The pay structure of travel therapy is the thing that makes the income so good. It’s also the thing that confuses almost every new traveler and gets actively obscured by agencies that benefit from you not understanding it. After 30-plus contracts I can explain it clearly. Here’s the full picture.
A travel therapy pay package has two parts: a taxable hourly wage and non-taxable stipends for housing, meals, and travel — so the right way to compare offers is by estimated take-home, not headline gross. Because stipends arrive untaxed while roughly 25–30% is withheld from wages, two packages with identical gross can pay very differently.
The Two-Part Structure: Taxable Wage + Non-Taxable Stipends
Every travel therapy pay package has two components. These are not interchangeable and they are not equivalent in take-home value.
Taxable hourly wage: This is treated exactly like a standard paycheck. Federal income tax, state income tax, Social Security, and Medicare are all taken out before you receive it. The tax burden on this portion is roughly 25–30% for most travelers, depending on tax bracket and state.
Non-taxable stipends: These are reimbursements for expenses you’re incurring by working away from home — housing, meals and incidentals, and sometimes travel. They arrive in your paycheck untaxed, because the IRS treats them as reimbursements for duplicate living costs, not as income. This only applies if you maintain a legitimate tax home. (See our tax guide for the full explanation of that requirement, or run your situation through the Tax Home Checker.)
A practical example: a package with a $22/hour taxable rate at 40 hours per week ($880/week taxable) plus $1,220/week in stipends produces roughly $2,040–$2,080/week in take-home after taxes on the taxable portion. The $1,220 arrives whole. A permanent PT making $1,800/week gross, fully taxable, takes home roughly $1,330–$1,440. The travel package has better take-home even though the gross weekly numbers look closer than you’d expect, because most of the travel package is untaxed. Understanding this structure is the first step; several other levers move your take-home even further, which we cover in how to maximize your take-home pay.
Current ProTherapy Pay Ranges
At ProTherapy Staffing, pay packages currently range from $2,000 to $3,500 per week gross, with the average new assignment around $2,100/week. The range reflects differences in specialty, setting, and geographic demand:
- SNF assignments in mid-demand areas typically come in at the lower-middle of the range
- Acute care and outpatient assignments in high-demand markets or rural areas often come in at the higher end
- SLP assignments frequently command above-average rates due to consistent shortage across settings
- 26-week contracts sometimes offer a modest pay premium for the longer commitment
Use our pay calculator to get a specific estimate for your specialty, target setting, and target state. And if you’re weighing assignments in different states, see our guide to the highest-paying states for travel therapy — gross pay alone can mislead once state taxes and cost of living are factored in.
How to Actually Compare Two Offers
The most common mistake travelers make when comparing offers is looking at only one number. Here is the right way to compare:
Step 1: Get the full itemized breakdown from both agencies
Ask for: taxable hourly rate, guaranteed hours per week, housing stipend per week, M&IE stipend per week, any other stipends. Write them down side by side. Do not accept a blended rate or a single weekly number without the breakdown. Any agency that won’t give you the breakdown is hiding how the package is structured.
Step 2: Calculate weekly gross for each
Taxable wage × guaranteed hours + all stipends = weekly gross. This is your headline comparison number, but it’s not the whole picture.
Step 3: Estimate take-home using after-tax wage calculation
Your take-home is: (taxable wage × hours × estimated after-tax rate) + all stipends. Estimated after-tax rate is typically 70–75% of taxable, depending on your situation. Stipends arrive at 100% because they’re not taxed. This number is your actual weekly income before housing costs.
Step 4: Subtract estimated housing costs
Housing costs in your target market are a real variable. A high gross package in San Francisco with a $1,400/week housing stipend may net you less after housing than a lower gross package in Omaha with an $800/week housing stipend, if San Francisco housing actually costs $1,200/week and Omaha housing costs $600/week. Do this math before you commit to a location based purely on the pay package headline. Our travel therapy housing guide covers how to spend less than your stipend and keep the difference.
Step 5: Add benefits dollar value
Health insurance, 401(k) match, license reimbursement, and CEU allowance all have real dollar values. Add them to your comparison. But be honest about the math: a 3% 401(k) match on a $22,000 annual taxable wage is worth about $660/year, or roughly $50/week. If the same agency is paying $150/week less in total compensation, the benefits don’t offset the gap.
This is false. Facilities pay agencies a per-hour contract rate. How that rate is split between the agency’s margin and the therapist’s compensation is entirely determined by the agency. I have personally compared pay packages with another PT working at the same facility through a different agency and found we were earning $180/week different in gross pay. That’s $2,340 over a 13-week contract — gone, because one of us was with a leaner agency and one wasn’t. The market rate is not the same at every agency. The agencies that tell you it is are the ones keeping more of your money.
Completion Bonuses
Completion bonuses are lump-sum payments paid when you complete the full contract term. They range from a few hundred to several thousand dollars and add meaningfully to effective weekly compensation. A $1,500 completion bonus on a 13-week contract adds $115/week to your effective pay. Ask specifically about completion bonuses on every contract: what is the amount, what exactly triggers it, and what happens if the facility cancels early versus if you leave early?
Benefits: What to Ask For and What Actually Matters
- Health insurance: Is it available from day one? What is the weekly premium? What are the deductibles and out-of-pocket maximums? First-day coverage with a low premium is a meaningful benefit; a 30-day waiting period with a high premium is much less valuable.
- 401(k) or Roth IRA: Is there an employer match? When does vesting begin? A match with no vesting period is significantly better than one with a multi-year cliff.
- License reimbursement: Does the agency cover the cost of new state license applications? This is standard at good agencies and should be expected, not celebrated as exceptional.
- CEU reimbursement: Does the agency provide a CEU subscription or flat allowance? Especially valuable if you’re holding multiple active state licenses with different CE requirements.
- Referral bonuses: If you refer a colleague who accepts a placement, does the agency pay a bonus? If you’re going to refer colleagues anyway, know what the agency pays.
The Guaranteed Hours Clause
One often-overlooked component of the pay package is the guaranteed hours clause. Most contracts guarantee 36–40 hours per week. If the facility has a slow census week and can’t fill your schedule, you’re still owed pay for the guaranteed hours. Before you sign, confirm: what is the guaranteed hours number, and what happens to your stipend if guaranteed hours aren’t met? Some contracts prorate stipends with hours; others don’t. The difference can be significant in a bad census week.
Red Flag: The Package That Changes Between Verbal and Written
If the written contract pay package differs from what was quoted verbally, that is a problem regardless of how small the difference is. I’ve had this happen twice in my career, and both times I should have walked away from the agency after the first occurrence. Legitimate agencies do not quote one number and write another. The verbal offer and the written contract are the same number. If they’re not, that pattern will repeat.
At ProTherapy Staffing, the number we quote is the number in the contract. No per-contract haggling, no bait-and-switch. Use our pay calculator to see what a ProTherapy package looks like for your specialty and target setting, then talk to our team or call (484) 324-8320 to verify it in a real conversation.