Mistake 1 — Pricing labor at wage
Burden adds taxes, insurance, benefits and non-productive time to every field hour. Estimating at wage produces a number that looks profitable and is not, and because it is consistent it never appears as a one-off problem to investigate.
Mistake 2 — Vague scope, missing exclusions
Whatever the scope does not exclude, the customer will reasonably assume is included. That assumption is settled during production, usually in the customer's favour, and usually without a change order.
Mistake 3 — The estimate that never gets sent
Work is measured, the estimate is drafted, and it stalls in someone's drafts folder while the next job takes attention. This is a pure process loss — the sales effort is already spent. It is the fastest leak to close because it needs a queue and a rule, not a skill.
Mistake 4 — Discounting without a decision
Discounts given in the field without an approval threshold do not show up as a category anywhere. They show up as a margin that keeps drifting down while everyone reports winning work.
Mistake 5 — Letting unsold estimates age
A large share of unsold estimates are not rejections; they are decisions that were never made. Without a follow-up cadence they expire quietly. This is the largest recoverable pool in most service businesses, and it costs nothing to work except discipline.
Mistake 6 — No estimated-versus-actual review
Without comparing priced cost to real cost by category, estimating cannot improve. The business learns that 'some jobs go badly' instead of learning that a specific work type is consistently underpriced.