How Much to Charge for Snow Hauling (Per Load or Per Hour)

Quick answer

• Time one cycle: load, drive to the dump, dump, drive back. 60 ÷ the cycle in minutes is loads per truck-hour.
• Cost one load: truck cost per hour ÷ loads per truck-hour, plus the loader’s share.
• Add your margin, then the dump fee: at cost on its own line, or inside the load price with your margin on it.
• Per load or per hour: the same numbers give both. Per load, you carry a slow cycle; per hour, the client does.
• Add a loader move charge and a minimum, and check where your city lets you dump.

Is snow hauling part of plowing?

No. Stacking is piling snow in agreed spots on the property; hauling is loading it into trucks and taking it off site when there is no room left. It is a separate service with its own price, and the contract says who approves it. The commercial bidding guide warns that hauling can cost more than plowing once piles fill the lot.

De-icing is separate too: a storm that needs plowing and salting is billed for both, with the salt included in the de-icing price unless your quote lists it separately (salting guide). Hauling, when it happens, is a third line.

Should you charge per load, per truck-hour or per crew hour?

Charge per load when the client wants a firm price and you know the haul, and per truck-hour or crew hour when the dump is far, the site is tight or it is your first job there.

How do you work out loads per truck-hour?

1. Time each part of one cycle: loading the truck, the drive to the dump, the wait and the dump itself, and the drive back. Time a real haul: the dump’s line changes the answer.
2. Work out loads per truck-hour: 60 ÷ the cycle in minutes. A 40-minute cycle is 1.5 loads per truck-hour.
3. Match the trucks to the loader. The cycle ÷ the minutes to load one truck is how many trucks the loader can keep busy. With fewer, you pay for the loader waiting.
4. Count the loads: the pile’s volume ÷ what one truck carries, in cubic yards or cubic metres. Piled snow doesn’t load the way it measures, so check the count against the real loads on the first job.
5. Cost each load: truck cost per hour ÷ loads per truck-hour, plus loader cost per hour ÷ the loads all its trucks make in an hour (how to build an hourly cost).
6. Add your margin, the dump fee, the loader move and a minimum. Price = cost ÷ (1 − margin).

What does one load cost? A worked example

This is arithmetic, not a market rate: the inputs are made up, so use your own. A pile of 420 cubic yards; trucks that carry 14 cubic yards a load; 5 minutes to load a truck, 15 minutes to the dump, 5 minutes to dump and 15 minutes back; 4 trucks and one loader; $105 an hour per truck and $120 for the loader, each with its operator; a $45 dump fee a load; a 25% margin; $150 to move the loader in and out; and a $750 minimum per hauling job. The arithmetic is the same in Canadian or US dollars.

How do per-load and hourly prices compare?

At the same margin, a truck-hour is $105 ÷ 0.75 = $140 and a loader-hour is $120 ÷ 0.75 = $160, or $720 an hour for the loader and its 4 trucks together. On the 40-minute cycle, 20 truck-hours at $140 and 5 loader-hours at $160, plus the same dump fees and loader move, is $5,150: the same price as per load.

The difference is who pays when the cycle runs long. If traffic or a line at the dump stretches it to 50 minutes, the same 30 loads take 6.25 hours:

What do published snow hauling prices say?

As of November 2026, LatestCost’s US commercial snow removal page lists snow hauling at $300 to $1,500 or more per truckload, depending on haul distance and disposal fees, and a loader or skid-steer at $125 to $250 an hour. It shows no author, date, truck size or haul distance, and says hauling charges may include “loading, truck time, travel, and disposal”, the same parts as the build-up above. That range starts well above the worked example’s $180 all-in load: at the example’s costs, a load reaches $300 all-in on a cycle of 80 minutes instead of 40, so time your own cycle before you compare.

Housecall Pro’s snow removal price guide, updated October 27, 2026, lists no price for hauling at all.

The public rate sheets are cities’ rates for equipment they hire. Haverhill, Massachusetts (US) set these base hourly rates for the 2025-26 season, in US dollars:

Where can you dump hauled snow, and what does it cost?

Only where the local rules allow, and the dump fee is part of every load’s cost. Hauled snow can carry road salt, sand, litter and oil, so the rules keep it away from water. Every rule below is general information read from each government’s own pages; check your own city and province or state before you haul, and call the dump site, since permits, fees and hours change.

