The build-up, in the order you work it out
A finished air conditioning price is four things added together, and the reason the cost guides are no use to you is that they only ever publish the total.
- Equipment, bought at trade and sold on at a markup.
- Labour, priced per zone or by the day.
- Materials, usually as an allowance that runs out and then bills per metre.
- Extras, which is where the margin quietly leaks.
1. Equipment: cost plus markup
UK trade guidance describes marking the unit supply cost up by 15% to 25% before it reaches the customer. That is not free money: it covers sourcing, delivery, checking the kit is right, and carrying the warranty conversation for the next five years.
The thing worth being precise about is that markup and margin are different numbers, and confusing them prices work low in a direction that always favours the customer.
Brand matters to the number and to the customer. Published figures put Mitsubishi Electric and Daikin roughly 15% to 25% above an equivalent kW from the budget end, and a customer who has been quoted three times will ask why. Put the make, model and kW on the line so the answer is already on the page.
2. Labour: per zone, or per day
Both conventions are in normal use in the UK.
- Per zone: published figures put a straightforward multi-split at £1,200 to £2,000 a zone, labour only.
- Per day: £300 to £400 for an installer with F-Gas Cat 1, £350 to £500 with REFCOM as well, and £400 to £600 for heat pump work with MCS. A separate survey of HVAC day rates puts the national typical at £325 to £385, from £235 in Northern Ireland to £640 in London.
London and the South East run 20% to 30% above national on the finished job. If you are reading a national figure and working in Zone 3, it is not your figure.
3. Materials: the allowance that runs out
This is the shape that makes air conditioning different from most trades, and the one a generic quoting app cannot express. The convention is that a standard install includes a set length of pipework, most often three metres, and anything beyond it bills per metre.
Published 2026 rates for the overage:
- £30 to £45 a metre for a surface run in trunking
- £45 to £60 a metre concealed in a ceiling void or chased into a wall
At the retail end, one London installer publishes £80 to £120 a metre beyond their three included, which tells you how wide the range is and why you should not take anybody else’s number.
Price each run separately on a multi-split. Trade guidance is explicit about this and it is the single easiest place to lose money: three bedrooms averaged at “about 5 metres each” is a guess, and the guess is always low on the awkward one.
4. The extras, which is where it leaks
Every one of these is a decision made on site, and every one of them is a line somebody forgets.
- Condensate pump: £80 to £150 at supply. A ceiling cassette always needs one.
- New dedicated circuit: £200 to £500. A consumer unit upgrade is £400 to £800 on top, and the trade advice is to quote it separately rather than absorb it.
- Scaffold or tower: £150 to £300 for a half day.
- Core drilling and making good. Give it a line. Making good is the single most common argument after an install, because it was assumed rather than quoted.
- Out of hours or weekend working. Charge it as a visible line, so the customer can see what moving the job to a Saturday costs them and can choose not to.
Itemise domestic. Consider not itemising commercial.
Trade guidance splits here, and the split is worth knowing because it looks like a contradiction.
For domestic work, an itemised quote converts better and produces fewer disputes than a single headline figure. A homeowner comparing three quotes cannot compare three numbers, but they can compare three lists, and yours is the one that explains itself.
For commercial work, the advice is a single project price with a detailed scope and an exclusions list, because a procurement contact handed thirty line items will negotiate thirty line items.
The exclusions list is the most valuable part of the quote
Every source consulted for this guide converged on the same finding: the arguments after a job are almost never about the price. They are about something that was assumed and never written down.
The same five, every time:
- Electrical work beyond connecting to an existing circuit
- Scaffolding, towers and powered access
- Making good, plastering and redecoration after core drilling
- Planning permission, listed building or freeholder consent
- Asbestos survey and removal
Add an assumptions list too, which does a different job: an exclusion says “this is not in the price”, an assumption says “the price holds while this is true”. “Pipe runs are as measured at survey” is what protects a fixed price against a wall nobody could see behind.
The compliance furniture, and why it wins work
Customers are told to check these before choosing an installer, so a quote that already answers them is a quote that is easier to say yes to.
- Your F-Gas certificate number and REFCOM registration. Anyone breaking into a refrigerant circuit needs the personal certificate, and the company, including a sole trader, must be certified by an approved body. Customers are told to verify it on the REFCOM register. Put the number on the quote and you have answered the question before it was asked.
- What certificates the customer receives on completion, and the commissioning you will do.
- TM44, on commercial work. Over 12kW of aggregated effective rated cooling output in one building triggers a legally required inspection every five years. Small sites cross 12kW without realising, because it aggregates several small splits. Published inspection fees run £250 to £1,000 ex VAT, and it is recurring work you are well placed to win.
Where the money actually is
Installations are the least valuable thing on your price list over five years. Published UK service contract rates are £150 to £400 per indoor unit per year domestic and £300 to £600 commercial. Fifty units on annual contracts at £200 is £10,000 a year of pre-scheduled revenue.
Most manufacturers require annual servicing to keep a five to seven year parts warranty alive. That makes the service plan a line on the installation quote, presented as warranty protection, rather than a cold call eleven months later.
Where these figures came from
Everything above is a published UK range as at August 2026, taken from installer-facing pricing guidance, homeowner cost guides used for cross-checking, and UK F-Gas and TM44 guidance. They are here so you know whether you are in the right order of magnitude. They are not a recommendation, they will be wrong somewhere, and they will be wrong within a year.
Your prices are yours. What a tool should do is stop you retyping them and stop you doing arithmetic in somebody’s hallway.