Hiring a sign installer: how it works and what it costs

Sign installer is an umbrella term. In practice you hire a specialism, and that decides who is right for the job:

• Lettering installer or vinyl applicator: window, facade and interior lettering, full-colour prints, frosted film and Clearview.
• Vehicle wrapper: vehicle lettering, partial or full wraps and fleet projects.
• Sign fitter: facade signage, built-up letters, frames and wayfinding, often at height.
• Illuminated sign fitter: light boxes and LED letters, with electrics and NEN 3140.
• Stand builder: building and dismantling exhibition stands and fabric frames.

Many self-employed installers combine two or three of these trades. On Signborn a sign installer states per skill what they do. In your job you ask for exactly the skills and certificates the work needs.

A freelance sign installer is the same as a self-employed (zzp) sign installer: someone working for themselves, with their own Chamber of Commerce (KvK) registration, tools, insurance and rate. For each job you enter into a contract for services and agree on the result, not on how they do the work.

An installation company sends a crew and often charges per half day, even for a three-hour job. A self-employed installer charges by the hour or by the job, and for small and medium-sized jobs is usually quicker to schedule. For a rollout across dozens of locations you often work with several self-employed installers at once, each in their own region.

Mind the Dutch DBA Act (Wet DBA): a self-employed professional works for several clients, may turn down a job and decides how to carry out the work. So don’t give them rosters or work instructions as you would an employee.

Most disputes afterwards start with an incomplete brief. Put this in your job:

• Location, access, parking and loading and unloading times.
• What is being installed: dimensions, weight, material and number of pieces.
• The substrate: glass, brickwork, composite, painted metal or a vehicle.
• Working height, whether a cherry picker or scaffolding is needed, and who arranges it.
• Whether electrics need connecting. Then NEN 3140 is needed.
• Who supplies the material and when it will be on site.
• The contact person at the end client and who signs off the handover.
• The preferred date, and whether it is fixed or can move a few days.

The sign installer sets their own hourly rate. The difference lies mainly in specialism and certification: simple vinyl application costs less than vehicle wrapping, work at height or electrics. Travel time, cherry picker hire and urgent jobs are often charged on top. Guide prices per specialism are on Signborn’s rates page.

On top of the sign installer’s rate, as the client you pay the Signborn fee: 8% for a match, minimum €15 and maximum €150 per sign installer per job. Working with your own network? Then you pay Signborn nothing. The sign installer never pays anything. No money runs through Signborn. You pay the sign installer directly on their invoice. The fee comes on a separate invoice.

Worked examples, at a rate of €50 per hour and working days of 8 hours:

• 2-hour job (€100): fee €15, the minimum.
• 1 sign installer, 1 day (€400): fee €32.
• 1 sign installer, 5 days (€2,000): fee €150, the maximum.
• 4 sign installers, 5 days each: fee 4 × €150 = €600.
• Sign installer from your own network: no fee.

Materials, parking and tolls the sign installer passes on do not count towards the fee. All amounts exclude VAT.

Always ask for a registration with the Chamber of Commerce (KvK) and public liability insurance (AVB) with care, custody and control cover. That cover is for damage to your end client’s property that the sign installer is working on. On construction sites, clients often ask self-employed installers for VCA-VOL, a MEWP certificate (for example IPAF) for a cherry picker, and NEN 3140 for electrics.

On Signborn, we check liability insurance before a sign installer can respond. Installers list their KvK number and certificates themselves. Does your job call for a certificate? Then only installers who listed it can respond. Ask to see the certificate if you want to. You compare portfolios and reviews from earlier jobs yourself.

Most agencies have a few regular sign installers. Invite them to Signborn. They see your jobs and appear at the top of your list of responses. Handover photos and signature are in one place, and they send their invoice to you directly. That already works in every region.

Post a job for everyone who fits? Then sign installers you don’t know yet will respond too. Signborn opens matching region by region. In an open region the five best-matching sign installers get a notification, ranked on seven factors with fixed weights. Is your region not open yet? Then you work with your own network and hear as soon as matching starts there.