What is a good booking rate for inbound calls?

Short answer: about 42% is typical, according to the best data I found. Whether that is good for you depends on your trade, your size, and what time the phone rings.

The benchmark: ServiceTitan, 2022 (vendor data)

In October 2022, ServiceTitan published call booking rates from more than 3,000 US and Canadian trade businesses on its platform, covering calls from June 2022. That is vendor data from its own customers, so it leans toward shops that already run software. It is also the largest trades-specific set I found.^[1]

Two things jump out. Trade barely matters: plumbing, electrical, and HVAC land within five points of each other. Size matters a lot: the smallest shops booked less than half of what the biggest ones did. The data does not say why. My guess is that big shops have somebody whose job is answering the phone, and small shops have a person under a sink. That is a guess.

After 6 p.m. the number falls off

In the same ServiceTitan data, booking fell to 21% for larger shops and 9% for smaller ones after 6 p.m. How many calls is that? A separate ServiceTitan look at residential HVAC in 2025 found 14.1% of inbound calls came after hours in June and 9.8% in October. ServiceTitan’s definitions of “after hours” and “after 6 p.m.” may not match, so do not multiply them together. The takeaway is plain enough: after-hours calls are a minority of volume, at least in HVAC, and the weakest part of the booking rate.^[2]

How to compute your own

1. Pick a window. Four weeks or more, so one strange week does not fool you.
2. Count calls in. Every inbound call from someone asking for work. Skip vendors and wrong numbers.
3. Count calls answered. Calls where a person talked to the caller. Voicemail does not count.
4. Count calls booked. Calls that ended with a scheduled appointment or estimate.
5. Divide booked by calls in. That is your booking rate.
6. Split by time of day. Before 6 p.m. and after. Your after-hours number will probably hurt.

Example math, not a statistic: 50 calls in, 30 answered, 17 booked. Booking rate is 17 divided by 50, or 34%. Answer rate is 30 divided by 50, or 60%. Those two numbers point at different problems. Calls you never answered are a coverage problem. Calls you answered and did not book are a conversation problem. Invoca’s 2026 report on more than 70 million calls (vendor data) found that 55% of home services businesses don’t ask leads to book. Ask.^[3]

What counts as good

Use the averages above as rough yardsticks, not grades. They are averages from one vendor’s customers.

• Around 24% with a small crew: you match the average small shop, and there is room to improve.
• Around 40%: you match the typical shop of any size, and sit well above the average for crews under 5 techs.
• 55% or more: you are close to the 59% ServiceTitan saw at shops with 25 or more techs. That is hard to do, and worth studying if you get there.

Your own number, tracked month over month, tells you more than any benchmark.