Project
£25/mo · included from CoreJob costing with a baseline you can measure against
A budget that shifts every time somebody tweaks the estimate can’t show you variance against anything. So the baseline gets frozen on purpose, as a version, and re-baselining makes a new one rather than overwriting the old. Cost breaks down against your own cost code tree. Actuals land in six categories. On top of that sits a dated cost-to-complete forecast that reconciles against the baseline and the actuals both. Included from Core up.
What the Job Costing module does
- Holds your cost breakdown structure as a tree: cost codes with a parent, a code, a name and a category.
- Freezes a job budget as a versioned baseline with a status of draft, active or superseded, and records who baselined it and when.
- Splits the budget into lines against cost codes and categories.
- Records actual cost entries against a job, a category, a cost code and a date, with a reference and an optional link to the purchase order that generated them.
- Uses six cost categories: labour, material, plant, subcontractor, preliminaries and other.
- Holds a cost-to-complete and forecast final cost per cost code at a period end, with the author recorded.
- Treats forecast final cost as a dated commercial judgement rather than a sum the software worked out. Somebody has to make that call, and their name goes on it.
Job Costing: how it works
What is a CVR and how does Estimark support one?
A cost value reconciliation sets the value you’ve earned on a job against the cost you’ve incurred, at a stated date, so you get a real margin rather than whatever the bank balance implies. Estimark keeps the three inputs apart: a frozen baseline budget, actual costs by cost code and category, and a dated cost-to-complete judgement your commercial manager enters at period end.
- Baseline: frozen on purpose, versioned, and superseded rather than overwritten when you re-baseline.
- Actual: cost entries by date, category and cost code, including those generated from purchase orders.
- Forecast: a cost-to-complete and a forecast final cost per cost code at period end, with the name of whoever made the call.
Why is the budget frozen instead of derived from the estimate?
Because a budget that recalculates itself from the estimate shifts every time the estimate does, and then nobody can say what the variance against the original was. So Estimark takes a snapshot and keeps it. Re-baseline and you get a new version with the old one marked superseded. What you thought the job would cost in March is still there in September.
What is a cost breakdown structure and why does it matter?
A tree of cost codes rather than a flat list of categories. Costs used to hang off a job under one of five categories, so an M&E contractor couldn’t report by system and nobody could see the cost of a package. A parent-child tree of codes is all a CBS or WBS ever was. It gets you from "materials" to "materials, second fix, plot 14".
Job Costing: at a glance
- Plan
- Included from Core
- Add-on price
- £25/month
- Cost categories
- 6
- Budget
- Frozen, versioned baseline
Job Costing
£25per month
Job Costing is a bundled module. Plans are a ladder, so it comes with Core and with Pro, Enterprise. On a lower plan you can switch it on by itself for £25 a month.
Included from Core, £129 a month
- Included on Core and above at no extra cost.
- £25 per month as an individual module on a lower plan.
- Included in full during the 14-day free trial.
- No implementation fee and no minimum term.
Questions
Job Costing: frequently asked
Which plan includes job costing?
It’s included from Core up. On a lower plan it’s £25 a month on its own.
Does Estimark calculate the forecast final cost for me?
No, and that’s on purpose. Forecast final cost is a commercial judgement, not arithmetic. Estimark holds the judgement, dates it, puts a name to it, and reconciles it against the baseline and the actuals. That’s what a CVR is for.
Where do actual costs come from?
Timesheet hours at their rate. Purchase orders and supplier invoices. Van stock booked to the job. And entries somebody types in directly. Every one of them arrives with a date, a category and a cost code.
Can I re-baseline a budget mid-job?
Yes. You get a new budget version and the old one is marked superseded, so "how does this compare with the original" is still a question you can answer.
Related
Payment Applications
The value side: interim applications, certification and retention.
Purchase Orders
Committed cost from open orders.
Timesheets
Labour hours at a rate, booked to the job.
For builders & contractors
Pro at £299/month. Payment applications, HR, training, plant and fleet.
Job costing & CVR
Actual, committed and forecast cost per job, with a cost value reconciliation pack.
Payment applications & retention
Interim applications, retention, payment and pay-less notices under the Construction Act.
Pricing & plans
Solo £39, Core £129 and Pro £299 a month plus seats. Enterprise is quoted. Bolt-ons are priced separately.
Try it on a real job.
14 days, full access, every plan. No implementation fee.