This report provides a detailed breakdown of which clients are actually profitable vs losing money? for managed service providers.
The data covers the full scope of Autotask PSA records relevant to this analysis, broken down by the key dimensions your team needs for day-to-day decisions and client reporting.
Who should use this: MSP owners, finance leads, and operations managers tracking profitability
How often: Monthly for financial reviews, quarterly for strategic planning, on-demand for pricing decisions
EVALUATE TOPN(15, SUMMARIZECOLUMNS('BI_Autotask_Charges'[company_id], "TotalRevenue", SUM('BI_Autotask_Charges'[billable_amount]), "TotalCost", SUM('BI_Autotask_Charges'[extended_cost]), "ChargeCount", COUNTROWS('BI_Autotask_Charges')), [TotalRevenue], DESC)| # | Client | Revenue | Cost | Profit | Margin | Eff. Rate/hr |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lewis LLC | $2,212,915 | $894,222 | $1,318,693 | 59.6% | $790 |
| 2 | Craig-Huynh | $2,324,617 | $1,013,970 | $1,310,647 | 56.4% | $532 |
| 3 | Little Group | $1,431,177 | $603,420 | $827,758 | 57.8% | $377 |
| 4 | Martin Group | $637,092 | $248,212 | $388,880 | 61.0% | $287 |
| 5 | Wall PLC | $476,622 | $214,395 | $262,227 | 55.0% | $281 |
| 6 | Burke, Armstrong and Morgan | $469,660 | $224,394 | $245,267 | 52.2% | $358 |
| 7 | Richards, Bell and Christensen | $328,165 | $107,091 | $221,073 | 67.4% | $419 |
| 8 | Torres-Jones | $255,698 | $46,812 | $208,887 | 81.7% | $1,301 |
| 9 | Wu-Jackson | $321,669 | $121,483 | $200,186 | 62.2% | $334 |
| 10 | Thompson, Contreras and Rios | $320,832 | $141,416 | $179,416 | 55.9% | $319 |
EVALUATE
TOPN(10,
ADDCOLUMNS(
SUMMARIZE(
'BI_Autotask_Companies',
'BI_Autotask_Companies'[company_name]
),
"Revenue", [Revenue - Total],
"Cost", [Cost - Total],
"Profit", [Profit - total],
"ProfitPct", [Profit - total - percentage],
"HoursWorked", [Company - Hours Worked],
"EffectiveRate", [Analytics - Client Effective Rate]
),
[Profit], DESC
)
ORDER BY [Profit] DESCThese 22 clients represent a combined cost overrun of roughly $180K. The top five alone account for the majority of that figure. Turner-Rodriguez has a negative margin of -288% — for every $1 earned, $3.88 is spent. Lopez-Reyes, the most active client by hours, runs at a loss of $55K despite generating nearly $590K in revenue.
| # | Client | Revenue | Cost | Loss | Margin | Risk Level |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Turner-Rodriguez | $23,124 | $89,730 | -$66,606 | -288% | Critical |
| 2 | Lopez-Reyes | $589,694 | $645,574 | -$55,879 | -9.5% | Critical |
| 3 | Butler, Weber and Carter | $25,468 | $55,205 | -$29,737 | -117% | Critical |
| 4 | Fox, Conner and West | $116,947 | $136,713 | -$19,765 | -16.9% | High |
| 5 | Smith PLC | -$2,581 | $765 | -$3,346 | N/A | High |
| 6 | Smith-Randolph | $0 | $1,115 | -$1,115 | 0% | High |
| 7 | Santiago, Ward and Beltran | $72 | $1,137 | -$1,066 | -1487% | High |
| 8 | Shaw-Ryan | $2,803 | $3,398 | -$595 | -21.2% | Monitor |
| 9 | Palmer, White and Decker | $7,822 | $8,460 | -$637 | -8.1% | Monitor |
EVALUATE
TOPN(15,
ADDCOLUMNS(
SUMMARIZE(
'BI_Autotask_Companies',
'BI_Autotask_Companies'[company_name]
),
"Revenue", [Revenue - Total],
"Cost", [Cost - Total],
"Profit", [Profit - total],
"ProfitPct", [Profit - total - percentage],
"HoursWorked", [Company - Hours Worked],
"EffectiveRate", [Analytics - Client Effective Rate]
),
[Profit], ASC
)
ORDER BY [Profit] ASCThe effective rate measures how much revenue your MSP earns per hour worked on a client. At $100/hr effective rate or below, it is very likely that the all-in cost of that engineer hour exceeds what you charge. The clients below all have more than 50 hours worked, making the pattern statistically meaningful rather than a one-off incident.
EVALUATE
TOPN(15,
FILTER(
ADDCOLUMNS(
SUMMARIZE(
'BI_Autotask_Companies',
'BI_Autotask_Companies'[company_name]
),
"Revenue", [Revenue - Total],
"HoursWorked", [Company - Hours Worked],
"EffectiveRate", [Analytics - Client Effective Rate]
),
[HoursWorked] > 50 && [EffectiveRate] > 0
),
[EffectiveRate], ASC
)
ORDER BY [EffectiveRate] ASCWith a cost of $89,730 against revenue of just $23,124, this client has a deeply negative margin of -288%. The hours worked (22.2h) suggest a small account with disproportionately high charges. Review whether the cost structure reflects mis-allocated time or pricing that never reflected actual effort.
At 694 hours worked, Lopez-Reyes is one of your most active clients — and it is generating a $55,879 loss. Revenue ($589K) is substantial but cost ($645K) is higher still. An effective rate of $849/hr looks healthy but the absolute cost base is too large. A contract structure review is overdue.
This client has logged over 101 hours but generates only $1,286 in revenue — an effective rate of $12.67 per hour. At any reasonable internal cost rate, this engagement runs at a severe loss. Check whether this is a managed service contract priced years ago without rate adjustment.
At 196 hours worked and a margin of nearly 82%, Torres-Jones is a model client. Low service volume, high revenue per hour, strong profitability. Understanding what makes this relationship work — contract type, scope, proactive pricing — gives you a template for improving others.
Profit is calculated as Revenue minus Cost. Revenue comes from billed charges and approved time entries in Autotask. Cost represents the internal cost of labour (engineer salaries and overhead) plus direct charges. The Power BI semantic model does this calculation automatically using the measures [Revenue - Total], [Cost - Total], and [Profit - total].
The effective rate is the total revenue from a client divided by the total hours worked. It tells you how much revenue each hour of your team's time generates for that client. An effective rate below your average fully-loaded engineer cost per hour means the engagement is unprofitable on a per-hour basis.
Negative revenue typically results from credit notes or billing adjustments that exceed the original charges. In Autotask, this happens when a credit memo reverses a previous invoice. It is worth investigating whether the underlying transaction was correct before drawing conclusions about profitability.
Start with clients in the critical or high risk category. For each, run the hours vs revenue breakdown to understand where time is being spent. If labour cost per ticket type is available, identify which service categories are driving the overrun. Use this as a data-backed basis for discussing a revised contract scope, rate increase, or out-of-scope charges.
Yes. The Proxuma Power BI model supports date slicers that filter all measures including Revenue, Cost, and Profit. You can narrow the view to the last 3 months, last year, or any custom period to understand whether profitability is improving or declining over time.
Connect Proxuma Power BI to your PSA, RMM, and M365 environment, use an MCP-compatible AI to ask questions, and generate custom reports - in minutes, not days.
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