All organizations, irrespective of how many assets they possess, need skilled general maintenance workers for the effective upkeep of their infrastructures. If you’re looking to hire a general maintenance worker and researching average maintenance worker salary figures, keep reading.
This also goes for presently-employed maintenance workers who want to find out if they’re being compensated fairly.
In this article, we’ll share maintenance worker salary estimates from reliable sources (so you won’t have to).
Let’s jump right in.
Average Maintenance Worker Salary Figures [Up-to-Date]
The salary of a typical maintenance worker in the United States, like every other position in virtually every industry, depends on a few factors.
Here are a few of the main deciding factors:
- Cost of Living – first and foremost, the overall rent, bills, and other costs of living are all huge deciding factors. A worker in San Francisco may earn a completely different salary than someone based in New York City.
- Years of Experience – if you’ve been in the industry for a while now, you’ll definitely earn more than an entry-level profile. As you progress, your competency will obviously increase, resulting in a higher compensation package.
- Education Level – a maintenance worker, at the very least, should be a high school diploma holder. If you have any additional credentials, your employer will obviously pay you more.
Other factors can include things like the maintenance worker job description, organizational structure of the company, and more.
Let’s take a look at the most up-to-date maintenance worker salary estimates from the following platforms:
1. Glassdoor
Glassdoor is one of the most well-known platforms for employers, workers, and researchers alike.
Not only can you search for capable professionals to fill in positions/set up job alerts (whatever your goals), you can also lookup average salary figures and read employee reviews.
According to the platform, the national average for a full-time maintenance worker (as of 2020) is $39,995 per year. The overall salary range starts from $25,000 and goes all the way up to $53,000.
The aforementioned data is based on over 9,000 salary reports, collected from real maintenance workers across the US.
If you want, you can also dig deeper and filter results according to industry, size of the company, and years of experience.
2. PayScale
If one of your goals is to also search for open positions, PayScale might not be a good place to look. But for salary estimates, it’s one of the most reliable platforms out there.
As per the various reports collected from actual professionals, the average maintenance worker salary is $45,934 per year (that’s roughly an hourly wage of $18.45).
Furthermore, the platform reports that maintenance workers mostly receive healthcare benefits.
You can also see salary estimates for various cities. As of now, Chicago, Illinois, is the highest paying city for maintenance workers, whereas Pheonix, Arizona, is at the bottom of the list.
3. Salary.com
If you want to get a second opinion on a salary estimate obtained from PayScale, Salary.com is one of the best alternatives to explore right now.
According to the various salary reports collected from different people, maintenance workers, on average, earn $59,627 per year. The overall salary range typically goes from $53,860 and $66,230.
In addition to the above, the platform reports that maintenance workers also receive additional cash compensations, bringing the total average median to $60,377.
Furthermore, typical perks and benefits for this role include social security, 401k, disability, healthcare, and paid time off, among others.
Compared to other platforms, Salary.com provides a greater selection of filters to narrow down search results. You can filter your results by location, education, years of experience, level of performance, and more.
Maintenance Worker Job Description [Roles and Responsibilities]
Maintenance workers are the first line of defense when it comes to equipment failure, deterioration of assets, and unplanned downtime.
Before we move on, it’s important to note that maintenance workers are separate from maintenance technicians and maintenance mechanics. What separates them is that technicians and mechanics work in “hard-hat” settings, whereas workers are responsible for the day-to-day, general maintenance of a facility.
With that distinction out of the way, here are the typical responsibilities of a maintenance worker (whether full-time or part-time):
- Conduct Day-to-Day Maintenance Tasks – first and foremost, a maintenance worker has to sort out the daily maintenance work as instructed by a maintenance supervisor. This includes tasks like plumbing, carpentry, cleaning, landscaping, and other miscellaneous tasks like the upkeep of a refrigeration system.
- Report Progress to a Supervisor – maintenance workers have to report to a maintenance planner or a maintenance supervisor. This may entail basic working knowledge of a computerized maintenance management system (CMMS).
- Identify and Report on Maintenance-Related Issues – as part of the company’s preventive maintenance program, a maintenance worker may also be expected to closely monitor the assets that fall within their jurisdiction and report on their conditions.
- Provide Training to New Workers – additionally, an experienced maintenance worker also provides onboarding and/or on-job training to new employees.
Additionally, a maintenance worker may also be required to work on certain additional tasks that may be expected of them.
Like the maintenance worker salary, the job description of this role may also vary substantially from industry to industry. For instance, a maintenance worker at a certain facility may only be required to clean windows and the floor. Those employed elsewhere may be expected to work on machines.
Ending Note
The estimated salary figures tend to vary from year to year.
National average figures (for the better – at least for the maintenance workers) depend on various economic factors. If you’re a recruiter, keep an eye out for the latest market trends and adjust your compensation packages accordingly.
Furthermore, if you’re a candidate, always stay up-to-date with the latest salary figures, set up job alerts for new job openings.
Josh is a partner at Maintenance Manager HQ.
