How much should you charge to install air conditioning?

Domestic air conditioning has gone from a rarity to a steady stream of enquiries in the UK, and most of the engineers quoting it are pricing each job from scratch. That is slow, inconsistent, and it leaks margin. The fix is the same as any trade: break the install into parts you price once, then assemble each quote from those parts. Here is the breakdown, with figures to sanity-check your own.

Prices below are typical ranges for domestic single-split work in 2026. Your kit costs, your region and your access all move them. Build your own numbers; keep the structure.

What a single split actually costs to deliver

A supplied-and-installed single split in a UK home commonly lands between £1,600 and £2,500. Underneath that number are five parts worth pricing separately:

1. The unit

Wall-mounted indoor unit plus outdoor condenser. Kit cost varies more by brand and capacity than any other line, so quote from a live supplier price. Size it properly: an undersized unit runs flat out and disappoints, an oversized one short-cycles. Our free BTU calculator gives a quick room-size sanity check before you commit to a capacity.

2. The pipe run

Refrigerant pipework, insulation, cable and condensate. A back-to-back install with the condenser directly behind the indoor unit is your baseline. Every extra metre of run, every core drill through engineering brick, and every condensate pump where gravity will not do it belongs on its own line. A £1,800 back-to-back and a £2,400 install with an 8-metre run through two walls are not the same job, and your quote should show why.

3. Electrics

A dedicated supply, isolation and any consumer unit work. If you do not hold the electrical qualifications, price your electrician in rather than absorbing them.

4. Commissioning

Pressure test, vacuum, charge check and handover. Price it; it is skilled time, and it is the part that separates you from the man with a van and a vacuum pump he has never calibrated.

5. Access

Ladder work is one price, scaffold or a tower for a first-floor condenser is another. Say so on the quote.

The worked example

A single split, 3.5kW, 4-metre run, ground floor:

• Indoor and outdoor unit, supplied: £1,050
• Install and pipe run, 4m: £520
• Condensate pump and trunking: £240
• Electrical supply and isolation: £180
• Commissioning and handover: £160

£2,150, in five lines a homeowner can read. When the customer two doors down asks for the same thing with a 9-metre run to the back of the house, you change one line and the quote still makes money.

Sell the service plan at the moment of acceptance

An AC unit needs an annual service, and the easiest moment to sell year one is on the install quote itself, as an optional add-on the customer ticks. You are not making a sales call in March; they are ticking a £120 box in the same minute they accept a £2,000 install. Tick rates at acceptance are dramatically better than callback rates a year later, and every plan sold is recurring work booked into next summer.

The same goes for the second indoor unit and the wifi control module. Priced options on the quote, chosen by the customer, no pressure applied. That is how a single-room enquiry becomes a two-room install without you selling anything.

Take a deposit that covers the kit

The unit is the expensive part and you are the one ordering it. Take 20% on acceptance by card, before anything is ordered. A £440 deposit on a £2,200 install means the customer is committed, the kit is funded, and a cancelled job is an inconvenience instead of a condenser in your garage. More on the reasoning in should you take a deposit.

Quote the same day you survey

AC enquiries are impulse-adjacent: they spike in the first hot week and cool off with the weather. The engineer whose branded quote arrives the same afternoon, with the service plan tickable and a deposit button on it, wins against the engineer whose spreadsheet arrives on Thursday.

Snapquo built for HVAC engineers is exactly that workflow: your installs, runs and extras saved once as priced items, quotes assembled on-site in about a minute, optional add-ons the customer ticks, and the deposit taken the moment they accept. The first few documents are free, so price the next survey with it and see.