Margin, cash, and growth, watched every week
Grow without losing control of the numbers
Level is the always-on finance team for contractors and service businesses. We show you which jobs, crews, and customers make money, where cash gets stuck, and which levers will drive profitable growth. Built by operators from the trades.
Finance & ops for contractors, restaurants, healthcare, ecommerce, staffing, cleaning & startups →
We kept hearing the same thing, so we built Level
“I'm past the stage where I just need someone categorizing transactions.”
Growing service business
Works with your existing software
QuickBooks, Stripe, Gusto, Ramp, spreadsheets, we connect to all of it
Operator observations
The same crew. Review gross profit per hour
Compare paid hours, billable hours, job mix and posted costs to spot missing costs or mispriced work. Put the office actions around your existing crew before deciding what to change.
These anonymized operator observations are not a published customer study or a verified profit improvement. Underlying company records are not public. The annual service-agreement comparison below comes from the separately defined Level aggregate.
Content reviewed . Read the revision history.
Skilled-labor checks
- ×Senior techs pulled into low-margin work
- ×Callbacks and revisits consuming capacity
- ×Add-on work left on the table during service visits
Margin Blind Spots
- ×Highest-revenue customer running 11% margin
- ×Rest of the business averaging 34%
- ×No weekly view of gross profit per labor hour
Unbilled job balances
- ×Completed jobs with cost posted but no invoice sent
- ×Closeout steps lagging long after field work was done
- ×$340K in one-time unbilled work found in the first 30 days, not cash received
Where to check the existing crew's work
Lift gross profit / hour
Right work routed to the right crew
Review agreement-customer follow-on revenue
Annual SA-account additional revenue: 29.6% at P75 vs an 8.7% median, n=386; not a visit conversion rate
Reduce callbacks
Revisits tracked as margin and capacity drain
Act this week
Each office gets the next actions, not another report
Real examples
Same problem. Different leak.
Service businesses don't just need more people. They need to stop wasting the skilled labor they already have.
Electrical contractor
11% margin on the biggest customer
A $40M electrical contractor found its highest-revenue client was running 11% margin while the rest of the business averaged 34%. The customer mix calls for a job-cost and labor-allocation review; revenue rank alone does not identify labor waste.
Mechanical contractor
Month-end Excel finally replaced
A $75M mechanical contractor was reconciling field data and ERP data in Excel every month. Level unified the operating layer so margin could be reviewed while there was still time to act.
Service contractor
$340K in unbilled work
Completed work had cost in the system but was still unbilled; billing status alone does not establish whether cash was received. Level surfaced the stuck jobs and the office actions required to move them forward.
Skilled trades
AI for work AI cannot replace
AI cannot do your best people's work. Level uses AI to orchestrate the jobs, billing, follow-up, and exceptions around that scarce skilled labor.
How We Work
The CLEAR Framework
We analyze service businesses across five pillars, Cash, Labor, Earnings, Accounts, and Risk, to find where scarce skilled labor turns into margin, gets wasted, or gets stuck before cash comes back.
Cash
Is completed work turning into cash?
Labor
Is scarce skilled time producing margin?
Earnings
Which work actually makes money?
Accounts
Which customers deserve your best people?
Risk
Where will margin or cash break next?
Benchmarks drawn from a 2,200+ contractor research universe; each metric uses its own eligible sample
What we do
Know which jobs and customers actually make money
Level connects your operations, payroll, billing, and books so you can see margin, cash, and job profitability in real time, and know which levers to pull to grow revenue without the chaos.
Metric
Gross profit per labor hour
See which jobs, customers, crews, and workflows turn scarce labor into margin, and which ones quietly consume your best people.
Proof
Cash trapped in open jobs
Find completed work that has cost in the system but has not become cash yet: unbilled work, slow billing, missing closeout steps, and collection delays.
Mechanism
Weekly AI agents
Custom agents monitor operations and finance, flag margin and cash leakage, and surface the actions each office should take this week.
Plus bookkeeping, job costing, WIP schedules, retainage & collections, payroll, and AI-native workflows, all pointed at one outcome: more profit from the crew you already have.
From flying blind to current numbers you can trace
Most owners run on numbers that are months old and hard to trust. Level connects the work to the money, current as your connected systems sync.
