A Schedule of Rates (SoR) in facility management is a pre-agreed price list that sets fixed unit rates for repairs, maintenance, and minor works - so every job gets priced the same way, every time. It turns reactive pricing into a predictable system, and it's the backbone of how most FM teams pay contractors and track cost per asset.
A Schedule of Rates is a priced list of work items - labor, materials, and plant - that a client and a contractor sign up to at the start of a contract. When a job comes in, the contractor picks the matching line items, multiplies by quantity, and the invoice is built automatically from the rates in the schedule.
In FM, SoRs sit underneath reactive repairs, minor works, and day-to-day responsive maintenance. A typical SoR contract in commercial real estate carries anywhere from 200 to 2,000 priced line items, each tied to a task description, a unit of measure, and a unit rate. Standards bodies like RICS and reference works like the BCIS SoR in the UK set industry benchmarks that many FM teams start from and then localize.
An FM Schedule of Rates is usually grouped by trade: HVAC (filter changes, belt replacements, coil cleans, refrigerant top-ups), Electrical (socket replacements, light fittings, emergency lighting, PAT testing), Plumbing (tap swaps, leak repairs, TMV servicing), Building fabric (door closers, ceiling tiles, patch plastering), Cleaning and grounds (deep cleans, gutter clearing), and Security and access (lock changes, card reader swaps). Each line item has a code, description, unit, and rate with normal-hours and out-of-hours columns.
SoR delivers high price certainty at the line-item level, medium admin effort, and a strong audit trail — best for 70-80% of responsive reactive work. Lump Sum is best for defined projects with clear scope. Time-and-Materials is the fallback for genuine unknowns and after-hours emergencies. Most multi-site FM operations run a hybrid of all three.
A reactive job on an SoR contract moves through six steps: Request (tenant logs fault via QR code), Triage (FM coordinator assigns trade and priority), Rate Match (system suggests matching SoR codes), Dispatch (contractor gets work order with rate attached — no separate quote), Complete (technician signs off with photo and time stamp), Invoice (system builds invoice from SoR quantity automatically). Admin time per job drops 30-50% versus ad-hoc quoting.
FM directors choose SoR contracts for three practical reasons: budget predictability (you know the rate for every common job, so forecasting repair spend is arithmetic not guesswork), faster response (skipping the quote cycle cuts hours off MTTR), and defensible cost per asset (each SoR line item links to a specific asset, building the data needed to justify replacement decisions).
SoR contracts fail for four recurring reasons: Out-of-date rates (build an annual CPI uplift clause and re-tender every 3-5 years); Gaps in the schedule (any job that doesn't match a line item falls back to T&M — review quarterly and add line items); Rate stacking (contractors splitting one job into multiple chargeable line items — define which combinations are mutually exclusive); Poor coding at the front end (wrong SoR code corrupts the whole cost trail — good CMMS software suggests the right code automatically from asset type and fault description).
Cryotos pulls SoR handling into the work-order flow directly. Each contract holds its own rate library linked to the right sites and contractors. When a ticket is triaged, the platform suggests matching SoR codes in one click. Quantities flow in from mobile sign-off and invoices generate automatically from rate × quantity. The Schedule of Rates reporting module rolls up cost per asset, cost per site, variance against budget, and trend lines. Teams using Cryotos see about 30% less downtime and 25% faster repair cycles.
A Bill of Quantities lists exact quantities for a defined project. A Schedule of Rates only sets unit rates — quantities are filled in later as jobs arise. FM teams live on SoRs because the work is unpredictable.
Apply an annual CPI or RPI uplift and run a full re-tender every three to five years. A quarterly gap review is also good practice.
Yes. Many FM contracts use SoR pricing for both reactive work and PPM tasks like filter changes, belt replacements, and statutory inspections.
Cryotos AI predicts failures, automates work orders, and simplifies maintenance—before problems slow you down.
