Window Cleaning Invoice Example: Every Pane Explained

Short answer: A window cleaning invoice example for post-construction work counts panes from the window schedule, not openings from the driveway. This job turned 31 openings into 52 exterior and 52 interior panes — 104 pane-sides — priced in three access classes, with label, mortar, and paint removal billed per pane on top of the cleaning rate. The builder pays on a draw, so the invoice carries the job number and the superintendent’s sign-off date.

One finished job, every line, and why it is there. A new-build final clean is the version of this invoice most likely to be argued, because the person paying counts windows on a plan sheet and you count sides of glass on a wall. The general field list is in what to include on an invoice; the rest of this is the glass.

What does a filled-in window cleaning invoice look like?

Every rate is one crew’s number in one market. Story height, how far apart your jobs are, and how much construction work is in your mix move them more than any regional figure, so take the structure and price it from your own day — the method is in window cleaning pricing guide.

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INVOICE #2026-0312 · Clearview Window Services · Issued October 9, 2026 Bill to: Hartwell Homes LLC · Job 214, Lot 9 Marsh Creek · PO 2026-1188 · Subcontract terms net 30 Service: post-construction first clean, interior and exterior · Crew of 2, October 7 and 8 · 15.5 crew-hours Window schedule attached: 31 openings = 52 exterior panes and 52 interior panes

#	Description	Qty	Unit	Rate	Amount
1	Post-construction clean, exterior, ground level — scrape, wash, squeegee, detail (31 ground panes less the 2 excluded on line 12)	29	pane	$5.25	$152.25
2	Post-construction clean, exterior, second story, extension ladder set and reset at each opening	17	pane	$7.50	$127.50
3	Post-construction clean, exterior, gable and stairwell glass, water-fed pole with deionized rinse	4	pane	$9.00	$36.00
4	Post-construction clean, interior, all floors — drop cloths laid, protective sheeting pulled and replaced	52	pane	$4.25	$221.00
5	Manufacturer labels and adhesive residue removed	31	unit	$1.75	$54.25
6	Stucco and mortar splatter, south and west elevations — soaked, softened, and carded	14	pane	$6.50	$91.00
7	Paint overspray at the trim line — razor work, test pane photographed before starting	9	pane	$8.00	$72.00
8	Silicone and caulk smear removal, patio slider and transoms	6	pane	$5.00	$30.00
9	Tracks and sills vacuumed and wiped — drywall dust and sawdust, two passes	31	window	$3.25	$100.75
10	Screens unwrapped, washed, and installed — stored by the builder in the garage	24	each	$4.00	$96.00
11	Re-clean, north elevation, after painters returned to the site October 8	6	pane	$5.25	$31.50
12	Excluded — 2 panes, north elevation, exterior side not cleaned pending builder instruction (see below). Not billed	2	pane	$0.00	$0.00
13	Trip minimum — waived, job exceeds minimum	1	each	$0.00	$0.00

Total due	$1,012.25

Excluded and documented: 2 panes, north elevation, surface scratching consistent with fabricating debris — photographed October 7 before any scraping. Exterior side left uncleaned pending builder instruction and deducted from line 1; the interior side was cleaned and is billed on line 4. 1 cracked pane, east elevation, damaged by others, photographed and reported to the superintendent October 7 and cleaned as normal. Sign-off: superintendent walk October 8, 4:10 p.m. Conditional lien waiver issued on payment.

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At 15.5 crew-hours, that invoice realized $65.31 per crew-hour. Printing the hours next to the total is what turns a four-figure bill for “washing the windows” into a two-day job with a number attached.

How did 31 openings become 104 pane-sides?

By counting glass, sides, and access instead of counting holes in a wall. Put the arithmetic on the invoice header where the builder can check it against the schedule.

Unit on the window schedule	Count	Exterior panes	Interior panes
Double-hung, upper and lower sash	18	36	36
Casement	5	5	5
Slider, two panels	2	4	4
Picture window	2	2	2
Transom	3	3	3
Patio slider, two panels	1	2	2
Totals	31 openings	52	52

The line that surprises people is the first one. A double-hung is two pieces of glass, so eighteen of them are thirty-six panes on each side of the wall before anyone touches a squeegee. Divided lites multiply again, which is why a colonial-grille package is quoted after a count and never over the phone.

Screens are not panes and never enter the count. On a new build they arrive shrink-wrapped in a garage, and unwrapping, washing, and hanging twenty-four of them is its own line with its own unit, as in line 10.

Why does the access line cost more than the glass?