Where scarce labor gets wasted
Illustrative weekly dashboard
Illustrative dashboard: $340K is a review balance, not cash recovered. The 7-day, next-day and 12-action tiles show a planning workflow, not standard customer outcomes.
↑
GP / Labor Hour
$340K
Cash to review
↓
Rework Drain
7d
Open Job Lag
Next-day
Billing Speed
12
Weekly Actions
How your numbers turn into faster decisions
Every engagement starts by finding where your money is being made, wasted, or trapped, then turns that into the few moves that grow revenue, margin, and cash.
Connect your systems. See where labor turns into margin.
We connect operations, labor, billing, and finance, then show where your team's time is producing profit, getting wasted, or getting stuck before cash comes back.
- 15-minute initial setup target after record access or exports arrive
- Gross profit per labor hour
- Cash trapped in open jobs
- Top weekly actions for each office
Free. No commitment. The 48-hour snapshot target starts once the required records and access are available. Later implementation is separately scoped.
Data Validation
Tie the analysis back to source records.
- Map data across operations, labor, billing, and finance
- Analysis outputs reconciled to the records provided
- Your team reviews the scope and findings before implementation
We check which records, dates and costs are missing before using the numbers.
Agents Deployed
The operating layer starts watching the work.
- Weekly alerts for margin and cash leakage
- Callback, billing, and open-job exceptions
- Office-level action lists
AI agents, reviewed by Level's finance team.
Actions Taken
Things get done, not just reported.
- Possible unbilled work checked with your team before billing or follow-up
- Low-yield customers and jobs flagged
- Writes to your systems with your approval
More profit from the crew you have.
How Level works
A finance team with better operating data
Level connects your systems, validates the numbers, and turns the messy work between operations and finance into weekly actions.
Finance operators who understand the work
Level reviews jobs, labor, billing, WIP, rework, and the messy handoff between operations and finance.
Delivered actions, not another dashboard
Most owners already have countless reports nobody opens. Level hands you a few numbers you can act on, then surfaces stuck jobs, chases billing gaps, and lands weekly actions with the people who can fix them.
Verified numbers from source systems
Each metric is tied back to the records you connect, with gaps flagged for review. Gross profit per labor hour should be an operating number, not a rough estimate.
AI where it helps the operator
AI watches for exceptions, missing handoffs, billing gaps, and margin leakage so people can focus on the decisions that actually require judgment.
Built for service businesses whose best people need clean numbers, faster feedback, and fewer hidden leaks between the field and the books.
Meet the teamField software, dashboards, your CPA vs. Level
Your field software runs the jobs. Your dashboards chart the past. Your CPA files the taxes. None of them connect the work to the money. Level is the weekly operating layer in between.
| Capability | Field Software | BI Dashboard | CPA / Accountant | Level |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Runs dispatch and job activity in your field software | ✓ | No | No | No |
| Records the books and shows accounting after it posts | No | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Year-end close and tax coordination with your CPA | No | No | ✓ | ✓ |
| Connects operations, labor, billing, and finance | No | Manual | No | ✓ |
| Tracks gross profit per labor hour | No | No | No | ✓ |
| Finds cash trapped in open jobs | No | Late | No | ✓ |
| Flags rework and revisits as margin drain | No | No | No | ✓ |
| Shows customers wasting scarce skilled labor | No | No | No | ✓ |
| Benchmarks from a 2,200+ contractor research universe, using each metric's sample | No | No | No | ✓ |
| Surfaces weekly actions by office | No | No | No | ✓ |
| Deploys custom AI agents | No | No | No | ✓ |
Not another dashboard. A weekly system for making more money with the crew you already have.
Who this works for
We are selective about fit, not about size
The door is open to any real business. But the operating work lands hardest in three situations.
You are growing and the numbers are getting away from you
New locations, bigger jobs, more crews, a first acquisition. The reporting that worked at your last size stopped working at this one.
Someone will act on a weekly number
We surface a short list every week: a job to reprice, a customer to fix, an invoice to chase. It only pays off if somebody moves on it.
Someone internal owns getting the team to use it
An owner, GM, controller, or ops lead who will hold the cadence. We bring the numbers and the analysis. Adoption still needs a person inside the business.
