Does Kickserv charge per user or per plan?

Kickserv sells three fixed tiers that each include a set number of users: Start includes 5 users for $60/mo, Run includes 10 users for $119/mo, and Scale includes 20 users for $199/mo. You are not billed per seat inside a tier; you upgrade to the next tier once you exceed its user cap. That means a 3-person crew and a 5-person crew pay the identical $60/mo Start rate, and a 6-person crew must jump straight to the $119/mo Run tier even though only one extra seat was needed — there is no published pro-rated or per-seat add-on between tiers.

How much does Kickserv's annual plan save versus monthly?

Kickserv states annual subscribers save 20% off the monthly rate. On Start that is $60/mo down to $48/mo equivalent, a $144/year saving. On Run it is $119/mo down to $95.20/mo, a $285.60/year saving. On Scale it is $199/mo down to $159.20/mo, a $477.60/year saving. Put another way, a full year of Start costs $720 billed monthly versus $576 billed annually; a full year of Run costs $1,428 monthly versus $1,142.40 annually; a full year of Scale costs $2,388 monthly versus $1,910.40 annually. The saving scales with plan size in dollar terms even though the discount rate (20%) stays flat across all three tiers.

Can HVAC contractors get a published price from FieldPulse?

No. FieldPulse's pricing page describes Essentials, Professional, and Enterprise packages but lists no dollar figures. Every tier routes to a 'Request Pricing' or 'Get a Custom Quote' form, and the FAQ confirms pricing depends on how many full-access versus field-only seats a contractor buys. Because neither a base fee nor a per-seat rate is published, a contractor cannot compute an estimated monthly or annual cost from the pricing page alone and must go through the quote process to get any figure at all — this also means no monthly-vs-annual discount comparison exists for FieldPulse the way it does for Kickserv.

What is Kickserv Kickback and does it change the monthly cost?

Kickback is a processing-volume rebate, not a plan discount. Start, Run, and Scale users get 5% off their monthly fee if they process at least $1,000, $2,000, or $3,000 respectively in online payments that month. Annual subscribers must hit 12 times that monthly minimum to qualify. For example, a Run customer on monthly billing who clears $2,000 in card payments in a given month gets $119 × 0.05 = $5.95 off, paying $113.05 that month. A Run customer on annual billing must process $2,000 × 12 = $24,000 across the year to get the equivalent 5% off the $95.20 annual-equivalent rate, worth $4.76/mo. The rebate applies to Kickserv's platform fee only — it says nothing about the separate payment processing rate charged on the transactions themselves.

Kickserv vs FieldPulse: Monthly vs Annual HVAC Pricing

Kickserv publishes three fixed HVAC tiers with clear monthly and annual rates: Start (5 users, $60/mo), Run (10 users, $119/mo), and Scale (20 users, $199/mo), each discounted 20% on an annual commitment. FieldPulse publishes no price at all; it sells seat-based access through a custom quote, so a like-for-like monthly-versus-annual comparison is only possible for Kickserv.

Kickserv’s published monthly and annual rates

Kickserv’s pricing page lists three tiers, each covering a fixed number of users rather than charging per seat:

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Plan	Users included	Monthly rate	Annual rate (20% off, monthly equivalent)	Annual saving per year
Start	5	$60/mo	$48/mo	$144
Run	10	$119/mo	$95.20/mo	$285.60
Scale	20	$199/mo	$159.20/mo	$477.60

The annual figures are calculated by applying Kickserv’s stated 20% discount to the published monthly rate ($60 × 0.8 = $48, $119 × 0.8 = $95.20, $199 × 0.8 = $159.20). The yearly saving is the difference between 12 months of the monthly rate and 12 months of the discounted rate (for example, on Run: (12 × $119) − (12 × $95.20) = $1,428 − $1,142.40 = $285.60).

12-month total cost, monthly vs annual billing

Spelling out the full-year totals makes the trade-off concrete rather than relying on the monthly-equivalent figure alone:

Plan	12 months, billed monthly	12 months, billed annually	Total saved
Start	12 × $60 = $720	12 × $48 = $576	$144
Run	12 × $119 = $1,428	12 × $95.20 = $1,142.40	$285.60
Scale	12 × $199 = $2,388	12 × $159.20 = $1,910.40	$477.60

For a contractor budgeting cash flow, the monthly option spreads the same total across twelve smaller payments instead of one larger annual commitment, at the cost of paying $144–$477.60 more over the year depending on tier.

Cost per user, by tier

Because each Kickserv tier bundles a set number of users, the effective per-user cost falls as you move up:

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Plan	Monthly cost per user	Annual-equivalent cost per user
Start (5 users)	$60 ÷ 5 = $12.00	$48 ÷ 5 = $9.60
Run (10 users)	$119 ÷ 10 = $11.90	$95.20 ÷ 10 = $9.52
Scale (20 users)	$199 ÷ 20 = $9.95	$159.20 ÷ 20 = $7.96

For a small HVAC outfit sizing a team, this means a 3-person crew still pays the full Start tier ($60/mo or $48/mo annual), since Kickserv sells whole tiers, not per-head seats. An 8-person crew must move to Run, again paying the full $119/mo (or $95.20/mo annual) even though only 8 of the 10 included seats are used. There is no partial-tier or per-seat rate published, so contractors sizing between tiers are effectively paying for unused headroom until they grow into it.

