Subbie to Your Own Trade Business (NSW)

Executive Summary

Key takeaways: what you'll get from this guide

The full list of what you need to go from subbie to running your own trade business in NSW, in the order to do it
Why your licence comes first, and the NSW rules that decide whether you even need one
The honest version of the money side: ABN, business name, structure, GST, and what each actually costs
The insurance you genuinely need, including the NSW cover most new tradies miss
What changes the day you take on your first worker
How your first leads actually come in, and where your website fits

Going out on your own is the best move a lot of tradies ever make. Your name on the van, your leads, your call on which jobs to take. But the jump from being on the tools for someone else to running the whole show means a pile of admin nobody really teaches you. Licences, ABNs, tax, insurance, contracts. Get it sorted properly up front and you start clean. Wing it and you spend your first year fixing things you should have done in week one.

This is the full run-through for NSW, in the order that makes sense. Work through it top to bottom. Once you are up and running, keep our tradie legal requirements checklist handy for the ongoing obligations, including the marketing and website rules.

Quick heads up. This is a plain-English guide, not legal, tax, or financial advice. The figures are current as of 2026 but fees and thresholds change, so check the official source linked for each step and talk to an accountant about your own situation. A full note sits at the bottom.

Is Going Out on Your Own Actually Worth It?

For most good tradies, yes. You keep the full rate instead of a subbie cut, you pick your jobs, and you build something with your name on it. The trade-off is that the admin, the quiet weeks, and the risk are now yours too. There is no sick pay and no one chasing the invoices but you.

The tradies who do well at it treat the business side as part of the job, not a nuisance. The good news is that the setup below is mostly a one-off. Do it once, properly, and you can get back on the tools.

Action: Before anything else, work out roughly what you need to earn a week to cover your costs and pay yourself. That number tells you how hard the phone needs to ring.

Leave Your Current Gig the Right Way

How you walk out the door matters more than most subbies think. Your old boss, the builders you worked under, and the other subbies are all part of the network that sends you work. Leave well and they refer you. Leave badly and word travels fast in a trade.

A clean exit means:

Give proper notice and finish the jobs you started. Do not walk off a half-done site.
Do not poach clients or staff on your way out. If a customer comes to you later on their own, that is fair enough, but actively taking your boss's clients while you are still on their books is a quick way to a bad name and sometimes a legal letter. Check whether anything you signed has a non-compete or non-solicitation clause.
Sort out the tools. Be clear about what is yours and what belongs to the business, and hand back anything that is not yours.
Stay on good terms. Your old boss is often your best early source of overflow work. Plenty of new tradies get their first months of jobs from the person they used to work for.

Action: Have the conversation in person, give fair notice, and ask your boss if they would pass on work they cannot take. Most will say yes if you leave well.

Step 1: Get Your Licence Sorted (NSW)

In NSW your licence comes first, because in some trades you cannot legally take a cent without one. NSW Fair Trading runs the licensing.

The basic rule: you need a contractor licence to do, advertise, or contract for residential building or trade work worth more than $5,000 in labour and materials including GST 1. Doing that work unlicensed carries heavy fines.

The big exception is specialist work. Electrical, plumbing, draining, gasfitting, and air conditioning or refrigeration work needs a licence or certificate no matter how small the job or the value 1. There is no $5,000 floor for these trades. If you are a sparky or a plumber, you are licensed from the first job, full stop.

There are three levels to know:

Contractor licence lets you contract directly with customers, run the business, and do the work. This is the one you need to go out on your own.
Qualified supervisor certificate lets you do and supervise the work, but not contract with customers in your own name.
Tradesperson certificate lets you do the work only, under someone else's supervision.

So the move from subbie to your own business is usually the move from a certificate to a full contractor licence. You apply through Service NSW, and licences run for 1, 3, or 5 years.

Other states: every state and territory licenses trades differently, with different thresholds and bodies (QBCC in Queensland, the VBA in Victoria, and so on). If you work across a border, you need the right licence in each.

Action: Check exactly what your trade needs on the NSW Fair Trading site, then book your contractor licence application through Service NSW before you take any work in your own name.

Step 2: Register Your ABN

An ABN (Australian Business Number) is the 11-digit number that goes on your invoices and quotes. You need one the moment you start working for yourself rather than as an employee.

It is free. Apply through the government's Business Registration Service or the Australian Business Register 2. Ignore any site that wants to charge you for it. If a customer pays you more than $75 and you have not quoted an ABN, they are legally required to withhold nearly half the payment for tax, so this one is not optional.

