Admin support for tradies in Australia, honestly compared

We run one of the services on this list. DotVA places offshore VAs, which makes us one option of four, and for a sole trader who just misses calls on the tools we are more than you need. That is the most useful thing we can tell you, so it comes first.

The method is the same as our comparison of Australian VA agencies. Every claim about another provider comes from its own website, checked on 11 November 2026 and linked in the table. Where a figure is not published we write “not stated publicly” rather than guess, and where a site does not say where its people are, we do not assume. Several names that appear in directories and AI answers are left out because they have no working website we could check.

The services at a glance

Service	What it is	Published price	Where the team is	Job software named	Terms
DotVA virtual assistant for trades (that’s us)	Managed offshore VA: one dedicated person who works to your direction	$12-17/hr admin, $18-25/hr specialist, AUD ex GST, from 10 hrs/week	Philippines, working Australian business hours	ServiceM8, simPRO, AroFlo, Tradify, Fergus, NextMinute, Buildxact	No lock-in contract; stop any time in the first 14 days, then 30 days’ notice; free replacement any time
Office Shed	Onshore tradie admin, reception and bookkeeping	$435 a week + GST for up to 5 hours; $620 for 7.5; $760 for 10; $1,050 for 15; onboarding $375 + GST a week for 1-2 weeks	Client-facing staff in Australia; four Philippines-based staff do back-end tasks only	ServiceM8, Tradify, AroFlo, simPRO, Fergus, Ascora, ServiceTitan, Buildxact, Xero	Change package any time; opt out with 2-6 weeks’ notice
Carbon Group	Onshore tradie admin and bookkeeping	From $150 a week plus GST; its flyer, dated February 2025, lists $150 a week for 2.5 hours, $275 for 5, $500 for 10 and from $900 for 20+ (GST basis not stated on the flyer)	Perth, serving Australia-wide	Xero, MYOB, simPRO, Tradify, ServiceM8	No long-term contract; notice not stated publicly
Tradie Admin Solutions	Admin support billed hourly	$68.70/hr incl GST for a team member; $99/hr incl GST for the director. The page said VA support was full when checked	Office on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland; staff location not stated publicly	ServiceM8	Not stated publicly
Virtual Trade Assistant	Dedicated VA with phone line, shared or solo	AUD$520 + GST a week for an assistant shared between two clients, up to 22 hours; AUD$695 + GST a week for your own assistant, up to 45 hours; AUD$1,090 + GST a week with AI features	Not stated publicly	Not stated publicly	”No long-term contracts”
Breaking BAS	Tradie bookkeeping with a virtual admin service	Virtual admin from $1,200 + GST a month for 20 hours a week; from $1,900 + GST a month for 40	Not stated publicly	Not stated publicly	Not stated publicly
Virtual Coworker	Offshore VA, generalist	From AUD $8/hr for a VA, $11/hr for a bookkeeper; 20 hours a week minimum (GST basis not stated)	Philippines; Sydney office	Not stated publicly	One-month minimum; 7 days’ notice in the first six months, then 14
OfficeHQ	Phone answering, per call	$25 a month plus $2.65 a call for messages; $35 a month plus $3.40 a call on its MyReceptionist plan, ex GST	Majority in Australia, with overseas overflow	ServiceM8 is shown among the booking tools on its MyDiary plan, which is priced separately	No minimum term; three days’ notice; 7-day free trial
Your Phones Covered	Phone answering, untimed calls	Per week ex GST: Essential with 55 calls a month $49; Value with 70 calls a month $29	Essential in Australia during standard hours; Value plan and after-hours calls in the Philippines	Not stated publicly	Pricing page: “no lock-in contracts”. Terms: minimum engagement two months; notice to the end of the plan period or 28 days, whichever is longer
Johnni AI	AI receptionist for trades	$49 a month billed monthly with 60 minutes, then $0.50 a minute, ex GST; larger plans to $899 a month	AI, 24/7; Brisbane company	ServiceM8 and simPRO as quoted add-ons	Month to month; 7-day free trial
Hey Jodie	AI receptionist for trades and small business	A$99, A$199 or A$399 a month excluding tax; no setup fee	AI, 24/7; the company is registered in England and Wales	Zoho CRM and Zapier	Month to month; 7-day free trial
Sophiie AI	AI receptionist and office manager for trades	Not stated publicly; demo only	AI; Gold Coast company	ServiceM8, simPRO, Ascora, Xero, QuickBooks	30 days’ written notice; the term is set in an order form and renews automatically

Checked on each provider’s own pages on 11 November 2026. “Not stated publicly” means we could not find the figure on the provider’s public pages; it is an observation, not a criticism.

Four more services work with trade businesses and quote on enquiry: Exceptional Tradie Solutions (Australian-based reception and admin; ServiceM8, simPRO, Fergus, NextMinute and Wunderbuild), Just Ask Tash (a Gladstone-based operator; ServiceM8, NextMinute and Fergus setup and ongoing admin), TradieVA (VAs for trades; a client case study on its site refers to “offshore support”) and MyTasker360 (back-office VAs for trade and service businesses).

