A carpet cleaning bookkeeper turns each day's van tickets into clean books: payments taken at the door, invoices for commercial contracts, and balances that insurers and restoration partners owe on water jobs. They review tech commissions and add-on spiffs ahead of payroll, and follow what each job spent on chemicals and fuel.
By the HireBus team · Updated · Pay data: BLS, May 2025
Median pay, building services companies · BLS, May 2025
As a Bookkeeper in our Home Services division, you will play a pivotal role in the financial operations of our carpet cleaning and floor care services. Your primary responsibilities include processing payments, reconciling accounts, and tracking expenses. This role contributes to the overall financial health and transparency of our operations, ensuring we can continue to deliver exceptional service to our clients.
2. Essential Duties and Responsibilities
Manage all aspects of day-to-day bookkeeping and accounting processes including but not limited to: A/P, A/R, payroll, journal entries, and bank reconciliation.
Compile and analyze financial information to prepare entries to accounts.
Track and manage all expenses.
Process and reconcile payments and expenditures, purchase orders, invoices, statements, checks, refund requisitions, etc., in compliance with financial policies and procedures.
3. Key Tasks / Daily Activities
Coordinate with the Operations department to verify transactions and resolve discrepancies.
Process customer payments promptly.
Maintain digital and physical financial records.
Provide assistance in budget preparation.
4. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Accuracy of accounts and records: 100%.
Timeliness of A/R and A/P processing: < 48 hours.
Monthly expense tracking accuracy: 100%.
Quarterly finance reports completion rate: 100%.
5. Required Qualifications and Skills
High school diploma or equivalent
Minimum 2 years of bookkeeping experience
Proficiency in Microsoft Office and understanding of bookkeeping software
Strong numerical skills and attention to detail
6. Preferred Experience
Prior bookkeeping experience within the home services or similar industry
Familiarity with QuickBooks or similar accounting software
7. Physical Requirements
Ability to sit for extended periods
Ability to view computer screens for long periods
8. Work Environment and Schedule
Office environment, Monday to Friday, 9 AM to 5 PM
Occasional weekend or evening work may be required during peak periods
9. Compensation and Benefits
Salary range: $35,000 - $45,000 per annum
Health, Dental and Vision insurance
401k plan with company match
10. Company Culture and Overview
At [INSERT COMPANY NAME HERE], we believe that our employees are our most valuable asset. We strive to foster a culture of respect, integrity, and open communication where every member of our team can grow and succeed. We are dedicated to providing top-quality services to our customers and a supportive, encouraging work environment for our employees.
11. How to Apply
If you meet the above criteria and want to be part of a growth-oriented company focused on customer satisfaction, please send your resume to [INSERT EMAIL HERE] or apply online at [INSERT WEBSITE LINK HERE].
Need help filling this role? HireBus posts the ad, Iris interviews every applicant by phone before you do, and you decide who to hire. Start hiring now
Most tickets are small and paid on the spot. The work piles up around the rest: commercial accounts that pay on terms, water jobs billed to someone other than the homeowner, and tech pay that rises with every add-on sold.
Water jobs: decide who the customer is
Set water jobs up one of two ways in the books. If you bill the homeowner's insurer yourself, the ticket carries a claim number, the deductible taken at the door and an open balance for the insurer. If a restoration company hired you to extract, that company is your customer, on its own terms, and it deals with the insurer. Code each water ticket to one setup the day it closes, or balances end up with nobody chasing them.
Commercial contracts bill three ways
An apartment complex may pay per unit turned. An office may pay a flat monthly fee for a set number of visits, and a store may pay by the square foot. The bookkeeper sets up each contract's billing and matches every invoice to the visits the schedule shows were done. Skipped or extra nights get billed the way the contract says. A missing purchase order number or a skipped upload to the property's billing portal can hold up payment for weeks.
Spiffs and commissions raise the overtime rate
Techs often earn hourly pay plus a cut of each ticket and a flat spiff for each protector, deodorizer or sofa sold. Federal rules put commissions in the regular rate, even when they sit on top of an hourly wage. A spiff promised ahead counts too: the rules give a set amount per item sold as an example of a bonus that isn't discretionary. So a tech who sells three protectors in a 45-hour week is owed overtime on those spiffs as well as on the hourly pay. Source: 29 CFR 778.117: Commission payments, general (eCFR).
Chemical and fuel cost per job
Pre-spray, rinse, spotter and protector come out of jugs on the van, and the truck mount burns fuel at every stop. The bookkeeper codes each chemical order to the van or branch that got it, and each fuel card charge to its van, so the CFO's cost per job starts from clean data. If one van's cost per job keeps rising, look for heavy mixing, a machine left running, or protector going out without a charge.
How much carpet cleaning bookkeepers make
The closest BLS group for carpet cleaning bookkeepers is bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks. Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks who work for building and home services companies earned a median of $22.50 an hour ($46,790 a year) in May 2025, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That’s below the $50,670 median for bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks in all industries. About 17,470 of the 1,373,680 bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks in that survey work for building services companies.
