Should you show VAT on a quote?

Guide · Updated 10 September 2026

If you are VAT-registered

Every quote carries three figures: the net subtotal, the VAT, and the gross total. Label all three. The customer reads the last one — it is the number they compare against the other quotes on the kitchen table — and if your quote leads with the net figure and theirs lead with the gross, you look cheaper than you are until the invoice arrives, which is the worst possible moment to look more expensive.

Put your VAT registration number on the document too. It is required on the invoice, it costs nothing to carry on the quote, and a customer who is themselves registered will want it when they reclaim.

If you are not VAT-registered

Say so, in one line: “Prices are not subject to VAT.” Without it, a customer who has just had two other quotes with VAT on them will assume yours is about to grow by a fifth, and either add it in their head (and think you are dearer than you are) or ask, which is a conversation about your turnover you did not need to have.

Whether you should be registered is a turnover question, and the threshold changes. Do not take the figure from a guide — including this one — take it from gov.uk's VAT registration page, which also explains the rolling twelve-month test that catches people who only look at the tax year. A business that crosses the threshold mid-year and keeps quoting without VAT has a problem it cannot fix on the invoice.

Quoting a consumer versus quoting a business

A homeowner cares about one number: what they will pay. Prices shown to consumers are generally expected to be the full price including VAT, so lead with the gross total and show the VAT beneath it as the breakdown. A business customer — a landlord with a portfolio, a contractor you are subcontracting to, a shop — often works in net figures because they reclaim the VAT, and will want the net line to be the prominent one. Same three figures, different emphasis; the document should carry all three either way.

Not everything is 20%

Some work carries a reduced or zero rate — certain energy-saving installations and certain conversions and renovations have qualified at different times, under conditions that are precise and that change. If you think a job might qualify, check the current rules on gov.uk or with your accountant before you quote it at the lower rate, and say on the quote which rate applies and why. Quoting the reduced rate on the customer's say-so and finding out at the invoice that it did not apply is a bill you end up paying yourself.

Subcontracting to another VAT-registered builder

If you are a VAT-registered subcontractor doing construction work for another VAT-registered contractor who is reporting under the Construction Industry Scheme, the domestic reverse charge may apply: you do not charge the VAT, the contractor accounts for it. It is a specific set of conditions, not a rule of thumb, and it does not apply when the customer is the end user, such as a homeowner. If your work is mostly for other builders, get the position clear with your accountant once and write the standard wording into your terms; if it is mostly for homeowners, it will rarely come up.

Materials, mark-up and the VAT on them

If you are registered, VAT applies to your whole charge — labour and materials together — regardless of what the merchant charged you. A customer who says “but the boiler was only £1,200 at the merchant” is comparing a trade price with your supplied-and- fitted price, and the answer is that your line includes the supply, the fitting, the warranty and the VAT on all of it. Which is another argument for the boiler being its own line, with “supplied and fitted” in the description, rather than lost in a lump sum.

The version that never goes wrong

Set your VAT status once and let every document carry it. In Speak to Quote, Business details holds whether you are registered and at what rate; every quote and estimate you build from then on shows the subtotal, the VAT line and the total, or says you are not VAT registered and no VAT is charged, without you deciding it again on a Tuesday evening. The builder page shows a worked example with the VAT breakdown on a loft-conversion-sized job, and the how it works page covers the rest of the document.

This is general guidance for tradespeople, not tax advice. The rules above have edges — flat-rate schemes, mixed-rate jobs, the reverse charge — where an accountant who knows your business is worth the hour.