Does ServiceM8 charge per user?

No. ServiceM8 states plainly on its pricing page that it does not charge per user. The Free plan caps a business at 1 user, but every paid plan (Starter through Premium Plus) allows unlimited user logins at the same flat monthly price. In practical terms, a 3-person crew and an 8-person crew on the same plan tier pay the exact same monthly fee — $29/mo on Starter, $79/mo on Growing, and so on — so adding staff never triggers a per-seat charge, only rising job volume does. Annualized, that flat-fee structure means a Starter subscription costs $348/year regardless of whether 1 or 10 users are logged in, which is the key number to compare against any seat-based competitor quote.

What happens if an electrical contractor exceeds their monthly job limit on ServiceM8?

If the plan resets before the cap is hit again, job credits reset automatically. Otherwise ServiceM8 prompts an upgrade. Only the Premium Plus plan has a published per-job overage fee, listed as 20 cents per additional job. Worked example: a Premium Plus account running 1,650 jobs in a month is 150 jobs over the '1500+' baseline, so the overage line item is 150 × $0.20 = $30, bringing that month's total bill to $349 + $30 = $379. Plans below Premium Plus have no published overage rate, meaning the only route past their caps is an upgrade to the next tier — for example, a Starter account (50 jobs/month cap) that regularly exceeds volume has no per-job add-on option and must move to Growing at $79/mo instead.

Can I see FieldPulse's price without talking to sales?

Not from the published pricing page as scraped on 2026-08-13. FieldPulse describes itself as seat-based, with full-access and field-only seat types, but the page routes every visitor to a custom quote form rather than listing dollar figures. Because no base rate, per-seat rate, or Professional/Enterprise price is published, there is no way to compute an annualized cost or a cost-per-job figure for FieldPulse the way this article does for ServiceM8. Any comparison against ServiceM8's flat tiers requires first obtaining a written quote broken down by full-access seats versus field-only seats, since those two seat types are described as priced differently.

Does ServiceM8 charge extra for text messages?

On the Free plan, yes: 10 cents per SMS. On every paid plan (Starter, Growing, Premium, Premium Plus), SMS is listed as free, with a standard overage fee applying only if a business exceeds its plan's monthly SMS cap. Worked example: a solo electrician on Free sending 200 appointment-reminder texts a month pays 200 × $0.10 = $20/mo in SMS charges alone, on top of the $0 base fee — a $20/mo total. Compare that to Starter at a flat $29/mo with SMS included: the crossover point is roughly 290 texts/month (290 × $0.10 ≈ $29), meaning any electrician texting clients more than about 290 times a month is already paying more on Free than they would on Starter.

ServiceM8 vs FieldPulse: Invoicing Plan Unlock for Electricians

ServiceM8 publishes five fixed monthly plans, from Free at $0 to Premium Plus at $349, with unlimited users on every paid tier. FieldPulse does not publish prices at all: its site describes seat-based pricing and routes every visitor to a custom quote form. For an electrical contractor comparing the two, only ServiceM8’s numbers can be verified today.

ServiceM8’s published plans

ServiceM8’s pricing page lists five tiers, each defined by a monthly job cap rather than a user cap:

Two technicians with helmets working on electrical equipment outdoors, ensuring safety.

Plan	Monthly price	Users	Jobs/month	SMS	Additional job fee
Free	$0	1	30	10c per SMS	Not offered
Starter	$29	Unlimited	50	Free	Not offered
Growing	$79	Unlimited	150	Free	Not offered
Premium	$149	Unlimited	500	Free	Not offered
Premium Plus	$349	Unlimited	1500+	Free	20c per job

Every plan, including Free, includes the core invoicing tools: job cards, scheduling, quotes, invoices, email and SMS, mobile payments and accounting integrations, per ServiceM8’s plan comparison table. The Free plan restricts a business to 1 user, which is the practical wall most electrical contractors hit first, not the job count.

Two add-ons sit outside the base plans:

Auto Time Tracking — from $19/mo, available on any plan.
Bundles (pricing/quoting/invoicing workflow tool) — $19/mo, available on Growing and up only.

A business running both add-ons on top of, say, Growing ($79/mo) would see a combined monthly bill of $79 + $19 + $19 = $117/mo, still with unlimited users included at no extra per-seat charge.

Annual cost and cost-per-job by tier

Multiplying each monthly price by 12 gives the annual commitment at each tier, and dividing the monthly price by the job cap gives a rough cost-per-job figure — useful when comparing tiers against actual crew output rather than sticker price alone:

Plan	Annual cost (price × 12)	Jobs/month cap	Approx. cost per job at full cap
Free	$0	30	$0.00
Starter	$348	50	~$0.58
Growing	$948	150	~$0.53
Premium	$1,788	500	~$0.30
Premium Plus	$4,188	1,500	~$0.23

Two patterns fall out of this table. First, cost-per-job drops as tiers rise, so a business that consistently runs close to its cap gets more value per dollar on a higher tier than a lower one running under-capacity. Second, the annual jump between tiers is steep — Starter to Growing adds $600/year, Growing to Premium adds $840/year, and Premium to Premium Plus adds $2,400/year — so it is worth confirming actual job volume over a full quarter before committing to an upgrade, rather than reacting to a single busy month.

What it actually costs to unlock invoicing at different team sizes

Because ServiceM8 does not charge per user on paid plans, the flat monthly price is what a solo operator and an 8-person crew both pay, provided job volume stays under the plan’s cap.

Two electricians in safety gear working on a utility pole with a clear blue sky backdrop.

