The cost tracker shows you, while a job is still running, whether it will keep the profit you priced in. You put in what you quoted, the profit you want to keep and the sections you priced the job in. Then you add costs as you pay them, and the page tells you if you're on track or eating into your profit. Only your team's admins see it.
Open the project and click Cost tracker, under Money in the project's sidebar.
Click Set up costs.
Under What did you quote?, check the amount. It's the project's Estimated value, so changing it here changes that too.
Under How much profit do you want to keep?, pick % or £ and type the profit. The line beside it says how much that leaves to spend.
Under Split the £… into sections, type a name and a budget for each part of the job, like the sections you priced it in. Click Add a section for another one.
Click Start tracking.
You don't have to split every pound before you start. Anything you leave is tracked as Not in a section. The bar under the sections turns green and says Adds up once it's all split.
Your own team's wages are a section like any other. Add a section for labour and type the wages in as costs.
On the project's Cost tracker, click Add a cost.
Type the amount under How much?.
Pick the section under Which section?, or Not in a section.
Pick the day it was spent under When?.
If you like, say what it was under What for? (optional), for example the skip hire or the merchant.
Under How far through is … now?, pick Not started, ¼, ½, ¾ or Done for that section.
Check the box at the bottom. It shows what this cost does to the section and to your profit before you save.
Click Add to and the section's name, or Add cost if it's not in a section.
Click a section's row to open it. There you can:
Change its Budget and click Save.
Set How far through is it? as the work moves on.
See every cost against it under Costs, and delete one that went in by mistake.
Click Add a cost, or Client agreed an extra.
Open the section the extra belongs to.
Click Client agreed an extra.
Say what the extra is, then fill in You charge the client and It costs you about.
Click Add the extra.
The project's Estimated value goes up by what you charge. The section's budget goes up by what it costs you, and the difference is added to your profit target. To take an extra off, delete it under Extras the client agreed in the section.
Click Change quote and sections at the top right of the page.
Make your changes.
Click Save.
Removing a section moves its costs to Not in a section, so nothing you've added is lost.
The headline at the top is the answer:
Nothing spent yet: no costs added so far.
On track to keep your profit: spending is heading for your budget or less.
Money is running ahead of the work: spending is heading over your budget, so it's eating into your profit.
Heading for a loss: the job is heading to cost more than the client pays.
Under it, Money spent shows how much of your budget has gone, next to Time gone, which comes from the project's start and finish dates. Tasks done shows too when the project has tasks.
On the chart, the solid line is what you've spent so far, and the grey line is a steady pace that lands on your budget at the finish. The dashed line shows where spending is heading. Hover over the chart to see, for that day, what you'd spent, where the steady pace was, and how far above or below it you were.
Each section's row says On track, May go over, Paid upfront (a deposit's gone out but the work hasn't started), Not started, or how much it's already over.
Each section is worked out on its own, then they're added up:
A section marked Done counts at what it cost.
A section under way counts at what it's spent, scaled up by how far through it is. £1,650 spent a quarter of the way through heads for £6,600.
A section not started counts at its budget, even if a deposit has gone out, unless it has already spent more than that.
The total is rounded to the nearest £100, because it's only as good as the "how far through" you've picked. Keeping that up to date makes the biggest difference to it.
It depends on whether your business is VAT registered. Click Settings, then Cost tracker, and answer Is your business VAT registered?:
Yes, we're VAT registered: leave VAT out of the quote and the costs. You claim it back, so it isn't a cost to the job.
No, we're not: include VAT, because it's a real cost for you.
Until you choose, Buildscout counts your team as VAT registered. In Australia it's GST rather than VAT.
Click Settings, then Cost tracker.
Under Usual profit target, type a percentage of the quote.
Click Save.
New jobs start with this target, and you can change it on any job.
Only your team's admins can see it, because it shows the business's figures. It's never shown on the client portal or to subcontractors, and it isn't in the phone app.
The project is complete. A finished job's costs can't be changed. The headline says what profit you made against your target, and each section shows how it came out against its budget.
The cost tracker needs an internet connection. A job's costs aren't kept on your device, so it can't open offline.
