Airtasker is the marketplace most Australian and New Zealand detailers start on, and Bark is the one they get emailed about. Both work. The question is what they cost once the job is on the calendar, and what you are left with when you stop. This article runs the numbers on two jobs a detailer does every week, a $150 full detail and a $1,200 ceramic coating, and then looks at the part the fee table leaves out: who owns the customer.

How Airtasker and Bark charge

Airtasker takes a service fee of 12.5% to 20% of the task price, plus tax, charged when you are assigned. The percentage falls as you climb the Tasker tiers. There is no subscription and no fee for a bid you lose. The Australian site lists 158 car detailing Taskers and a median detailing job of $150; the New Zealand site lists about 50 and an average job of $80 to $180 NZD.

Bark charges per lead. You buy credits at $3.40 AUD or $3.30 NZD each, every lead shows its credit cost before you respond, the cost rises with the size of the job, and the same lead is sold to other detailers. Credits expire after three months. You pay whether or not the customer replies.

Oneflare, the other marketplace detailers used, closed on 30 June 2026 and its traffic now goes to Airtasker.

The $150 full detail

On Airtasker at a 15% fee, a $150 detail nets $127.50. Add the time to write a bid, answer questions and wait for assignment, and the effective cost of the job is the $22.50 fee plus perhaps half an hour of admin. For a new detailer with no reviews and an empty Tuesday, that is a fair trade: the job pays for the fuel and the review builds the profile.

On Bark, a $150 detail lead might cost five or six credits, call it $20, and go to four detailers. Win one in four and each booked $150 job cost $80 in credits. Win one in three and it cost $60. Either way it is a thin job, which is why most detailers on Bark chase the bigger enquiries and let the washes go.

With your own ads, the detailing accounts Detail Up runs average $14.70 per tracked enquiry on Google and $11.86 per lead on Meta (figures on the results page). At a one-in-two booking rate, the $150 job costs about $30 to win, the customer called you, and they are yours to rebook. On a single $150 job the three channels are within $50 of each other. The difference is what happens next.

The $1,200 ceramic coating

Here the commission model breaks. Airtasker's 15% on a $1,200 coating is $180, more than the marketing cost of the job through any other channel, and Airtasker's own median of $150 tells you coating customers rarely post there in the first place. A detailer who wants coating work is fishing in the wrong pond.

Bark prices leads by job size, so a coating lead costs more credits, perhaps $40 to $50, and still goes to several detailers. At one in three the booked coating cost $120 to $150 in credits, plus the quotes you wrote for the two you lost. That is workable on a $1,200 ticket, but you are competing on price with three strangers for a job that should be sold on your portfolio.

With your own Google Ads, a person searching "ceramic coating" plus your suburb lands on your ceramic coating page, sees your work and your reviews, and calls. Even at a conservative $40 per enquiry and one in two booked, the coating cost $80 to win. At Detail Up's account averages it is nearer $30. On a $1,200 job that is 2.5% instead of 15%.

Melbourne studios publish ceramic coatings at $500 to $2,500 and full-car film at $4,000 to $7,000. Run the same maths on a $5,000 film job and the marketplace fee is $750. Nobody running their own ads pays $750 to win one job.

Who owns the customer

This is the part the fee comparison hides. On a marketplace the customer belongs to the platform. The review sits on the platform's profile, the booking history sits in the platform's app, and the next time that customer wants a detail the platform shows them every detailer in the area again. You rented the introduction and the rent is due every time.

When the customer finds you through your own website, your Google Business Profile or your ad, the review lands on your Google listing, the phone number is in their contacts, and the six-month maintenance wash comes to you without a fee. Two years on Airtasker leaves you with two years of fee statements. Two years of your own marketing leaves a site that ranks, a review base, an ad account with two years of conversion data, and a customer list you can message before every hail season.

Exclusivity changes the win rate

A Bark lead is sold to several detailers by design. A hipages lead goes to up to three. An Airtasker job takes bids from anyone. Every one of those channels makes you the cheapest of several options, and the customer often goes with whoever answers first. An enquiry from your own ad or your own ranking is one customer talking to one detailer, which is why booking rates of one in two are normal on owned channels and one in four is normal on shared ones. Detail Up goes one step further and sells each territory to one detailer only, so the ads we run in your suburbs are never also running for your competitor. See how it works.

When Airtasker still makes sense

  • You are new, have no reviews, and need paying work this week.
  • You have spare capacity midweek and are happy to fill it with $100 to $200 jobs at a 12.5% to 20% fee.
  • You are testing a new area before committing to marketing there.

In each case, take the job, do it well, and ask the customer to leave a Google review as well as an Airtasker one. That way the marketplace job builds an asset you own.

What to do next

Read what the lead generation system includes, put your own ticket sizes into the lead value calculator, and book a call to check whether your territory is open.

Sources

Third-party prices and terms were checked on 28 September 2026 and can change — check the platform's own page before deciding. Detail Up's own figures come from the accounts on the results page.