When to Fire a Customer (or a Lead Source)

Not every booked job is worth keeping. Some accounts drain techs, cash, and attention while showing up as "revenue" on a busy week. Firing a customer or a lead source is a profit decision: stop selling work that consistently loses after labor, travel, overhead, and acquisition cost.

Use ticket profit, not personality

Cost the last 5–10 jobs for the account or channel in the job profitability calculator. Include lead fees on paid sources. If net is repeatedly thin or negative, the relationship is a cost center — even if they call often.

Customers worth exiting

• Chronic late payers who eat office time and cash
• Tiny tickets that never clear your truck-roll minimum
• High-drama accounts that generate callbacks, reviews threats, and unpaid extras
• Scope that always expands with no change order

You can still be professional: raise minimums, require payment up front, or decline new work. Firing does not have to be a fight.

Lead sources worth cutting

A platform can send volume that looks like growth and still destroy margin. If cost per booked job exceeds contribution on the typical ticket from that source, more spend makes the hole deeper. Pause that channel, raise prices on that work, or filter job types that cannot absorb the fee.

A simple go / no-go rule

1. Average net profit per job for the last quarter on that account or source.
2. Compare to your target for that job type.
3. If it misses after a price or policy change, stop feeding it capacity.

Capacity given to a loser is capacity stolen from a winner. That is the real cost of being "too nice."

Frequently asked questions