Our row in full is on pricing. If a 30-minute call beats ten tabs, book a discovery call, and if another row fits your business better we will tell you on the call.

Four products for one problem

1. A tradie admin service (Office Shed, Carbon Group, Tradie Admin Solutions, Exceptional Tradie Solutions, Just Ask Tash). Australian businesses that already know trade software, sold in small weekly packages or by the hour. On the published prices it works out at roughly $50-87 an hour before GST on packages of 5 to 15 hours. Good when you want a few hours a week from an Australian business; check who answers your customers’ calls.
2. A dedicated VA (DotVA and Virtual Coworker, both placing VAs in the Philippines; Virtual Trade Assistant, Breaking BAS, TradieVA and MyTasker360 also sell VA packages, and where their sites do not say where the VA works, ask). One person working your hours inside your job software: booking jobs, sending quotes, invoicing the day a job closes, chasing debtors. The offshore hourly rate is a fraction of a local one, and the minimums are higher: 10 hours a week with us and 20 with Virtual Coworker. Breaking BAS’s smallest published virtual admin package is 20 hours a week.
3. A phone answering service (OfficeHQ, Your Phones Covered). A shared team takes a message or transfers the call for a few dollars each. Our comparison of virtual receptionist services covers these in detail.
4. An AI receptionist (Johnni AI, Hey Jodie, Sophiie AI). Software that answers every call around the clock, captures the job and books it. Often the cheapest call cover once you take more than a handful of calls a month. Sophiie AI also advertises quoting, invoicing and payment reminders, and Johnni AI sells an outbound caller for quote follow-ups. None of them attends a site visit, so check what each plan does beyond the call.

If calls are the whole problem, our contractor virtual receptionist page covers phone answering for trades on its own.

What 10 hours a week costs

These figures use each provider’s published price. Where we have multiplied or divided, that is our arithmetic, not the provider’s quote.

Option	Published price	10 hours a week
DotVA admin VA	$12-17/hr ex GST	$120-170 a week
Carbon Group	10-hour package on its February 2025 flyer	$500 a week (GST basis not stated on the flyer)
Tradie Admin Solutions	$68.70/hr incl GST	$687 a week incl GST, about $625 before GST (VA support was full when checked)
Office Shed	Up to 10 hours	$760 a week + GST

For 20 hours a week, Virtual Coworker starts at $160 a week, Breaking BAS’s $1,200 plus GST a month works out at about $277 a week plus GST, we are $240-340 a week, and Virtual Trade Assistant’s shared package is $520 plus GST a week for up to 22 hours with a phone line included.

Under five hours a week the picture changes: we do not place under 10 hours, so if you only need two or three hours, Carbon Group’s 2.5-hour package ($150 a week plus GST) buys a local team for about the cost of our 10-hour minimum, and an answering service costs far less.

How to compare them

1. Calls or office work? Count last fortnight’s missed calls, then count the quotes not sent and invoices not chased. Calls alone points to an answering service or AI. The second list points to a person.
2. How many hours? Under five a week, an onshore package fits. At 10 or more, the hourly rate becomes the biggest number.
3. Which job software? Ask for experience in your system by name. Office Shed, Exceptional Tradie Solutions and Just Ask Tash publish ServiceM8 partner status.
4. Who talks to your customers? If a local voice on the phone matters to you, check which staff are customer-facing. Office Shed, for example, says its client-facing staff are in Australia and its overseas staff do back-end work only.
5. What are the exit terms? Published notice runs from three days (OfficeHQ) to six weeks (Office Shed). Get them in writing before you start.

Who should pick whom

• A sole trader who just needs calls caught: an AI receptionist (Johnni AI from $49 a month, Hey Jodie from A$99) or OfficeHQ at $25 a month plus $2.65 a call.
• A few hours a week from an Australian-based team: Carbon Group from $150 a week plus GST (its flyer adds bookkeeping tasks from the $500 10-hour package), or Office Shed if you want reception, admin and bookkeeping under one roof.
• ServiceM8 set up or cleaned up before you delegate anything: Just Ask Tash, Exceptional Tradie Solutions or Office Shed, all ServiceM8 partners.
• A 20 to 40 hour a week offshore VA at the lowest published hourly rate: Virtual Coworker from AUD $8 an hour.
• An assistant with a phone line bundled in: Virtual Trade Assistant’s weekly packages.
• 10 to 30 hours a week from one dedicated person who quotes, schedules, invoices and chases, managed for you at a published hourly rate: that is the trade business we built DotVA for. See what the work looks like for plumbers, electricians and air conditioning businesses, or by software: ServiceM8, simPRO, AroFlo and Tradify.

Run your own numbers

Price your hours on the VA cost calculator and check our tiers on pricing. If calls are the main problem, the trades virtual receptionist page shows how a dedicated receptionist runs alongside an AI one, and our AI receptionist comparison covers the AI products built for trades. If the right answer for your business is one of the other names in the table, we would rather you find that out now than in month two.