Because the glass takes seconds and the setup takes minutes. The same sash is a squeegee pull at ground level, a ladder set and reset on the second story, and a pole assembly with a deionized rinse at a stairwell gable.

Access class on this job	Panes	Rate	What the customer is paying for
Ground	29 billed of 31	$5.25	Walk, scrape, wash, squeegee, detail
Extension ladder, second story	17	$7.50	Footing, leveling, and a reset for almost every opening
Water-fed pole, gable and stairwell	4	$9.00	Pole assembly, deionized water, resin cost, no towel finish

The middle class is where the money quietly goes. A ladder set on soft graded fill, leveled, tied where needed, climbed, and moved is a couple of minutes per window in setup alone, and OSHA’s construction ladder rule at 29 CFR 1926.1053 requires side rails to extend at least three feet above an upper landing surface, or the ladder secured at the top with a grasping device. That is not overhead you can absorb into a ground-level rate.

Price each class as its own line with its own count. A single blended per-pane number on a house with three access classes overcharges the easy elevation and underprices the hard one, and it makes the invoice impossible to check.

What makes a post-construction clean a different service?

Three passes instead of one, and a real risk of scratching glass that belongs to someone else.

New glass arrives under labels, adhesive, drywall dust, mortar or stucco splatter, paint overspray at every trim line, and silicone smears from the caulk crew. The tracks hold sawdust and joint compound rather than pollen. Nothing about this is maintenance cleaning at maintenance speed, and lines 5 through 9 exist so the difference is visible rather than buried in an inflated per-pane rate.

The scraping carries the liability. Tempered glass can leave the factory with fabricating debris — fused particles on the surface — that a razor drags into a permanent scratch no matter how careful the technician is. Test one pane, photograph the condition before you start, tell the superintendent in writing, and put anything you refuse to scrape on the invoice as its own zero-dollar line with the count on it, deducted from the class it would have been billed in. That is what line 12 above does, and a refused pane that is visibly not charged for is a very different conversation from a pane quietly billed and quietly skipped. Those two exclusion sentences at the bottom are worth more than the invoice.

Which lines does a builder query, and how should they read?

Six of them, every time. The wording fixes all six.

The line they call about	What they mean	Write it like this
52 exterior panes on 31 windows	”There are 31 windows on the plan."	"18 double-hungs are two sashes each. Schedule attached; count matches the takeoff line for line.”
Second story at $7.50 against ground at $5.25	”It is the same window."	"Ladder set, leveled, and reset at each of 17 openings, extended three feet above the landing.”
Labels, $54.25	”Peeling stickers is not a service."	"31 units of label and adhesive residue removed by hand, softened and carded where the glue set.”
Mortar and stucco, $91.00	”That is part of cleaning windows."	"14 panes on the two elevations the masons worked; soaked, softened, and carded, roughly six minutes each.”
Interior at 52 panes	”You were already inside."	"Drop cloths laid and lifted, protective film pulled, sills cleared, 52 pane-sides cleaned and detailed.”
Re-clean, $31.50	”You already cleaned those."	"Cleaned October 7. Painters returned October 8 and sprayed the north trim. Re-cleaned at the same rate, photographed both times.”

Line 11 is the important one on a construction site, and it is a policy before it is a line. Trades come back after you leave. Agree in the subcontract that a re-clean caused by another trade is billed at the standard rate, then bill it calmly with the date the other crew was on site.

How do I explain the estimate against this invoice?

Keep the estimate number in the header and the lines in the same order, then show any quantity that moved with both figures next to each other: “52 exterior panes (estimated 48).”

Counts move on new builds more than on any other job, because the estimate is often quoted from a plan set and the house gets built with a window added in the mudroom. The rule that keeps this clean is simple: recount on arrival, before the first bucket comes off the truck, and send the corrected count and the corrected total for a yes in writing. A count corrected before the work reads as diligence. The same count corrected on the invoice reads as a bill that grew.

Anything genuinely discovered — an elevation of overspray nobody mentioned, a slider full of construction adhesive — goes on as its own dated line at a unit price the estimate already named, with a photo. A price invented after the work is finished is the one that sits unpaid for a month, whatever its merits.

Who signs off, and when does a builder actually pay?

Not the same day, and not to whoever is standing on the site.

Residential maintenance work is a card at the door. Construction work runs on a chain: a purchase order or subcontract number, a superintendent walk and sign-off, an invoice submitted before the month’s billing cutoff, and payment when the builder’s draw funds. Net 30 from sign-off is normal, net 45 exists, and some builders hold retainage until the certificate of occupancy.