If you just want clean books right now, that is a real answer, and Bookkeeping from $500/month is the right door. Plenty of clients start there and move up once the numbers show them something.
What your numbers should be able to explain
Operating questions, not client quotations or measured customer results.
Do service calls and installation projects need different margin reviews?
Short-cycle service and project work can have different cost and billing cutoffs.
Evidence to request: Keep the job populations separate and trace labor, materials and billing for each.
Which location and daypart actually explains the result?
A group total can conceal different labor and food-cost patterns across operations.
Evidence to request: Keep the location, sales period and cost definitions aligned before adjusting schedules or menu prices.
Is project profit turning into cash at the expected milestones?
Progress billing and cash receipts can lag costs even when a project is profitable.
Evidence to request: Review the contract, billing schedule, incurred costs and actual receipt dates together.
What funds the interval between crew payroll and customer payment?
The dates for earned labor, payroll funding and receipts can differ.
Evidence to request: Put those actual dates and unresolved receipts beside the cash forecast.
Do store sales, settlement cash and cohort reports answer the same question?
Orders, payout activity and cohort reports describe different populations and definitions.
Evidence to request: Choose the report for the decision, align the period and predictive assumptions, and retain the bridge to the bank and books.
Does a large customer justify the capacity it consumes?
Revenue alone does not show contribution after crew time, travel and callbacks.
Evidence to request: Compare customer-level source activity and complete incurred costs before changing account priorities.
Do service calls and installation projects need different margin reviews?
Short-cycle service and project work can have different cost and billing cutoffs.
Evidence to request: Keep the job populations separate and trace labor, materials and billing for each.
Which location and daypart actually explains the result?
A group total can conceal different labor and food-cost patterns across operations.
Evidence to request: Keep the location, sales period and cost definitions aligned before adjusting schedules or menu prices.
Is project profit turning into cash at the expected milestones?
Progress billing and cash receipts can lag costs even when a project is profitable.
Evidence to request: Review the contract, billing schedule, incurred costs and actual receipt dates together.
What funds the interval between crew payroll and customer payment?
The dates for earned labor, payroll funding and receipts can differ.
Evidence to request: Put those actual dates and unresolved receipts beside the cash forecast.
Do store sales, settlement cash and cohort reports answer the same question?
Orders, payout activity and cohort reports describe different populations and definitions.
Evidence to request: Choose the report for the decision, align the period and predictive assumptions, and retain the bridge to the bank and books.
Does a large customer justify the capacity it consumes?
Revenue alone does not show contribution after crew time, travel and callbacks.
Evidence to request: Compare customer-level source activity and complete incurred costs before changing account priorities.
Do service calls and installation projects need different margin reviews?
Short-cycle service and project work can have different cost and billing cutoffs.
Evidence to request: Keep the job populations separate and trace labor, materials and billing for each.
Which location and daypart actually explains the result?
A group total can conceal different labor and food-cost patterns across operations.
Evidence to request: Keep the location, sales period and cost definitions aligned before adjusting schedules or menu prices.
Is project profit turning into cash at the expected milestones?
Progress billing and cash receipts can lag costs even when a project is profitable.
Evidence to request: Review the contract, billing schedule, incurred costs and actual receipt dates together.
What funds the interval between crew payroll and customer payment?
The dates for earned labor, payroll funding and receipts can differ.
Evidence to request: Put those actual dates and unresolved receipts beside the cash forecast.
Do store sales, settlement cash and cohort reports answer the same question?
Orders, payout activity and cohort reports describe different populations and definitions.
Evidence to request: Choose the report for the decision, align the period and predictive assumptions, and retain the bridge to the bank and books.
Does a large customer justify the capacity it consumes?
Revenue alone does not show contribution after crew time, travel and callbacks.
Evidence to request: Compare customer-level source activity and complete incurred costs before changing account priorities.
Do service calls and installation projects need different margin reviews?
Short-cycle service and project work can have different cost and billing cutoffs.
Evidence to request: Keep the job populations separate and trace labor, materials and billing for each.
Which location and daypart actually explains the result?
A group total can conceal different labor and food-cost patterns across operations.
Evidence to request: Keep the location, sales period and cost definitions aligned before adjusting schedules or menu prices.
