Four ways to build an estimate

The bill editor

One screen, and everything you need on it.

A new estimate opens as Revision 1. Sections run down the left, the bill grid takes the centre, the Data Sheet sits under it showing how the selected item is built up, your template library and resources are on the right, and the totals run along the bottom and move as you work.

Estimate · Revision 1Section 2 — Roof coverings

Item	Description	Qty	Unit	Rate	Total	Came from
2.01	Warm roof, TPO mechanically fixed	1,240	SF	9.999	12,398.76	Takeoff VEC
2.02	Perimeter edge trim, powder coated	318	LF	24.10	7,663.80	Template
2.03	Rainwater outlets, complete	6	EA	186.40	1,118.40	Typed
2.04	Parapet capping — north elevation	—	LF	—	—	GAP imported

There is no rate on the item — the rate comes from its build-up

Why the item has no rate Because a rate you type is a rate nobody can check. The item's rate is whatever its build-up costs: the resources it consumes, at your rates, with your factors and waste. Change a line in the build-up and the rate follows. That is what makes the internal cost report worth reading.

Route 01

Import the client's bill, and price it back to them.

Drop their workbook on the project vault. The import shows you the whole spreadsheet — every tab, as it looks — rather than asking you to describe it first and hope. Point at the description, unit and quantity columns, correct the guess if it is wrong, tick the rows you want, and import.

The whole workbookTabs and all

Bills of quantities arrive with cover sheets, preliminaries and four trades you are not bidding. You see the lot and take the part that is yours.

Column mappingGuessed, then confirmed

It marks which columns look like description, unit and quantity. If the guess is wrong you change it before anything is created.

Row selectionTick-all, shift-click

Tick-all takes the tab; shift-click extends a range. Headers and subtotal rows stay out.

A row with no numberGAP

Arrives as a named gap carrying its reason, not as a zero and not as a guess. Fill it by measuring it or by typing the figure — either way it is recorded as yours.

Then measure against itOptional

Open the drawings and attach measurements to the imported lines. Units are checked as you do it: an area cannot feed a linear-foot line.

A simpler listStraight import

Where the spreadsheet really is just a list, a direct Excel import turns each row into a bill line without the picker.

Route 02

Type the bill, and build each item up from your resources.

Name a section, add an item, and fill in the cells the way you would a spreadsheet — double-click, type, Enter. Then select the item, open its build-up, and add the resources it takes.

Sections you control

Give each a code and a title, add as many as the bill needs, and rename one by double-clicking its band in the grid. Items drag between sections and re-price under where they land.

Build-up lines

Add resource picks from the database this job is pinned to. Set each line's quantity per bill unit; the factors and waste columns are the same ones your templates use.

Free-text lines

Something not in the book — a one-off hire, a specialist's day rate — goes in as a free-text line with its own rate, without polluting your library with a row you will never use again.

Several build-ups per item

An item can carry more than one, each on its own tab: a base build-up and an alternative, or the supply and the fix. They total into the one item.

Promote what works

A build-up you typed for this job and would use again becomes a template with Create template from build-up. Your library grows out of real jobs.

Numbering that behaves

Items are numbered for you and stay unique. Re-sequence a section when you have finished rearranging it, rather than fighting the numbers while you work.

Routes 03 & 04

From the drawings, and from the library.

03 · Push it from a takeoff

Measurements you have traced and confirmed on the drawing go across as bill lines: pick the estimate, pick the section, push. The quantity arrives with its working and its VEC tag intact, so the bill knows the number came off a sheet at a stated scale and can prove it. Push more later and it adds to the same estimate rather than replacing it — a takeoff done in stages is normal, not a special case. How the measuring works.

04 · Drop in a template

As its own bill itemInsert as new item puts the template on the bill as a line of its own. Set the quantity and every resource in the recipe scales with it.
As an assembly on an item you wroteAdd to selected item lands the whole recipe as a build-up under your own item — the usual way a described bill item gets priced.
Editable for this job onlyChange a line, a factor or a waste figure and it applies here. It never reaches back into the template in your library.
Priced at the pinned versionThe estimate holds the database version it was built against, so what you dropped in stays what you quoted.

Revisions, not overwrites An estimate is a revision. Duplicate one to try the job a different way — a different system, a leaner build-up, a second look at the market — and the copy carries the same pinned rates, so the two are actually comparable. The one you sent stays exactly as you sent it.

Questions

The questions people ask about this.

The client sent their bill of quantities as a spreadsheet. Can I price that directly?

Yes, and it is one of the routes the software is built around. The import shows you the whole workbook as it looks — every tab, including the cover sheets and the trades you are not bidding — you point at the description, unit and quantity columns, tick the rows that are yours, and import. Then you price them.

What happens to a row that has no quantity against it?

It arrives as a named GAP line carrying the reason it has no number, rather than as a zero or a guess. You fill it by measuring it on the drawings or by typing the figure yourself, and either way it is recorded as yours. An import never invents a quantity.

Can I mix imported, measured and typed lines in one estimate?

Yes. An imported section, a measured section and a section you typed sit side by side in the same bill and total together. Each line keeps a record of where it came from, so mixing them costs you nothing in traceability.

Why is there no rate field on a bill item?

Because the rate is whatever the item's build-up costs: the resources it consumes, at your rates, with your factors and your waste. Type a rate and nobody can check it later. Build it up and the internal cost report can show exactly how the number was arrived at.

Can I try the same job two different ways?

Duplicate the revision. The copy carries the same pinned rates, so a leaner build-up or an alternative system can be compared against the original like for like. The revision you sent stays exactly as you sent it.

If I change a build-up on one job, does my library change?

No. Local edits stay local — a change inside an estimate never reaches back into the template it came from. When a build-up is good enough to keep, you promote it to the library deliberately with Create template from build-up.

Four ways in. The same bill at the end.