Action: Register your ABN free at business.gov.au. It is usually instant if your details match ATO records.

Step 3: Choose Your Business Structure

This is the one worth a chat with an accountant, but here is the plain version.

Sole trader is the simplest and cheapest. You and the business are the same thing. All the profit is your income, taxed at personal rates, and all the debts are yours personally. Most tradies start here. Setup cost is basically nothing beyond your ABN.
Company (Pty Ltd) is a separate legal entity, so it limits your personal liability for business debts. Company tax sits at 25% for small businesses, which can beat personal rates once you are earning well. The trade-off is more admin and cost: registering a company runs a bit over $600, with an annual review fee on top 3, plus a separate tax return and tighter record keeping.
Trust is often used by tradies with a partner or family to split income. It is more complex and really needs an accountant to set up right.

A rough rule: most tradies start as a sole trader and look at a company once the profit is consistently strong, the jobs are getting bigger, or they are taking on staff and want the liability separated. There is no single right answer, which is exactly why this is the step to get advice on.

Action: Start as a sole trader unless an accountant tells you otherwise. You can always move to a company later as the business grows.

Step 4: Register Your Business Name

You only need to register a business name if you are trading as something other than your own legal name. "John Smith" needs nothing. "John Smith Plumbing" needs to be registered.

It is done through ASIC, and it is cheap: around $45 for one year or just over $100 for three 3. You can do it in the same online session as your ABN.

Action: Pick a name customers will remember and search for, check it is free on the ASIC register, and lock it in for three years to save the renewal hassle.

Step 5: Sort Your Tax and GST

As a sole trader you use your personal tax file number, and your business income goes in your personal tax return. A company gets its own tax file number.

The one to watch is GST. You must register for GST once your turnover hits $75,000 a year, and you have to do it within 21 days of expecting to cross that line 4. Turnover means total income, not profit, so most full-time tradies get there. Once registered, you add 10% GST to your invoices, lodge a Business Activity Statement (usually each quarter), and you can claim the GST back on your tools, ute, and materials.

You can also register for GST voluntarily before you hit $75,000. It is often worth it, because claiming GST back on a big tool or vehicle purchase adds up.

Action: If you expect to earn over $75,000, register for GST when you set up your ABN. Put roughly a third of every payment aside for tax and GST so it is there when the BAS is due.

Step 6: Get Insured Properly

This is where new tradies cut corners and regret it. The cover you actually want:

Public liability is the big one. It covers you if you damage property or injure someone on the job. Most NSW jobs expect $10 million cover, and bigger commercial or council sites often want $20 million. Many builders and sites will not let you start without a current certificate 5.
Tool and plant insurance covers your gear against theft and damage. Not legally required, but losing a ute full of tools without it ends a lot of new businesses.
Income protection replaces your income if you are hurt and cannot work. As a sole trader you get no sick pay and you cannot cover your own injuries under workers comp, so this is your only safety net. The premiums are usually tax deductible.
Home Building Compensation (HBC) cover is the one most people miss. In NSW, you must take out HBC cover for any residential building work worth more than $20,000 including GST, before you start or take a deposit 6. It is run by icare and it protects the homeowner if you cannot finish or fix the job. Specialist trades and smaller jobs are treated differently, so check whether your work needs it.

Action: Get a public liability quote at the level your jobs require, and check the icare site to see if your residential work crosses the $20,000 HBC threshold.

Step 7: Get Your White Card

If you set foot on a construction site, you need a White Card (General Construction Induction). It comes from a short course with an approved training provider, and you then get the card through Service NSW 7.

A NSW White Card is recognised in every state. It has no set expiry, but if you are out of the construction industry for more than two years it stops being recognised, so keep your time on the tools current.

The White Card is the baseline, not the whole picture. High-risk work like working at heights, in trenches, or near live electrical also needs a Safe Work Method Statement (SWMS) for the job, and some tasks need their own tickets, like a working-at-heights or asbestos course. Sort the ones your trade needs.

Action: If you do not already hold a White Card, book the course before you line up site work, and check which extra tickets your high-risk tasks require.

Step 8: If You Take On Staff, Sort Workers Comp and Super

The day you put on your first worker, two new obligations kick in.

Workers compensation. In NSW you must take out a workers comp policy through icare as soon as you employ anyone. You cannot cover yourself with it as a sole trader, only your workers. There is an exemption if you pay $7,500 or less in wages a year, but you are still on the hook if a worker is hurt, so most who employ just get the policy 8.
Superannuation. You must pay super on top of wages, currently 12% of ordinary earnings 9. Watch this one: if you pay a subbie who is really working like an employee, mostly their own labour, you may owe super on their pay too even though they have an ABN. From 1 July 2026, super has to be paid at the same time as wages rather than quarterly, so set it up that way from the start 9.