Four things make the difference between thirty days and ninety. Get the job number and PO before you mobilize. Get the sign-off dated and signed on the day, because a superintendent who moves to another site cannot approve a walk he did not do. Submit the invoice against the billing cutoff rather than whenever the paperwork is finished. And find out what lien waiver form they require before you invoice, since a missing conditional waiver stalls otherwise clean invoices. When one goes past due anyway, run the sequence in how to get clients to pay rather than calling the superintendent again.

How do I set my own per-pane rate for this work?

Measure post-construction separately from maintenance, because they are not the same job and one number cannot cover both.

Count panes per hour on your next three construction finals and on your next three maintenance houses. Most crews find the construction rate is a fraction of the maintenance rate once labels, splatter, and dust-filled tracks are in the mix. Then price a day: your pay, the crew’s loaded wages, the van, insurance, ladders and poles, resin, and the drive. Divide the day’s cost by the panes that day actually produced, and that is your floor for that class of work.

Add profit as a margin rather than a markup. A crew-day that costs you $520 and is sold at a 25 percent margin is $520 ÷ 0.75, or $693. Multiplying by 1.25 gives $650, which is a 20 percent margin. Then keep a stated trip minimum on the form, because the drive and the setup cost the same whether the job is eight panes or a hundred and four.

What do I keep after the window cleaning invoice goes out?

The window schedule, the before photos of every restoration and exclusion, the signed superintendent walk, the resin and supply receipts, and the mileage. Construction records also outlive residential ones — how long that is, and why, is covered in how long to keep tax records.

Keel is an iOS app that runs entirely on the device — no account, no bank connection, no cloud, no login, and an App Store privacy label reading Data Not Collected. The pane counts by access class, the exclusions, the PO and job number, your own numbering, your logo, your brand color, and a payment link as a QR code all come together on the phone at the tailgate, which is where this invoice is actually written. The supply-house receipt for resin and squeegee rubber is photographed at the counter and read on the device by Apple Intelligence. Every leg of a route day logs as a trip, which is what turns six stops into a defensible mileage record. Freeboard shows cash minus tax reserve, minus committed invoices, minus a buffer, which is the number that matters when a builder’s net 30 lands in a slow winter. The ledger is append-only and hash-chained, and the year exports as one file or as the Accountant Pack, a CSV plus a one-page summary PDF. Free is $0 with unlimited invoices, receipts, and mileage; Keel Pro is a one-time $249.99 Lifetime purchase, not a subscription.

Frequently asked questions

How do you count panes on a window cleaning invoice?

Count pieces of glass and sides, not openings. A double-hung has an upper and a lower sash, so it is two panes per side. Casements count per sash, sliders per panel, picture windows as one. Print the count next to the opening count so the customer can check it against a window schedule or their own walk-through.

Why does post-construction window cleaning cost more than regular cleaning?

Because it is three passes instead of one. New glass carries manufacturer labels and adhesive, drywall dust, mortar or stucco splatter, paint overspray, and silicone smears, and tracks hold construction debris rather than dirt. It also carries scratch risk from scraping tempered glass. Bill those as separate per-pane lines rather than hiding them inside a higher cleaning rate.

Should ladder work be a separate line on a window cleaning invoice?

Yes, as its own access class with its own pane count and rate. Setting, leveling, and resetting a ladder at each opening takes minutes per window before any glass is touched, and the ladder has to extend three feet above an upper landing or be secured at the top. A single blended rate overcharges the ground floor and underprices the second story.

How do window cleaners bill a builder or general contractor?

Against a purchase order or subcontract number, with a dated superintendent sign-off, submitted before the builder’s monthly billing cutoff. Terms are normally net 30 from sign-off, sometimes longer, and payment often waits on a construction draw. Ask which lien waiver form is required before you invoice, since a missing waiver stalls an otherwise clean submission.

What do I do if another trade dirties the windows again?

Bill the re-clean at the standard rate, with the date the other crew was on site and photographs from both visits. Agree the policy in the subcontract before you mobilize so it is a rate rather than an argument, and tell the superintendent the day it happens. Absorbing re-cleans on a construction site teaches everyone that your time is free.

Should I scrape paint or mortar off new glass?

Only after testing one pane and photographing it first. Tempered glass can carry fabricating debris that a razor drags into a permanent scratch, and the damage is not repairable. Test, document, tell the superintendent in writing what you found, and list any pane you will not scrape as an excluded line on the invoice rather than taking the risk quietly.

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This article is general information, not professional or tax advice.