that's 38.
- Schedule booked: 32 ÷ 45 ≈ 71%, with 6 open slots before hitting the target.
- Technician utilization: 32 × 2 h × 2 cleaners ÷ 240 paid hours ≈ 53%.
- For 60 jobs a week: one crew handles 3 × 5 × 85% = 12.75 → 5 crews, 10 cleaners — hire 4.
Notice the gap between 71% booked and 53% utilization: driving, breaks and the unused 15 minutes per day eat almost half of the paid time. Shorter routes or slightly longer jobs per stop would raise utilization without hiring anyone.
5 ways to get more jobs from the same team
- Cluster jobs by areaAssign each crew a zone per day. Cutting 10 minutes of driving per job can add a whole extra job per crew every couple of days.
- Fit jobs to the dayIf a crew has 1–2 hours left after its last job, fill it with a small one-time job or add-on instead of leaving it empty.
- Track real job timesAverage durations drift as clients' homes and needs change. Use actual times from your schedule, not old estimates.
- Lock in recurring daysRecurring clients on fixed weekdays make routes predictable and leave fewer gaps than one-off bookings scattered through the week.
- Hire before you're fullHiring and training take weeks. Start when you pass your target utilization, not when crews are already working overtime.