WIP MANIPULATION WARNING SIGNS.
Because cost-to-complete estimates rely on judgment, a WIP schedule can be manipulated, intentionally or not, to smooth earnings or hide a struggling job. Warning signs include cost-to-complete estimates that never change month to month, percentage-complete figures that round suspiciously evenly, and a job that keeps reporting healthy progress while the cash from it never shows in the bank.
Percentage-of-completion accounting calculates progress as cost incurred divided by total estimated cost, and that total estimated cost is a forecast rather than a fact. Forecasts can be adjusted to produce a preferred outcome. Sometimes that's deliberate earnings smoothing and sometimes it's just an unwillingness to update a number that carries bad news, but the signals look similar either way: figures that stay too static, percentages that look too clean, and a distance between what the WIP schedule reports and what the cash position shows.
WHAT IT MEANS.
WIP manipulation is the adjustment of cost-to-complete estimates or percentage-complete figures, deliberately or through reluctance to report bad news, to produce a preferred reported outcome rather than an accurate one.
A cost-to-complete estimate that's kept too low can make a struggling job look on track for months, deferring the bad news until the job closes and the truth can no longer be avoided. Nobody has to falsify a document for that to happen. All it takes is a number that never gets challenged in a room where somebody who runs the job every day is present.
Three beliefs keep the problem alive. The first is that the cost-to-complete estimates haven't changed because the job is going as planned, when real construction jobs almost always encounter some variance and an estimate that never moves across many months is unusual enough to warrant a closer look. The second is that the percentages look clean because the estimating is very accurate, when accurate estimating produces slightly irregular figures instead of repeated round ones. The third is that manipulation is an audit concern rather than something to watch for internally, when by the time an external audit catches it the underlying problem has often been compounding for months.
WHAT MANIPULATION LOOKS LIKE.
The cost-to-complete estimate never changes
An estimate that doesn't move month to month, even as the job progresses and site conditions change, is one of the clearest signals. Real jobs encounter real variance from weather, site conditions, and scope changes. An estimate that never moves suggests it's not being genuinely reassessed, and that's worth investigating rather than accepting at face value.
The percentages round too cleanly
Percentage-complete figures that consistently round to suspiciously even numbers are worth a closer look. Genuinely accurate estimating produces realistic and often slightly irregular figures as conditions play out on the job. Repeated round numbers usually mean the figure is being managed rather than calculated.
The job reports progress the cash doesn't support
A job that reports healthy progress on the WIP schedule while the cash collected from it lags far behind is a divergence worth investigating. The two should generally move together, because billing follows progress and collection follows billing. When they separate by a lot, one of the two numbers is wrong.
THE STRUCTURAL FIX.
The strongest protection is a meeting where cost-to-complete estimates get actively questioned and compared against job conditions reported by whoever is running the job day to day. A report distributed by email gets read and filed. A meeting produces a challenged number, and a challenged number is the one that stays honest.
Periodically compare what the WIP schedule predicted on a completed job against what happened on it. That comparison tells you whether the estimating discipline behind the numbers is holding up over time. It's the only test that uses a known answer, which is what makes it worth running.
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.
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