Worked examples at common crew sizes

1 user: Start tier is the floor. Cost is $60/mo (or $48/mo annual) whether the account has 1 seat filled or all 5 — per-user cost is nominally $60.00 but drops as more seats are added.
3 users: Still Start tier, $60/mo or $48/mo annual. Per-user cost works out to $20.00/mo monthly billed, $16.00/mo annual billed.
5 users: Start tier at full capacity, $12.00/mo per user monthly, $9.60/mo per user annual — the cheapest per-user rate available on Start.
8 users: Requires Run tier at $119/mo (or $95.20/mo annual), even though 2 of the 10 included seats sit unused. Effective per-user cost for the 8 active users is $119 ÷ 8 = $14.88/mo monthly billed, or $95.20 ÷ 8 = $11.90/mo annual billed.

Break-even between monthly and annual billing

Kickserv’s annual discount is fixed at 20%, so the break-even point is mathematical, not usage-dependent: paying annually always costs less over 12 months than paying monthly, provided the business keeps the subscription for the full year. The only reason to choose monthly is cash-flow preference or uncertainty about staying past a few months, since the annual plan is a 12-month commitment paid in one block per Kickserv’s plan structure. There is no stated penalty or refund term for early cancellation on the pricing page, so contractors weighing that risk should confirm the cancellation terms directly with Kickserv before committing to annual billing.

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Kickserv Kickback: the processing-volume rebate

Separate from the monthly/annual choice, Kickserv offers a rebate called Kickback tied to how much a business processes in online payments through the platform:

Plan	Monthly minimum processing volume	Discount
Start	$1,000	5% off monthly fee
Run	$2,000	5% off monthly fee
Scale	$3,000	5% off monthly fee

For annual subscribers, the source states the monthly minimum is multiplied by 12 to set the annual qualifying volume. So a Run customer on the annual plan would need to process $2,000 × 12 = $24,000 over the year to qualify for the 5% rebate, rather than hitting $2,000 in a single month.

Applied to the Run tier as an example: 5% off the $119 monthly rate is $119 × 0.05 = $5.95/mo, bringing the effective monthly cost to $113.05 for a business that clears $2,000/month in card payments through Kickserv. On the annual Run rate, 5% off $95.20 is $4.76/mo, bringing the effective annual-equivalent rate to $90.44/mo. Kickserv’s page does not state what payment processing rate (interchange, per-transaction fee) applies separately to this volume, so the rebate figure above is the platform-fee saving only, not a net processing cost.

The same math applied to Start and Scale: a Start customer clearing $1,000/mo saves $60 × 0.05 = $3.00/mo (monthly plan) or $48 × 0.05 = $2.40/mo (annual plan). A Scale customer clearing $3,000/mo saves $199 × 0.05 = $9.95/mo (monthly plan) or $159.20 × 0.05 = $7.96/mo (annual plan). In every case the rebate is stacked on top of whichever billing cadence discount already applies, so annual-plus-Kickback is the lowest published effective rate on each tier.

FieldPulse: no published price to compare

FieldPulse’s pricing page does not list a dollar figure anywhere. It describes itself as “seat-based,” with full-access seats and limited field seats, and states that “pricing is customized to your team size and setup.” Every plan tier on the page (Essentials, Professional, Enterprise) links to a “Request Pricing” or “Get a Custom Quote” form rather than showing a rate. The page’s own FAQ confirms this is deliberate, noting that pricing on third-party review sites should not be trusted as accurate.

Because no rate, per-seat cost, or annual discount percentage is published, FieldPulse cannot be placed in the price table above, and no monthly-versus-annual comparison can be made for it. Any number attributed to FieldPulse elsewhere (a review site, a forum post, a competitor’s comparison page) was not sourced from FieldPulse itself and should not be treated as current.

What could not be verified

FieldPulse’s per-seat monthly or annual price, for either full-access or field-only seats.
Whether FieldPulse offers any annual-versus-monthly discount at all, since no billing cadence pricing is shown.
Kickserv’s payment processing rate (the percentage or per-transaction fee charged on card payments), separate from the Kickback rebate on platform fees.
Kickserv’s early-cancellation terms for annual subscribers.
Whether Kickserv has a “Premium” tier above Scale; the Kickback section references “Premium users” but no Premium plan, price, or feature list appears elsewhere on the pricing page.

What to check before buying

Before committing to either platform, confirm directly with the vendor: the exact seat count FieldPulse would quote for your crew size and whether field-only seats cost less than full-access seats; Kickserv’s annual contract terms and whether mid-term cancellation forfeits the 20% discount already taken; and, if payment processing volume is central to your decision, ask Kickserv for its per-transaction processing rate so the Kickback rebate can be weighed against total processing cost rather than platform fee alone. For general guidance on structuring contractor payroll and 1099 costs that often factor into a field service software budget, the IRS small business tax center is a primary source worth checking before finalizing any software spend.