1 electrician, solo operator, under 30 jobs/month: Free plan works: $0/mo. Above 30 jobs/month, or the moment a second user is added, Free no longer fits.

3 electricians, sharing invoicing/scheduling: Free plan is not an option — it caps at 1 user regardless of job volume. Minimum is Starter at $29/mo, which allows unlimited users but caps at 50 jobs/month. At roughly 8 jobs per tech per month (24 jobs total for 3 techs), Starter’s 50-job cap holds. Cost: $29/mo flat, same as it would be for 1 user. Annualized, that is $348/year for the whole 3-person crew — a figure worth writing down before requesting a FieldPulse quote for the same headcount, since it becomes the number any seat-based quote needs to beat.

5 electricians, moderate job volume: If 5 techs average 12 jobs each per month, that is 60 jobs/month, which exceeds Starter’s 50-job cap. The next tier up, Growing at $79/mo, covers up to 150 jobs/month. Cost: $79/mo flat for all 5 users, still no per-seat charge. That works out to roughly $15.80/user/month if the cost were spread evenly across 5 techs, though ServiceM8 does not actually bill per user — the per-user figure is purely illustrative for comparing against a seat-priced competitor.

8 electricians, high job volume: At 10 jobs per tech per month, 8 techs generate 80 jobs/month, which fits inside Growing’s 150-job cap at $79/mo. Push volume higher, say 20 jobs per tech (160 jobs/month), and the business needs Premium at $149/mo (500-job cap). In every case, the number of users does not change the bill; only job volume does. Spread across 8 users, Premium’s $149/mo works out to roughly $18.63/user/month if divided evenly — again, an illustrative figure only, since ServiceM8’s actual billing unit is the plan, not the seat.

The arithmetic that matters for ServiceM8 buyers is jobs-per-month against the tier cap, not headcount against a per-seat rate. A crew of 8 doing low job volume can sit on a $29 or $79 plan; a crew of 3 doing very high job volume could be forced onto Premium or Premium Plus.

Premium Plus overage example: a business on Premium Plus ($349/mo, 1500+ jobs included) that runs 1,650 jobs in a month pays for 150 jobs over the “1500+” figure. At 20 cents per additional job, that is $30 in overage, for a total of $379 that month, per the published overage rate. Run that same 150-job overage every month for a year, and the added cost is 150 × $0.20 × 12 = $360/year on top of the $4,188 base — a number worth flagging if job volume is consistently near or over the Premium Plus baseline, since at that point negotiating a custom quote may be worthwhile.

SMS cost on the Free plan: a solo electrician on Free sending 200 texts a month for appointment reminders pays 200 × $0.10 = $20/mo in SMS fees on top of the $0 base — effectively making Free cost more than Starter ($29/mo, unlimited free SMS) once messaging volume climbs past roughly 290 texts. Extended over a year, 200 texts/month on Free totals $240/year in SMS charges alone, compared to $0 in SMS charges on any paid plan — a gap that closes the moment a business upgrades to Starter, since the $348/year Starter cost already includes unlimited texting.

FieldPulse: seat-based, but no published rate

FieldPulse’s pricing page states the platform is “seat-based,” distinguishing “full access seats” from “limited field seats,” and describes packages named Professional and Enterprise. No dollar amount appears anywhere on the scraped page. The FAQ section confirms pricing is “customized to your team size and setup” and directs prospects to request a quote rather than publishing a rate card.

This means there is no way to calculate a FieldPulse cost at 1, 3, 5 or 8 users, or to compare a break-even point against ServiceM8’s flat tiers, without contacting FieldPulse sales directly. Any number attributed to FieldPulse elsewhere is not sourced from FieldPulse’s own pricing page as scraped on 2026-08-13.

What could not be verified

FieldPulse’s per-seat dollar rate. The pricing page describes the seat model (full-access vs field-only) but publishes no price for either seat type, for Professional, or for Enterprise.
FieldPulse trial length or terms. The FAQ heading “Does FieldPulse offer a free trial?” appears on the page, but no answer text was present in the scraped source.
FieldPulse invoicing-specific limits, such as invoice volume caps or payment processing fees, are not listed on the pricing page.

Detailed image of a hand using pliers to cut a blue wire on a gray background.

Nothing about ServiceM8’s plan structure was left unverified in the source text; every figure in the table above appears on ServiceM8’s own pricing page.

What to check before you buy

Confirm your actual monthly job volume, not headcount, before picking a ServiceM8 tier — the job cap, not the user count, is what drives an upgrade.
Ask FieldPulse directly for a written seat-by-seat quote, including how many full-access vs field-only seats your invoicing workflow needs, since none of that is public. When requesting the quote, ask specifically for the monthly rate per seat type, whether the quote is month-to-month or requires an annual commitment, and whether there is a job or invoice volume cap similar to ServiceM8’s tiers — none of that structure is disclosed on FieldPulse’s public pricing page.
Check current SMS volume if considering ServiceM8 Free — messaging fees can erase the “free” advantage quickly, as shown in the $240/year example above.
Re-verify both pages before signing, since neither vendor publishes a rate lock guarantee in the scraped text, and ServiceM8 notes plan credit is applied “pro-rata” on upgrade, implying prices can change between visits. In practice, “pro-rata” means that if a business upgrades mid-billing-cycle, ServiceM8 credits the unused portion of the current plan toward the new plan’s cost rather than charging the full new rate on top of what was already paid — worth confirming directly with ServiceM8 support at the time of upgrade, since the exact mechanics of that credit are not spelled out in dollar terms on the pricing page itself.