Guide
Per hour vs per cube: how concrete pumping rates actually work
Per hour or per cube isn't a religion. They're two blades covering two different costs — and running one without the other is how busy pumps bleed out.
Every argument about concrete pumping rates ends up in the same place: per hour or per cube. Blokes defend one like it's a footy team. It isn't. The hourly and the cube rate aren't rivals — they're two blades on the same set of shears, and each one cuts a different cost.
Run one without the other and certain jobs will bleed you every single time. The trick is knowing which jobs, and why.
The hourly covers time
Time-based costs don't care how much concrete moves. Finance ticks over whether you pump 10 cube or 100. So do wages, insurance, and the fact your truck can't be earning anywhere else. A slow job — agis running late, chippies still fixing formwork, staged pours with gaps in between — burns hours without burning much concrete. The hourly is what makes sure those hours aren't free.
If you only charge per cube, the slow jobs kill you. You stand there all day for 25 cube, the truck is committed from dark to dark, and the invoice looks like a half-day's work. You just gave away a full day of your business at a per-metre price.
The cube rate covers wear
Every cube through the machine grinds steel. Pipeline, rubbers, wear plate, cutting ring, hoses. That wear doesn't happen per hour — it happens per cube, and a harsh mix makes it worse. The cube rate is how the concrete pays for what it eats on the way through.
If you only charge hourly, the big fast pours kill you the other way. Three hundred cube through the line in a day looks like a great invoice — until you realise you sold six hours of time and gave away a fortune in wear for nothing. The bloke charging hourly-only on high-volume work is running a wear parts charity for builders.
Where the trap really bites
Most operators inherit one model from whoever trained them and never question it. Then they wonder why certain jobs always feel like hard money. It's not bad luck. It's a pricing model with a blind spot, and the market is very good at finding blind spots and booking them solid.
Set both blades, and set minimums
Charge an hourly that covers your time-based costs on the slowest realistic day. Charge a cube rate that covers what the concrete eats. Put a minimum on both so the tiny jobs don't slip under the door. Then it doesn't matter what the job throws at you — slow and small or fast and huge, one blade or the other catches it.
Per hour versus per cube was never the question. The question is whether every cost your pump carries has a line on the invoice that pays for it. Get both blades sharp and stop letting jobs pick which one of your pockets to empty.
