Job costing that shows budget vs. actual in real time
See exactly where every job stands: budget, committed cost from purchase orders, actual cost from approved vendor bills, and remaining — updated the moment you approve a bill. No spreadsheets, no month-end surprises.
The problem
Most builders don't know a job is over budget until the final invoice. Estimates live in one place, POs in another, and vendor bills in a shoebox — so there's no single number for what a job has actually committed and spent versus what it was budgeted.
How BuildersBridge solves it
Budget → Committed → Billed → Remaining
Every active job shows its budget, committed cost from open POs, actual billed cost from approved bills, and what's left — as one live row.
Purchase orders that commit cost
Issue POs to suppliers and subs; their totals become the job's committed cost automatically.
Bills that become actuals
Approve a vendor bill and it rolls straight into the job's actual cost and the remaining-budget figure.
Change orders that protect margin
Approved change orders update the contract and budget so scope changes never quietly erode profit.
Frequently asked questions
- Are job costing programs different from full construction software?
- Standalone job costing programs tell you what a job consumed, but somebody still has to feed them the budget and the bills. Here the budget arrives from the approved estimate and the costs arrive from purchase orders and vendor bills already in the system, so the costing is a view of work that already happened rather than a second round of data entry.
- What is job costing in construction?
- Job costing tracks the money on a specific project — its budget, the costs committed via purchase orders and subcontracts, and the actual costs billed — so a builder can see budget-vs-actual and protect margin before the job is finished.
- How does committed cost differ from actual cost?
- Committed cost is money you've obligated through purchase orders that haven't been billed yet. Actual (billed) cost is what approved vendor bills have added. BuildersBridge shows both, plus remaining budget, on every job.
- Does approving a bill update the budget?
- Yes — immediately. When you approve a vendor bill against a project, the job's billed total and remaining budget recalculate in real time.
- Can I see profit across all active jobs?
- The Financials view rolls budget, committed, billed, and remaining across every active job, so you see company-wide exposure at a glance.
- What does a budget variance look like here?
- A job budgeted at $80,000 with $52,000 committed on POs and $31,000 billed shows $28,000 uncommitted and flags when committed-plus-billed passes budget — the variance is visible mid-job, not at the final invoice.
See job costing software done right
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