THE CHART OF ACCOUNTS SETUP, IN BUILD ORDER.
A construction chart of accounts gets built in four passes, and the order decides whether the result can be used. Pass one is the cost code structure, two levels deep: a broad category at level one and a breakdown by type at level two, so a cost posts somewhere a human can read. Pass two carves out direct job expense, the nine cost types that belong to a specific job and show no physical progress on it. Pass three sets the equipment cost basis, a daily, weekly and monthly cost for every owned piece. Pass four builds the eight overhead categories, which is the only pass that can produce an overhead rate, and it can't run until the first three are done.
The order is the method here, because each pass consumes the one before it. An overhead rate divides total overhead by revenue, so it can't be computed until every cost has a home and direct job expense has taken back what belongs to the jobs. Run the passes out of sequence and the rate gets calculated over categories that still hold each other's costs, which is arithmetic performed on numbers that don't mean what their labels claim. Most books we inherit are correct to the penny and still can't produce that rate, because nobody ever built the structure underneath them.
WHAT IT MEANS.
Construction chart of accounts setup is the work of building the cost code structure, the direct job expense category, the equipment cost basis and the overhead categories in an order where each one is finished before the next depends on it.
Two levels is the whole design. Level one is a broad category and level two is a breakdown by type inside it, which is enough to read a job without turning the code list into a project of its own. One level collapses everything into a bucket called job expense, and a company that adds a third level and a fourth ends up with a list the field won't use correctly.
The equipment side gets a computed basis rather than a rate somebody guessed at. Daily, weekly and monthly cost per owned piece, worked out from how long you plan to own it, what it will cost to replace, general maintenance across the ownership period, insurance and registration, the major repairs that happen once or twice rather than annually, and your real count of annual working days after holidays and planned downtime. Rental companies charge thirteen months in a year on monthly rentals, and the CONTROL Book asks you to price your own iron the same way.
FOUR WAYS THE STRUCTURE FAILS.
One level of coding, and a bucket called job expense
A single level leaves nowhere to record what kind of cost something was, so the catch-all line grows until it holds a serious share of the job. Two levels solve it: the broad category at level one, then the type at level two. The test is whether somebody who wasn't on the job can read the cost detail afterward and say what happened out there.
Labor in dollars with no hours behind it
Burden rates differ by employee, because family coverage and retirement contributions aren't the same for two people on the same crew. A labor line that exists only in dollars can't separate a crew that took more hours than the estimate allowed from a crew whose hours were right and whose burden ran higher than the bid assumed. Dollars against dollars and hours against hours, on every code where labor or equipment can touch it.
Direct job expense has nowhere to live
Superintendents, non-working foremen, project managers, assistant project managers, safety, job trailers, storage containers, permits, and legal are all required to execute a specific job, and none of them show physical progress on it. A structure with no home for those nine cost types buries them in overhead, so every job reads cheaper than it ran and the business reads heavier than it is. The CONTROL Book carves direct job expense out as its own category for that reason.
The project manager question never gets settled
A project manager dedicated to one job at a time is a job cost. One who floats across several is overhead. A company that never writes that rule down codes the same role both ways inside a single year, and then the overhead rate moves for a reason nobody can trace back. Settle it during setup, in writing, per person.
FOUR PASSES, IN THIS SEQUENCE.
Broad category at level one, breakdown by type at level two, built from the way your estimators already write a bid so budget and actual compare line by line. Every code that can hold labor or equipment carries a dollar field and an hour field. This pass takes the longest, and everything after it's built out of it.
Give the nine cost types their own category before touching overhead, and settle the project manager rule at the same time, because that's the borderline case deciding where a large payroll line goes. Do the owner in the same sitting: owner compensation belongs in overhead at market rate for the work being done and not at whatever the draws happen to total.
One daily, weekly and monthly cost per owned piece, computed from the ownership period, the replacement cost, maintenance across that period, insurance and registration, the repairs that happen once or twice rather than annually, and your real count of annual working days. Job costing uses the daily figure. A bundled all-in hourly rate that folds the machine, the operator and the fuel into one number hides a labor overrun inside a rate that looks correct, which is why the book keeps them apart.
Office requirements, software subscriptions, administrative expenses, employee benefits and development, owned equipment idle time and normal maintenance, insurance, non-direct job employees, and everything else. Non-direct job employees is the category that decides whether the rate is right, because it holds the estimating team, the safety manager, in-house accounting, business development, the C-suite and the owner. Run those categories honestly and the rate usually comes out above what the business believed it was.
A structure one person maintains stops being current the first busy month. The cost codes, the equipment rates and the overhead calculation go into the system the company runs on, so the accounting record and the job cost record are one record rather than two that somebody reconciles at month end by guessing. Books and bank reconciliations closed by the tenth is the cadence that keeps it honest after the setup is finished.
THE OUTPUTS, NAMED.
FLAT MONTHLY FEE. NO SURPRISES.
Three tiers, priced by your trailing twelve month revenue. Which one you're in depends on how much of the work you want off your desk. No hourly billing, no payroll, and no add-ons.
Pricing
| Last 12 months revenue | Monthly fee |
|---|---|
| Up to $1M | $1,900 to $2,900 |
| $1M to $3.5M | $2,600 to $3,900 |
| $3.5M to $6.5M | $3,800 to $5,700 |
| $6.5M to $9.5M | $5,100 to $7,100 |
| $9.5M to $12.5M | $6,100 to $8,500 |
| $12.5M to $15.5M | $7,400 to $11,000 |
| $15.5M to $18.5M | $9,400 to $13,500 |
| $18.5M+ | Quoted individually |
Range reflects the three tiers below. Which one you're in depends on how much of the work you want off your desk. No payroll. No hidden line items.
You stop guessing.
You get the CFO work. Job costing built against the way you estimate, a 13 week cash forecast, monthly WIP, and a meeting every month that ends in decisions rather than a report.
Your bookkeeper keeps doing the books.
You stop touching the books.
Everything in Core, and we run the bookkeeping and the controllership as well. Nobody in your office is answering coding questions or chasing a reconciliation at month end.
We do the books. No payroll.
Every job shows its margin while it's still running.
Everything in Executive, plus the job costing and WIP platform set up, loaded with your cost codes, and managed for you every month. You never have to learn it.
We do the job costing.
FREQUENTLY ASKED.
