Qualify
Read the city's water quality report before the truck stops. Know what range to expect and which disinfectant the city uses, so the test means something when it runs.
For managers and owners
The 20 Percent Problem: Getting Every Technician to Test on Every Call
Train five technicians and one of them will run the water test on every call without being asked. The other four will do it when they remember, which is one call in five. That is not a training failure. It is the 80/20 rule, and it has been true of every sales process ever handed to a field crew. The manager's job is not to find more of the one. It is to build the path the four will follow.
A technician who brings water up on one call in five has cut the $300,000 claim by eighty percent before close rate ever enters the picture.
Short answer
Where the 20 Percent Number Comes From
Jeff Hubbard of HALO Water Systems, who sold water treatment as an independent dealer before he was at HALO, put it this way on a call with Roger Wakefield in October 2026: "I'll bet 20 percent, we'd be lucky, 20 percent of our contractors actually follow that path. That 20/80 rule is unbreakable. For decades it's not changed. It never will change. 20 percent of them will do it, 80 percent will follow and hope." The path he means is three steps: qualify the house, identify the problem and show it to the homeowner, then offer a solution. The technicians who skip a step are not the exception. They are the 80 percent.
Identify and show
Sixty seconds at the kitchen sink with the homeowner watching: hardness, total chlorine, total dissolved solids (TDS). Say the city's number and the tap's number out loud.
Offer
Put a price on fixing what the test found, without sounding like a salesman, and say so when the water is fine. That is day three of the class.
What it costs
What One Call in Five Does to the Number
The arithmetic on the $300,000 a year page is built on one truck, three calls a day, 260 working days and a deliberately low 5 percent close rate. That assumes the test runs on every call. Here is the same truck when it does not.
| Technician | Calls where water comes up | Systems a year at 5 percent | Revenue at $7,000 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tests every call | 780 of 780 | 39 | $273,000 |
| Tests when he remembers | 156 of 780 (one in five) | 8 | $56,000 |
| Never brings it up | 0 of 780 | 0 | $0 |
Same technician, same close rate, same price. The only thing that moved is whether the test ran. 5 percent of 156 is 7.8 systems, shown as 8. Consistency of the offer matters more than skill at the offer, and it is the one variable a manager controls from the office.
The fix
You Cannot Hire Your Way Out of 80/20. You Build the Path.
The 20 percent will test on every call because that is who they are. Jeff's point is that the 80 percent are not bad technicians. They need the path handed to them, every call, in a form that does not depend on remembering. Four things do that.
Make the test part of the call, not an add-on
The sixty-second test runs on every service call, the way a technician checks the water heater's relief valve. It is on the ticket. A test that is "when you get a chance" is a test that runs one call in five.
Write the three numbers on the customer's copy
Hardness in grains, total chlorine, TDS, next to the city's own range. If it is written down it happened. If it is not, it did not. The invoice is the log.
Count tests, not sales
Sales depend on the house. Tests depend on the technician. A weekly count of calls run against tests written is the only number that tells you which of your people are on the path and which are hoping. Coach the gap, not the close rate.
Send more than one
One trained technician on one route changes one route. Two or three back from the same room hold each other to it, and the test becomes how the shop works instead of one person's habit. That is why team pricing starts at three seats.
Why they skip it
The 80 Percent Are Not Lazy. Nobody Taught Them.
They do not understand the water well enough to bring it up
A technician who cannot read the city report or say what 9 grains means in a sentence will not start that conversation, because he does not want to be asked a question he cannot answer. Day one fixes that. It is the whole reason the class starts with water science instead of product.
They are afraid of sounding like a salesman
Your best technicians got good because homeowners trust them. They will not risk that to pitch a filter. The test is the answer: it is a reading, not a pitch, and the city's own report sits next to it. Day three teaches the conversation that follows without the pitch.
Right now most technicians walk past the water heater scale, and not because they are lazy. Nobody ever taught them to name the problem, prove it in front of the homeowner, or put a price on fixing it. Source: the owners page.
Watch it
Roger on Why Most Plumbers Never Bring It Up
Questions
Questions Managers Ask About Getting Techs to Test
Why do technicians not bring up water treatment on service calls?
Two reasons, and neither is laziness. They do not understand the water well enough to start the conversation, and they do not want to sound like a salesman to a homeowner who trusts them. Training fixes the first. A test that is a reading, not a pitch, fixes the second.
What is the 80/20 rule in water treatment sales?
Jeff Hubbard of HALO Water Systems puts it at about 20 percent of contractors following the path of qualifying the house, identifying and showing the problem, and offering a solution, with the other 80 percent following and hoping. In his words, that rule has not changed in decades and never will. The fix is a path the 80 percent can follow without remembering.
How much revenue does a plumbing company lose when techs test only sometimes?
On the tour's one-truck arithmetic, a technician who tests on every call lands 39 systems a year at a 5 percent close rate, about $273,000 at $7,000 installed. The same technician testing on one call in five lands about 8 systems, about $56,000. The close rate did not change. The test did.
How do you get plumbers to run a water test on every call?
Put the test on the ticket so it is part of the call, write the three numbers on the customer's copy so the invoice is the log, count tests against calls every week instead of counting sales, and send more than one technician to training so the test becomes how the shop works rather than one person's habit.
Does the HALO Water Tour offer team pricing?
Yes. Team pricing starts at three seats and is set on the call. Three or four seats is the number that changes how a six to twelve truck shop talks about water, rather than changing one route.
Sources
Where These Facts Come From
Checked in October 2026.
- Jeff Hubbard, HALO Water Systems, on a call with Roger Wakefield, 2 October 2026 (the 20/80 statement and the three steps, quoted)
- Can one water treatment sale a week really add $300,000 a year? (780 calls, 5 percent, 39 systems, $273,000, and condition two: somebody brings it up every time)
- Water treatment training for plumbing company owners (why technicians walk past it, who to send, team pricing from three seats)
- The sixty-second water test (the three readings and the report-first order)
Written by Roger Wakefield, Texas Master Plumber
45 years in the trade and LEED AP. Published . More about Roger or visit rogerwakefield.com.
Keep going
Related Guides
Who to send, by fleet size
One seat, two seats or a private class, and what the seat really costs.
The $300,000 a year page
The four conditions, and the one that kills the number.
The sixty-second water test
Report first, then hardness, total chlorine and TDS at the tap.
Plumbers vs water treatment dealers
The four things a dealer has to buy that you already have.
Give the 80 percent a path
Three consecutive days, in person, twenty seats a city: Dallas November 3-5, 2026, with more cities announced as it fills. Team pricing starts at three seats.