How much does a virtual assistant cost in the UK?

If you have never worked with a virtual assistant (VA) before, the first question is almost always the same: what will it cost? The honest answer is that it depends on how much support you need and how you choose to pay for it – but the good news is that a VA is almost always cheaper than employing someone, because you only pay for the time you actually use.

Here is how virtual assistant pricing works in the UK, what drives the cost up or down, and how to work out whether it is worth it for your business.

The short answer

Most UK virtual assistants charge somewhere between £35 and £45 per hour, depending on their experience and the type of work. You can usually pay as you go by the hour, or agree a monthly package of hours at a lower effective rate. There is no salary, no holiday or sick pay, no pension, no National Insurance and no office costs – you simply pay for the work that gets done.

The main ways a VA charges

At ETC Virtual you can buy support by the hour, day, week or month, so you are never locked into paying for time you do not need. Every new client also gets a free 30-minute consultation so you can talk through what you need before anything is agreed.

What affects the cost

• How much you delegate. A few hours of inbox and diary management each week costs far less than day-to-day management of your whole back office.
• How specialist the work is. General admin sits at the lower end; bookkeeping support, research or project work can sit higher.
• How predictable it is. A regular monthly package is usually better value per hour than occasional ad-hoc calls.
• When you need it. Urgent work outside normal office hours is charged at a higher rate.

VA vs employee: the real comparison

When people compare a VA’s hourly rate to a salaried wage, they are not comparing like for like. An employee costs far more than their headline salary once you add employer’s National Insurance, pension contributions, holiday pay, sick pay, equipment, software and desk space – and you pay for their time whether the work is there or not.

A virtual assistant carries none of those overheads. You pay for productive time only, scale it up or down as your workload changes, and there is no recruitment cost to get started. For most sole traders and small businesses, that makes a VA the more flexible and cost-effective choice.

So, is it worth it?

A useful way to decide is to look at what your own time is worth. If you are spending hours each week on admin that someone else could do for £35–£45 an hour, and that time could instead go into billable work, sales or simply getting your evenings back, a VA usually pays for itself quickly.

Frequently asked questions