How much revenue do contractors leave on the table by not following up on unsold estimates?

There is no reliable public dollar figure. The leftover is last month’s still-open estimates with no live call, counted in dollars. Score it from your own FSM. Open quoted dollars are unfinished work on a list you already paid to generate.

This is the score for a 2-to-10 truck HVAC, plumbing or electrical shop whose change-outs, water heaters, panel upgrades, and repipes go quiet after the estimate goes out.

What leftover revenue actually is

Leftover from skipped follow-up is the dollar total of estimates you already presented that still sit open with no live call logged.

Pile	What it is	Count it as leftover?
Still open, zero calls logged	Nobody asked after the visit	Yes. This is the leftover
Still open, next date on file	Spouse, financing, second bid	No. Parked with a date
Declined, hired someone else, or asked you to stop	A named no	No. Log the reason
Sold or approved	They bought	No. Book the install
Repair instead of replace	A different job	Score it in the repair pile

On r/HVAC, shops still say most homeowners who go another way ghost you. Silence stays unfinished until you have asked. On r/hvacadvice in September 2026, shops also said they skip the list because they are booked. A full calendar is a capacity choice. The open dollars stay on the file until someone dismisses them with a reason.

How to measure estimate close rate is sold versus presented. This page is the still-open pile sitting next to that rate.

The numbers people quote

Sales blogs print a leftover. None of them publish a dataset a 2-to-10 truck shop can reuse.

Claim	Who says it	What a check finds
$50,000 to $200,000 a year left on the table	Vendor calculators at PipelineOn, Rivetops, CallJolt, and OperantOS, read 2026-11-01	A guessed close-rate gap times a guessed ticket. No public file
22% close without follow-up, 38% with a cadence	One operator on YouTube	Unverified. The same talk claims 46% within 60 minutes and 11% after 72 hours
1,860 open estimates totaling $25 million	Stephen Dale, via ServiceTitan’s blog dated 23 February 2024	One large client. He tells shops to log in and look
$2.23 million of missed options in 30 days	Chris Hoffmann on X, 27 September 2023	One business unit that had just completed $8.78 million. He guessed an inside sales team could keep 25% of that
80% of sales on the fifth to twelfth contact	ServiceTitan quoting Salesforce, same blog	A recycled sales-blog claim. Is it true that 80% of sales need five follow-ups? is the source check
60% average response on HVAC estimate follow-up texts	Hatch, 23 September 2024, 163,212 campaigns	Response rate. A reply is not a booked change-out

Last month’s untouched dollars are the leftover. A slide that multiplies a guessed close-rate gap by a guessed ticket is a pitch.

Hatch also quotes John Wilson of Wilson Plumbing and Heating saying inside sales “contributes nearly $400,000 a month.” That is one large shop with an inside sales desk.

A worked March (labelled example)

Say you sent 40 replacement estimates in March, totaling $400,000. These figures are made up so the math is visible. They are not a benchmark.

Ending	Count	Dollars
Sold the change-out, panel upgrade, or repipe	12	$180,000
Took the repair instead	4	$8,000
Declined or hired someone else	6	$72,000
Still open, next date on file	10	$90,000
Still open, zero follow-up logged	8	$50,000

The leftover from skipped calls is $50,000. That is the eight rows nobody rang. Add the parked ten and open quoted dollars are $140,000. Those ten have a date.

A coach who says “close 10 percent of open” would call $14,000 recovered. That 10 percent is a prompt Dale used on a giant list. Score booked after a call from this file next month.

How to follow up on HVAC estimates that haven’t closed is five live attempts on those eight rows: the same business hour, then days 2, 4, 7 and 14.

What each FSM actually reports

Use only what that product’s own help publishes. Pull last month, then mark which open rows have a live call.

App	Where the open dollars sit	What to add
ServiceTitan	Follow Up, Unsold Estimates, filter Open. The Opportunity and Estimate Follow Up report has Estimates Subtotal, Opportunity Status, and Number of Follow Ups	Sum subtotals where status is Not Attempted, or Follow Ups is 0
Jobber	Quotes report, status Awaiting response, Total ($)	Export last month, sum awaiting response with no call in the notes
Housecall Pro	Estimate conversion reporting, Open value	Open value is undecided dollars. For multi-option estimates it uses the maximum option
Workiz	Estimate reports, By status, Amount on Pending	The new reports are still a beta. Pending dollars are the pipeline

ServiceTitan. Follow Up (updated 2026-10-15) is Unsold Estimates: Open, Not Attempted, Unreachable, Contacted, Won, or Dismissed. Export is on the screen if you have permission. The Opportunity and Estimate Follow Up report (updated 2026-10-16) lists Estimates Subtotal, Number of Follow Ups, Last Follow Up Date, and Opportunity Status. Filter Open, sort by subtotal. Not Attempted with zero follow-ups is the leftover. How to track unsold estimates in ServiceTitan is that list.

Dale’s method is the same look. Log in, count open estimates, add the dollars. A 2-to-10 truck shop is counting dozens.

Jobber. The quotes report (updated 2026-10-29) has Quote conversion rate, Sent and converted quotes by value, and a status overview. Export to CSV. Awaiting response is the open pile. Sum Total ($) on those rows, then mark which have a live call in the notes. Conversion rate on the screen compares sent dates to conversion dates in the same month and can go over 100 percent.

Housecall Pro. Conversion rate reporting (dated 2026-07-09) publishes Open value, Lost value, and Won value. Open value is undecided estimates. For multiple options it uses the maximum. Conversion rate is won over won, lost, and open, so scoring last week treats this week’s open change-outs as a drag. Filter by job type so a $400 repair sits apart from a $12,000 change-out.

Workiz. New estimate reports (published 2026-07-10, read 2026-11-01) include By status with count and Amount. Workiz says that view is for seeing how much potential revenue is open versus won versus declined. The feature is still a beta. How to follow up on estimates in Workiz is the Pending list.

What those open dollars actually are

Quoted dollars on an open row are a presentation that has not ended.

• They hired someone else. Log it. Stop calling.
• They took the repair. Book it. Leave the change-out on file and score it in the replacement pile only if you still want that job.
• They named a date. Call then. That parked row is owned work.
• The shop is booked. On r/hvacadvice, owners still say there is too much work to chase quiet quotes. Capacity is a choice. The dollars stay on the report until you dismiss them with a reason.
• A reminder email already went. Jobber’s quote follow-ups (updated 2026-10-28) on Connect and up email or text the client up to twice. Housecall Pro Pipeline (dated 2026-08-06) can resend First through Third Follow-Up, then decline it. Those sends never miss. They do not pick up the phone.

How to track why customers turn down estimates is the reason column on the lost pile. Price, hired someone else, repair instead, financing, and no-answer are different stories. The leftover tells you the size of the untouched pile. The reason tells you which hole.

The FCC (updated 2026-02-27) prohibits telemarketing calls to the home before 8 a.m. and after 9 p.m. local time, and says telemarketers must comply immediately with a do-not-call request. This is not legal advice. Check with your own counsel.

How to tell this week

The leftover is honest when March has a sent dollar total, a sold dollar total, a still-open dollar total, and a count of open estimates with no call. If the FSM conversion rate moved and the untouched pile grew, the report changed status.

Export last month’s estimates from ServiceTitan, Jobber, Housecall Pro or Workiz. Sum sold, declined, parked with a date, and still open with no call. The last pile, in dollars, is the leftover. Start with the blanks.