Action: Before your first worker starts, set up a workers comp policy and a system that pays their super every payday.

Step 9: Set Up Your Back Office

The boring stuff that keeps you out of trouble and makes tax time painless.

Separate business bank account. Not legally required for a sole trader, but do it anyway. It keeps your business and personal money apart and makes the BAS far easier.
Accounting and invoicing software. Xero, MYOB, or QuickBooks all handle invoices, track GST, and lodge your BAS. For a one-person operation the cheapest tier is usually plenty.
Proper tax invoices. Once you are registered for GST, your invoices must say "Tax Invoice", show your business name and ABN, the date, what you did, and the GST amount 10. On invoices of $1,000 or more, include the customer's details too.
Written contracts. In NSW, residential work over $5,000 needs a written contract, and work over $20,000 needs a full home building contract with a cooling-off period and progress payments 11. Free standard templates are on the NSW Government site. A deposit cannot be more than 10%.

Action: Open a business account, pick one accounting app, and download the NSW contract templates so you are ready before your first big job.

Step 10: Get Found From Day One

You can have every licence and form sorted and still sit by a quiet phone. The last step is making sure customers can find you and choose you. For a week-by-week lead plan (who to text first, review scripts, what to skip in month one), see how to get your first customers going out on your own. For a new tradie, leads come from four places:

Google Business Profile. Free, and the single highest-return thing you can set up. It puts you on Google Maps and in the local results when someone searches your trade plus their suburb. Set it up, verify it, add real photos, and start collecting reviews.
Your own website. This is the asset that turns those searches into calls and that you actually own. Pair it with your Google Business Profile and pages for the suburbs you work in. Two reads worth your time: what a good tradie website looks like and why it has to be mobile first, because most of your customers will find you on a phone, mid-problem, ready to call.
Word of mouth and reviews. Still the strongest channel early on. Ask every happy customer for a Google review and a referral. Once you are established, see when word of mouth isn't enough for going online without abandoning referrals.
Lead platforms like hipages and Oneflare. Useful for volume at the start, but you pay a subscription plus a fee per lead, and you share each lead with three or four other tradies. Handy to fill gaps, expensive to rely on. The full picture is in our directories guide and local SEO guide.

Action: Set up and verify your Google Business Profile this week, then get a proper website live so the searches it sends you have somewhere to land.

The Order to Do It In

Here is the whole thing as a checklist you can work down.

#	Step	Where	Rough cost
1	Contractor licence	NSW Fair Trading / Service NSW	Varies by trade
2	ABN	business.gov.au	Free
3	Business structure	DIY or accountant	$0 sole trader, $600+ company
4	Business name	ASIC	About $45/yr
5	Tax + GST registration	ATO	Free
6	Insurance (public liability, tools, income protection, HBC)	Insurer / icare	Varies
7	White Card	Approved trainer + Service NSW	Course fee
8	Workers comp + super (if employing)	icare + your super setup	Varies
9	Bank account, software, contracts	Bank, Xero/MYOB, NSW templates	Low monthly
10	Google Business Profile + website	DIY or M4T	Free GBP, website varies

Do not let the list scare you. Most of it is a one-off afternoon of admin. Steps 1 to 7 get you legal and covered. Steps 8 to 10 are about running and growing.

What's Different If You're Not in NSW?

Most of this guide is set federally, so it is the same wherever you work in Australia. Your ABN, GST, super, business name, White Card, and tax invoice rules do not change across state lines. Two things do: who licenses you, and the home warranty insurance you need for bigger residential jobs. Both are run state by state, with different bodies and different dollar thresholds.

Here is the quick version for every state and territory. Thresholds move, so always confirm the current figure with your local regulator before you quote.