Is project profit turning into cash at the expected milestones?
Progress billing and cash receipts can lag costs even when a project is profitable.
Evidence to request: Review the contract, billing schedule, incurred costs and actual receipt dates together.
What funds the interval between crew payroll and customer payment?
The dates for earned labor, payroll funding and receipts can differ.
Evidence to request: Put those actual dates and unresolved receipts beside the cash forecast.
Do store sales, settlement cash and cohort reports answer the same question?
Orders, payout activity and cohort reports describe different populations and definitions.
Evidence to request: Choose the report for the decision, align the period and predictive assumptions, and retain the bridge to the bank and books.
Does a large customer justify the capacity it consumes?
Revenue alone does not show contribution after crew time, travel and callbacks.
Evidence to request: Compare customer-level source activity and complete incurred costs before changing account priorities.
Does the cash forecast include the next payroll funding event?
A completed or approved payroll run does not establish the date and net amount that will leave the bank.
Evidence to request: Retain the run, check date, funding evidence and correction credits beside the forecast assumption.
Which proposal option did the customer accept?
Adding alternative options can count work the customer did not purchase.
Evidence to request: Retain the accepted option and its relationship to the final invoice.
What work would a supervisor release from the owner or crew?
A title and salary do not establish what capacity a new role creates.
Evidence to request: Name the tasks transferred, time available and measurable operating output before approving the role.
Does billed production explain the cash collected?
Charges, claim status, adjustments and receipts are separate populations.
Evidence to request: Use the same provider, service dates and payment evidence before comparing production with collections.
Which operating decision can your current reports not answer?
Clean transaction records, management reporting and decision ownership are different parts of the finance function.
Evidence to request: Name the required output and the person who reviews it before buying another tool or adding a role.
Which labor denominator does the hourly rate use?
Estimating hours, paid hours and productive job hours can yield different rates.
Evidence to request: Name the numerator, denominator and overhead treatment before repricing a route or job.
Does the cash forecast include the next payroll funding event?
A completed or approved payroll run does not establish the date and net amount that will leave the bank.
Evidence to request: Retain the run, check date, funding evidence and correction credits beside the forecast assumption.
Which proposal option did the customer accept?
Adding alternative options can count work the customer did not purchase.
Evidence to request: Retain the accepted option and its relationship to the final invoice.
What work would a supervisor release from the owner or crew?
A title and salary do not establish what capacity a new role creates.
Evidence to request: Name the tasks transferred, time available and measurable operating output before approving the role.
Does billed production explain the cash collected?
Charges, claim status, adjustments and receipts are separate populations.
Evidence to request: Use the same provider, service dates and payment evidence before comparing production with collections.
Which operating decision can your current reports not answer?
Clean transaction records, management reporting and decision ownership are different parts of the finance function.
Evidence to request: Name the required output and the person who reviews it before buying another tool or adding a role.
Which labor denominator does the hourly rate use?
Estimating hours, paid hours and productive job hours can yield different rates.
Evidence to request: Name the numerator, denominator and overhead treatment before repricing a route or job.
Does the cash forecast include the next payroll funding event?
A completed or approved payroll run does not establish the date and net amount that will leave the bank.
Evidence to request: Retain the run, check date, funding evidence and correction credits beside the forecast assumption.
Which proposal option did the customer accept?
Adding alternative options can count work the customer did not purchase.
Evidence to request: Retain the accepted option and its relationship to the final invoice.
What work would a supervisor release from the owner or crew?
A title and salary do not establish what capacity a new role creates.
Evidence to request: Name the tasks transferred, time available and measurable operating output before approving the role.
Does billed production explain the cash collected?
Charges, claim status, adjustments and receipts are separate populations.
Evidence to request: Use the same provider, service dates and payment evidence before comparing production with collections.
Which operating decision can your current reports not answer?
Clean transaction records, management reporting and decision ownership are different parts of the finance function.
Evidence to request: Name the required output and the person who reviews it before buying another tool or adding a role.
Which labor denominator does the hourly rate use?
Estimating hours, paid hours and productive job hours can yield different rates.
Evidence to request: Name the numerator, denominator and overhead treatment before repricing a route or job.
