Prep levels — the bands and when each applies
Prep in Surfacely is a percentage uplift on the painting hours of a surface — not a separate line item. It runs on a fixed ladder; the everyday bands are:
- None (0%) — paint-ready: already primed or prepped by someone else. No sanding, no patching.
- Minimal (10%) — scuff & dust: near paint-ready, a quick scuff and dust down, the odd spot fill. For surfaces in excellent shape.
- Light (20%) — light sand: very good condition, light sand and dust down, minimal filling.
- Standard (30%) — fill & sand: typical repaint in sound condition. Wash, sand, spot-fill, dust down. The usual baseline for a normal repaint — drop below it only when the surface is genuinely near-new.
- Moderate (50%) — moderate fill & sand: older surface, more filler work, a few minor repairs, some scraping.
- Heavy (80%) — spot strip, heavy fill & sand: neglected or peeling, significant sanding, filling, primer spots, cracked paint removal.
- Very Heavy (120%) — full strip, heavy fill & sand: weathered exterior, failed paint, extensive filling, stabilising primer, damaged substrate.
Beyond Very Heavy, two restoration-grade bands cover the heaviest work: Extensive (150%) — major repair, heavy strip and full prime on structural or significant substrate damage — and Restoration (300%) — detailed, slow heritage and full-rebuild work where prep dominates the job.
How it applies
If a wall is 100 m² and your Steady speed step gives 15 m²/hr, the paint hours are 6.67. At Moderate prep (50%), the prep hours are 3.33 — total 10.0 hours. This shows up in the quote as painting + prep, priced at your labour sell rate.
Automatic bumps
Two things auto-bump prep above the surface default:
- Switching the surface to spray bumps to Moderate (extra masking and back-rolling setup)
- Marking a defect as significant during assessment bumps to Heavy (strip, fill, prime)
You can override either if the specific job is different — but the default reflects real labour cost.
Why it matters: painters who use a flat "prep included" assumption either under-charge on heavy repaints or over-charge on good-condition walls. Surfacely's per-surface prep gives you per-surface accuracy, which is what wins competitive quotes on easy work and protects you on hard work.
Tip: the percentages are deliberately not user-configurable. They're calibrated against decades of painter data. If your crew takes longer than Standard prep suggests, you have a training opportunity — not a pricing bug.