State / Territory	Who licenses your trade	Licence needed for work over	Home warranty cover needed over
NSW	NSW Fair Trading	$5,000 (electrical and plumbing: any job)	$20,000 (Home Building Compensation)
VIC	Building and Plumbing Commission (electrical: Energy Safe Victoria)	$10,000	$16,000 (Domestic Building Insurance), rising to $20,000 from July 2026
QLD	QBCC (electrical: Electrical Safety Office)	$3,300	$3,300 (QBCC Home Warranty Scheme)
SA	Consumer and Business Services (electrical and plumbing: Office of the Technical Regulator)	$20,000	$20,000 (Building Indemnity Insurance)
WA	Building Services Board	$20,000	$20,000 (Home Indemnity Insurance)
TAS	Consumer, Building and Occupational Services	around $20,000 (confirm with CBOS)	A scheme is being introduced, check the current status with CBOS
ACT	Access Canberra	Any building work, no dollar threshold	$12,000 (Builders Warranty Insurance)
NT	Building Practitioners Board (electrical: NT WorkSafe)	$12,000	$12,000 (Fidelity Fund Certificate)

A few things stand out. Queensland has the lowest bar in the country: at $3,300, almost any paid residential job needs both a licence and home warranty cover. The ACT licenses all building work regardless of value. And specialist trades like electrical, plumbing, and gas are licensed everywhere, usually for any job, no matter the dollar threshold above.

Workers compensation is also state-run, through a different body in each: icare in NSW, WorkSafe Victoria, WorkCover Queensland, ReturnToWorkSA, WorkCover WA, WorkSafe Tasmania, WorkSafe ACT, and NT WorkSafe. Wherever you are, you need a policy the day you take on your first worker.

Action: If you work outside NSW, find your state's building regulator from the table above and confirm the current licence and home warranty thresholds before you take on your first job.

What Should You Charge?

This is the question that stops most subbies from making the jump. The short version: your charge-out rate has to be a lot more than your old subbie rate, because you now carry everything the business used to cover for you.

As a subbie you got paid for hours worked. As your own business you also cover insurance, tools, the ute, fuel, software, super, quoting time, quiet weeks, sick days, and tax. Your rate has to soak all of that up and still leave you a wage.

A simple way to think about it:

Start from what you need to earn, not what the bloke down the road charges. Work out your weekly costs and the wage you want, then divide by the hours you can realistically bill. You cannot bill 40 hours when you are also quoting, driving, and chasing invoices, so plan for billable hours well under your working hours.
Mark up your materials. You carry the cost and the risk on materials, so a markup, often 10% to 20%, is normal and fair.
Quote the job, not just the hour, where you can. Customers understand a price for the work better than an hourly rate, and a fixed quote protects your margin if you are quick.
Do not race to the bottom. The tradie who wins on being cheapest attracts the worst customers and the tightest margins. Win on showing up, doing good work, and being easy to deal with.
Remember GST. Once you are registered, your prices include 10% GST that was never yours to keep. Quote GST-inclusive so there are no surprises, and set that money aside.

Action: Before your first quote, work out your real hourly cost of being in business, then set a charge-out rate that covers it with a wage on top. Sense-check it against local rates, but lead with your own numbers.

Getting Paid and Staying on Top of Cashflow

Plenty of busy tradies get into trouble not because the work dried up, but because the money came in slower than it went out. Cashflow is what actually sinks new trade businesses, so protect yourself from day one.

Take a deposit on bigger jobs to cover materials up front. In NSW a deposit on home building work cannot be more than 10%, so price it accordingly.
Invoice straight away, the day the job is done, not at the end of the month. The longer you wait, the longer they wait.
Set clear payment terms in writing before you start, like 7 days, or payment on completion for smaller jobs.
Make paying easy. Put your bank details and a payment link right on the invoice. The less effort it takes, the faster you get paid.
Chase late payers early and politely. A friendly reminder the day a payment is overdue gets results. Letting it slide for a month does not.
Keep tax and super money separate. Put aside roughly a third of every payment for tax, GST, and your own super, so the BAS and tax bill never catch you out. As a sole trader nobody pays your super for you, so a regular personal contribution is on you, and it can be tax deductible.

Good accounting software handles most of this for you: automatic invoices, reminders, and a clear view of who owes you what.

Action: Set a standard payment term, put your bank details on every invoice, and send the invoice the day you finish the job.

How M4T Helps With the Last Step

We do not do your licence or your tax, but we own the part most tradies find hardest: getting found. We build mobile-first websites that turn local searches into calls, set up and sharpen your Google Business Profile, and put you on the map for the suburbs you work in. We pull your copy and photos from what you already have, so it costs you a couple of hours, not a couple of weekends.

Made 4 Tradies note

Going out on your own? Get the legal and tax bits sorted, then let us handle getting found.

New to all this? Start with what a good tradie website looks like. Plan quotes@yourdomain early, not a personal Gmail inbox on invoices (business email for tradies).

See what we offer →

Want a Hand Getting Found From Day One?