The template quotes a yearly salary plus health, dental and vision insurance and a retirement plan with a company match. Before paying it as a salary with no overtime, have the duties checked against the federal and state exemption tests.
Building services companies
$46,790$46,790 median Middle half $40,700–$56,960 10th–90th $32,590–$67,710
All industries
$50,670$50,670 median Middle half $43,520–$61,470 10th–90th $36,000–$74,550
$20k$30k$40k$50k$60k$70k$80k
10th–90th percentileMiddle halfMedianAnnual pay, May 2025. Source: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics.
Annual pay by percentile
Group
10th
25th
Median
75th
90th
Building services companies
$32,590
$40,700
$46,790
$56,960
$67,710
All industries
$36,000
$43,520
$50,670
$61,470
$74,550
BLS doesn’t publish pay for carpet cleaning companies on their own. These figures cover services to buildings and dwellings, which include them. Post a real range for your market in the ad.
The pay line in the template above is an example from our Role Blueprint. Set yours from these figures and what local companies pay.
Skills to hire for, and what you can teach
Hire for these
Has run payroll with hourly pay plus commissions and spiffs
Keeps receivables straight when one job has two or three payers
Sets up recurring and per-visit billing in QuickBooks or similar software
Codes chemical orders and fuel card charges to the right van or branch
Explains a commission statement to a tech in plain words
Teach these on the job
How your pay plan counts add-ons, two-tech jobs, re-cleans and refunds
Water job terms: claim numbers, deductibles and restoration partners
Each commercial contract's billing terms and portal
How your scheduling software sends tickets to the books
Product names on your chemical supplier's invoices
Expect QuickBooks or a similar ledger, which the template names, fed by closed tickets from your scheduling software, plus a payroll service that can carry commission and spiff lines, a fuel card portal and the billing portals some property managers use.
Carpet cleaning bookkeeper interview questions
Two of the 6 questions we'd ask, and what a strong answer sounds like. Ask every candidate the same questions, and rate each answer on your own before you compare notes.
Situational · Field payments
A customer says they paid the technician by check, but the payment never reached the office. What do you do?
A strong answer: Checks the work order and deposit logs, asks the technician neutrally, asks the customer for a copy of the check if needed, and tells the manager how field payments are handed in.
Behavioral · Tracing errors
Tell me about a time card batches or field payments wouldn't reconcile to invoices. How did you find the problem?
A strong answer: Walks through the steps (matched deposits to work orders, checked fees, refunds and timing), names the cause, such as a check never handed in or a refund posted twice, and the fix.
Measure a month first: how fast tickets, bills and payments reach the books today. Then settle each target with the CFO.
Accuracy of accounts and records
Monthly, pull a sample of closed tickets, contract invoices and insurance payments and trace each to its source. Count any entry with the wrong customer, job, van or amount.
Timeliness of A/R and A/P processing
Hours from a ticket closing or a bill arriving to its posting. Track commercial invoices on their own line, since a late portal upload delays the payment, not just the entry.
Monthly expense tracking accuracy
Each month, confirm that every chemical, fuel and parts charge carries a van or branch code. Count the uncoded and miscoded ones, and fix the card or vendor behind most of them.
Quarterly finance reports completion rate
Reports the CFO asked for each quarter, delivered on the agreed date with every account reconciled. Note which report ran late and which account held it up.
What should a carpet cleaning bookkeeper check before commission payroll runs?
Match each tech's tickets to the commission report: job total, add-ons sold and any discount the office gave. Check that two-tech jobs split the way the plan says. Make sure helpers' hours are in and that overtime uses the week's full pay. If the plan pays only on money collected, hold the tickets still marked unpaid.
How much does a carpet cleaning bookkeeper make?
Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks who work for building and home services companies earned a median of $22.50 an hour ($46,790 a year) in May 2025, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The middle half earned between $40,700 and $56,960 a year. Pay also depends on your local market, experience and overtime.
What happens to a tech's commission when a job gets re-cleaned or refunded?
That depends on the written pay plan, so write that part first. Say whether a refund or free re-clean takes back the commission and spiff, and when. For the overtime math, federal rules let you count a late debit, such as a refund, in the period when it posts, even if the job was done earlier. Before you take back pay already given, check your state's rules on deductions.
What does the bookkeeper need from techs on a water job?
The insurer, the claim number, the adjuster's name if known, the signed work authorization, photos, the deductible collected at the door, and who referred the job. Without them, nobody can tell who owes the balance. Ask the office not to close a water ticket until each item is attached.
How do you bill a per-square-foot commercial contract?
Measure once, with the property manager, and list each area's footage in the contract. Each invoice then shows the areas cleaned that visit, their footage and the rate, with the signed work order attached. When a tenant moves out or a space changes, update the footage in writing before the next bill. Otherwise every invoice after it will be wrong.