• Massachusetts (US): MassDEP’s Snow Disposal Guidance, effective December 11, 2020, applies to private businesses as well as governments. It recommends upland sites and says to avoid dumping snow into any waterbody, “including rivers, the ocean, reservoirs, ponds, or wetlands”, on storm drain catch basins, or within 75 feet of a private well.
• Needham, Massachusetts (US): private haulers need a Snow Dumping Permit for every truck, good for one dumping event, and pay by volume before hauling to the site (the town does not bill). Its application, revised in January 2018, splits an event’s cost ($2,400 for 8 hours) by cubic yards; small haulers during regular hours, when the town can take the snow, pay $4.00 a cubic yard, with a $15.00 minimum. That is $56 a load for the example’s 14 cubic yard truck.
• Montreal, Quebec (Canada): the city tells snow removal contractors that under the law, snow they get rid of must go to an authorized disposal site, or they can be fined, and its sites need snow disposal coupons. As of November 2026, a coupon costs $28.00 for a 6-wheel truck, $41.90 for a 10-wheel truck and up to $83.60 for a semi-trailer, in Canadian dollars with taxes included. The pages we read don’t say whether one coupon covers one load.
• Saskatoon, Saskatchewan (Canada): a 2020 city report found that about 75% of the snow at its three snow management facilities came from private companies, and that charging them their share would mean about $58 a load. The city kept its model then; the pages we read don’t say what haulers pay today.

What should a hauling quote say?

• When you haul: what triggers it, such as piles blocking parking, sightlines or drains, and who approves each haul.
• The unit and the price: per load, with the truck size it assumes, or per truck-hour and loader-hour.
• The dump fee: inside the load price, or listed separately at cost, and where the snow goes.
• The loader move and the minimum: what moving the loader costs, and the least any haul is billed.
• How loads are counted: a tally for each truck, with the dump’s receipts where it gives them.

How do you price hauling in Icey Software?

We make Icey Software. On a quote, set a line’s Frequency to Per Load or Hourly, or save it once as a service in Settings › How you work › Services, charged Per load or Hourly; an Hourly line is priced per person or per machine. The client’s quote prints the price with its unit, such as “$150 per load”.

The quote form notes that hauling isn’t a visit type Icey records, and a Per Load line is never billed at a snow or de-icing visit’s price. So is an Hourly line named “Hauling”. Named “Snow hauling” on a Per event quote with no snow price of its own, an Hourly line becomes the hourly price of every snow visit instead, and the form says so under it. For the lines Icey counts, Ready to Bill’s “Lines you count each month” card asks “How many?” (“How many hours?” for an Hourly line) for every month of a signed contract. Type the loads or hours, and they go on that client’s draft invoice when you create it; leave 0 to bill nothing. Nothing goes to the client until you send it. Free forever up to 10 sites and 5 crew. Every feature.

Sources

• LatestCost: commercial snow removal prices, no author or date shown, checked November 8, 2026: “Snow hauling” at $300 to $1,500 or more per load, billed “Per truckload”, with “Haul distance and disposal fees” as what changes it; “When piles must be removed, charges may include loading, truck time, travel, and disposal.”; a loader or skid-steer at $125 to $250 an hour; its assumptions name a U.S. commercial property.
• Housecall Pro: snow removal prices, updated October 27, 2026, checked November 8, 2026: no price for hauling, stacking or moving snow off site.
• City of Haverhill, Massachusetts: rates for plowing, clearing and hauling snow, a council order for the 2025-26 season, checked November 8, 2026: base hourly rates in US dollars for hired equipment, snow hauling by 10-wheeler, tri-axle or dump trailer $120, loaders $137 under 4 cubic yards and $149 at 4 and up, plow vehicles $91 to $131 by weight, with the owner furnishing the plow; hired plow contractors guaranteed 4 hours a call-out.
• MassDEP: snow disposal guidance, checked November 8, 2026 in the copy archived on May 12, 2026, because mass.gov returned “forbidden” to us that day: effective December 11, 2020; applies to federal, state, regional and local agencies and to private businesses; recommends upland disposal sites.
• MassDEP: 2020 Snow Disposal Guidance document, checked November 8, 2026 in the copy archived on September 1, 2025: avoid dumping snow into any waterbody, on storm drain catch basins, or within 75 feet of a private well; a 50-foot vegetated buffer to waterbodies wherever possible.
• Town of Needham, Massachusetts: snow dumping information, checked November 8, 2026: a Snow Dumping Permit for every private hauler’s truck, one event each, paid by volume before hauling; the town does not bill.
• Town of Needham: snow dumping permit application, revised January 22, 2018, checked November 8, 2026: $2,400 for an 8-hour event or $1,200 for 4 hours, shared by cubic yards; at least 4 trucks for an off-hours opening; $4.00 a cubic yard with a $15.00 minimum during regular hours.
• City of Montreal: snow disposal sites, last updated November 4, 2025, checked November 8, 2026: snow a contractor gets rid of must go to an authorized disposal site; coupons are needed to use the city’s three sites.
• City of Montreal: buy coupons to access a snow disposal site, last updated February 4, 2026, checked November 8, 2026: fees by vehicle in Canadian dollars, taxes included, from $28.00 for a 6-wheel truck to $83.60 for a semi-trailer truck; coupons don’t expire.
• City of Saskatoon: snow management facility user-pay model, an information report dated August 10, 2020, checked November 8, 2026: about 75% of the snow from private companies; about $58 a load to recover their share; the city kept its model.