You sort the licence, the ABN, and the insurance. We will make sure customers can actually find you the moment you are ready to take work.

Book a quick call. Tell us your trade and where you work. We will give you a straight plan to get found, no pitch, no obligation.
Free website audit. Already have a site or a profile? We will check it and send you a PDF on what is working and what is costing you calls within 24 hours.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need a licence to start my own trade business in NSW?

In most cases yes. NSW Fair Trading requires a contractor licence for residential building or trade work worth more than $5,000 in labour and materials. For specialist work, including electrical, plumbing, draining, gasfitting, and air conditioning, you need a licence or certificate no matter how small the job. To go out on your own and contract with customers, you generally need a full contractor licence, not just a tradesperson certificate.

How much does it cost to start a trade business in Australia?

The core registrations are cheap. An ABN is free, a business name is around $45 a year through ASIC, and registering a company is a bit over $600 if you go that way. The real costs are your licence (varies by trade), insurance such as public liability, and your tools and vehicle. Budget for the licence and insurance as your main upfront spend.

Should I be a sole trader or a company?

Most tradies start as a sole trader because it is the simplest and cheapest, with your business income taxed at personal rates. A company limits your personal liability and is taxed at 25% for small businesses, but costs more to set up and run. The usual trigger to switch is when your profit is consistently strong, your jobs get bigger, or you take on staff. It is the one decision worth getting an accountant's advice on.

Do I need to register for GST as a tradie?

You must register for GST once your turnover reaches $75,000 a year, which most full-time tradies hit. Turnover is total income, not profit. You can also register voluntarily before then, which lets you claim the GST back on tools, your ute, and materials. Once registered you add 10% GST to invoices and lodge a BAS, usually each quarter.

What insurance do I need as a tradie going out on my own?

Public liability is the must-have, usually $10 million and often $20 million for bigger sites. Tool insurance protects your gear, and income protection covers you if you are hurt, since sole traders get no sick pay and cannot use workers comp on themselves. In NSW, you also need Home Building Compensation cover for residential building work over $20,000. If you employ anyone, you must take out workers compensation.

How do I get my first customers when I go out on my own?

Message builders and your old boss before you leave, then verify your Google Business Profile and ask for reviews on every job. Add a simple mobile-first website within the first month. Full 90-day playbook: how to get your first customers going out on your own. Lead platforms like hipages can fill gaps but work best alongside your own listing and site, not instead of them.

Do these rules apply outside NSW?

The federal parts are the same everywhere in Australia: your ABN, GST, super, business name, White Card, and tax invoice rules do not change between states. What changes is licensing and home warranty insurance, which each state runs through its own body and dollar thresholds. Queensland needs a licence and home warranty cover for work over just $3,300, while the ACT licenses all building work no matter the value, and NSW sits at $5,000. Check your state's building regulator for the current figures before you quote.

What should I charge when I go out on my own?

Your charge-out rate needs to be well above your old subbie rate, because you now cover insurance, tools, the ute, super, quoting time, quiet weeks, and tax on top of your wage. Start from what you need to earn, not what others charge: work out your weekly costs and target wage, then divide by the hours you can realistically bill. Add a markup on materials, quote the job rather than the hour where you can, keep prices GST-inclusive, and avoid winning work just by being the cheapest.

How do I make sure I get paid on time?

Cashflow sinks more new trade businesses than a lack of work does. Take a deposit on bigger jobs, capped at 10% for NSW home building work, invoice the day you finish rather than at month end, and set clear payment terms in writing before you start, like 7 days. Put your bank details and a payment link on the invoice to make paying easy, chase late payments politely the day they are overdue, and set aside about a third of every payment for tax, GST, and super.

References:

State building regulators (for the other-states section):

VIC: Building and Plumbing Commission (replaced the VBA on 1 July 2025)
QLD: Queensland Building and Construction Commission (QBCC)
SA: Consumer and Business Services
WA: Building and Energy (Building Services Board)
TAS: Consumer, Building and Occupational Services
ACT: Access Canberra
NT: NT Building Practitioners Board

This guide is general information for Australian tradies, with NSW detail throughout, current as of 2026. It is not legal, tax, financial, or insurance advice. Fees, thresholds, and rules change, and your situation is your own, so confirm the current details with the official source linked for each step and speak to a licensed accountant or adviser before you act.

Published by Made 4 Tradies, built by online experts who understand tradies. Serving Sydney, the Central Coast, Newcastle, and the Hunter.

Going Out on Your Own: From Subbie to Your Own Trade Business