Custom field operations platform for 100+ field workers

Software that covers four jobs: quotes and estimating, scheduling your crews, site follow-up with work orders, and invoicing, which in Belgium goes over Peppol for business clients. For most small contractors an off-the-shelf construction package does that well enough. Custom software pays off when your way of working does not fit such a package, or when your office retypes data from one program into another. Then we connect the software you already use to one database.

For most small contractors that is crew scheduling software, which decides who goes to which site tomorrow. Project planning is a different job. It splits a project into phases on a timeline, usually as a Gantt chart. In the field operations platform on this page, the planner creates tasks, picks people by skill and availability, and the schedule then shows up in the app of whoever does the work.

There are four kinds. A spreadsheet costs nothing and everyone knows it, but the crew only sees a change when someone sends it on. A general scheduling app runs on any phone, but knows nothing about your sites and work orders. A construction package ties the schedule to sites and invoices, though you then work the way the package wants. A scheduling board of your own runs on your own jobs, but has to be built first.

Yes. A spreadsheet or a free general scheduling tool is enough while you schedule one crew. It breaks once there are several crews, the schedule changes during the day, or someone in the office retypes it into work orders and invoices. At that point the retyping takes more time than the scheduling. The agency in this case study started with schedules in Excel too.

A tool your crews use without being shown how. For a contractor, simple means one screen per day that shows who is where. It works on a phone, also on a site with poor reception. And a change made in the office reaches the crew straight away, with no phone call to chase it. Try a tool with one crew for a week before you decide.

It depends on your sites. Software with phases and a Gantt chart pays off on large projects, where subcontractors follow each other and materials have to be ordered weeks ahead. If you split crews over smaller jobs every day, as an installer or a renovation company does, a good day schedule helps you more. If you need both, let the day schedule follow from the phases.

AI can propose a schedule, and a planner approves or changes it. The proposal follows rules, such as who has which skill, the distance between sites and the deadlines. AI also flags conflicts, such as a crew booked in two places at once. For that, your jobs, your crews and their availability first need to be in one place. While the schedule is spread over separate spreadsheets, AI has nothing to work from.

Estimating software works out what a job costs and what you charge for it, from quantities, unit prices, hours and your margin. A good one keeps your unit prices, shows the margin per line item and keeps every version of a quote. The estimate becomes a quote, and later an invoice, without anyone retyping it.

There are three kinds. A price library supplies unit prices and standard line items to build an estimate from. A construction package often has a quote module that ties the estimate to the site and the invoice. A quote calculator of your own works with your prices and rules. For smaller trades it can sit on their own website, so a client works out an indicative price before calling.

Yes, free spreadsheets and templates exist for making an estimate. What they lack is job costing: comparing your estimate with the hours and materials the site actually took. That is where margin disappears, because without the comparison you never see which line items you keep underestimating. The platform in this case study shows, per task, what was planned and what it actually cost.

Work per job, in five steps. Measure the quantities. Put unit prices for materials and equipment next to them. Estimate the labour hours per line item and multiply them by your hourly cost. Add your overheads and your margin. After the job, compare the estimate with the real hours and materials, and adjust the unit prices where you were off. That makes the next quote more accurate.