Does the cash forecast include the next payroll funding event?
A completed or approved payroll run does not establish the date and net amount that will leave the bank.
Evidence to request: Retain the run, check date, funding evidence and correction credits beside the forecast assumption.
Which proposal option did the customer accept?
Adding alternative options can count work the customer did not purchase.
Evidence to request: Retain the accepted option and its relationship to the final invoice.
What work would a supervisor release from the owner or crew?
A title and salary do not establish what capacity a new role creates.
Evidence to request: Name the tasks transferred, time available and measurable operating output before approving the role.
Does billed production explain the cash collected?
Charges, claim status, adjustments and receipts are separate populations.
Evidence to request: Use the same provider, service dates and payment evidence before comparing production with collections.
Which operating decision can your current reports not answer?
Clean transaction records, management reporting and decision ownership are different parts of the finance function.
Evidence to request: Name the required output and the person who reviews it before buying another tool or adding a role.
Which labor denominator does the hourly rate use?
Estimating hours, paid hours and productive job hours can yield different rates.
Evidence to request: Name the numerator, denominator and overhead treatment before repricing a route or job.
Our published contractor benchmark universe contains 2,242 contractors. This counts businesses in the research, rather than Level clients. The research does not cover every industry shown above.
Level works across contractors, restaurants, healthcare practices, ecommerce, staffing, cleaning, and venture-backed startups.
See who we serveCommon questions
Level shows service businesses which jobs, crews, and customers make money, where cash gets stuck, and which levers drive profitable growth. Clean books are the sensor. Better weekly decisions are the product.
QuickBooks, Sage, Spectrum, ServiceTitan, BuildOps, Jobber, Housecall Pro, Procore, and other operations systems. Level connects operations, labor, billing, and finance data into one operating layer.
Level starts with a free profit audit, then Bookkeeping from $500/month for clean books and a clean data layer. Scale adds CFO operating-layer work for $5M-$100M service businesses. It's strongest when skilled labor is scarce, job volume is high, and margin and cash leakage hide in the noise.
No. Level deploys custom AI agents that monitor the work between operations and finance, find margin and cash leakage, and surface the actions each office should take each week.
Gross profit per labor hour and cash trapped in open jobs. The first shows whether scarce skilled labor is turning into margin. The second shows whether completed work is becoming cash fast enough.
AI watches for exceptions, missing handoffs, billing gaps, and margin leakage across your operating and finance systems. Level's finance team reviews the numbers and turns the signal into weekly actions.
Level's finance team reviews your books, payroll, billing, job, and operating data. Automation helps find exceptions faster, but the recommendations come from people who understand the link between field work, margin, and cash.
The first step is a free profit snapshot, with a 48-hour target after the required records and access are available. We check the available labor, job, billing and accounting records, explain any gaps, and identify questions to investigate. The snapshot shows where your team's time turns into margin, gets wasted, or leaves cash trapped in open jobs. Later data validation, implementation and ongoing work are separately scoped.
Contractors and skilled trades are our core, HVAC, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, refrigeration, roofing, general contracting, landscaping, and field service. But the same operating layer works for any labor-heavy business where scarce skilled time is the constraint: restaurants, healthcare practices, staffing, cleaning, and venture-backed startups. Visit our Who We Serve page to find your industry.
You choose the records and access provided for the engagement. A profit audit does not authorize posting changes to your books. Ongoing bookkeeping and automation need an agreed scope and permissions. We can arrange an NDA before you provide financial records and explain which providers process the data and which data-use settings apply.
Level fits best when the business is growing, skilled labor is scarce, job volume is high, and the numbers are starting to get away from the owner. Someone on your team should own acting on the weekly findings across margin, labor, billing and cash, and getting the team to use them. If you only need clean books today, our Bookkeeping starts at $500 per month and is the right door for many clients. If you only need tax filing or a generic dashboard, we may not be the right fit.
Grow without losing control of the numbers
AI for the skilled work AI cannot replace.
Drop your info and we’ll show your real margin after callbacks and rework, which crews and jobs are worth the time, and how much cash is sitting in work you have already finished.
Start with a discussion of your priorities. Financial analysis follows access to the agreed books and operating records.
No commitment. Real numbers, not generic advice.