Dog walking rate calculator
Work backwards from target monthly income, walking days, group sizes and admin time to sanity-check your dog walking rates.
Sanity-check your rate
Work backwards from what you want to take home to the minimum average price per walk.
Fuel, insurance, admin, holidays, unpaid gaps.
Minimum average price per walk
£0.00
Takings you need: / month
Billable walks: / month
Once you’re running, you don’t have to estimate: BearWalk’s Reports show projected monthly revenue and what’s still unbilled, so you can check your rate against the work you actually did.
The mistake to avoid
Do not price only from the hour spent walking. Your rate also needs to cover travel, messaging, invoices, insurance, holidays and unpaid gaps. The walking hour is often barely half the working hour.
A worked example
Target: £2,400 a month. Three group slots a day, four dogs each, five days a week is 60 dog-walks a week, roughly 260 a month if every slot fills. £2,400 ÷ 260 ≈ £9.25 per dog as an absolute floor at full capacity. Since rounds are rarely 100% full, a realistic 80% fill pushes the floor to about £11.50, before you have paid for insurance or fuel. That is why £12–£14 group rates are normal, not greedy.
Useful benchmark calculation
Monthly income target ÷ realistic monthly billable walks = your minimum average fee per walk. Run it once a year and whenever your costs change; if your actual rate is below the answer, the business is subsidising the clients.
How BearWalk helps
BearWalk reports projected monthly revenue and unbilled walks so pricing decisions are based on real work, not memory: you can see immediately what a £1 rate change does to the month.
FAQ
What fill rate should I assume?
Around 80% is realistic for an established round once holidays, cancellations and gaps are counted. New rounds run lower, so price with that honesty.