CONTROLQORE FOR BRIDGE CONTRACTORS.
Generic accounting software can't report cost per unit against a measured DOT bid item, carry a cofferdam as the engineered structure it is, or tell you whether new construction or rehab is the side of your business that pays. ControlQore can.
ControlQore for bridge contractors builds cost codes two ways at once: by measured bid item, so actual cost per unit can be read against the unit price bid, and by structure phase, meaning mobilization, temporary works, foundations and piers, steel erection, deck, and rehab work. Falsework, cofferdams, and causeways get their own codes with design, erection, carry, and removal inside them. In-water permit windows sit on the cash forecast as milestones, because a missed window slides foundation work a season. The WIP schedule is produced monthly from cost-to-cost percentage complete, which is the same schedule the surety reads when it sets your bonding limit.
Bridge contractors at $1M to $5M net 6 percent before taxes on the SPM 48-trade dataset, and the CFOS target at that revenue is 10 percent. Gross margin for bridge at the same revenue reads 22 percent, derived from the nearest comparable trade in that dataset rather than measured directly, so treat it as a reference point. The distance between 6 and 10 isn't a bidding problem. It's the cost of a cofferdam nobody coded, an overrun on a measured quantity nobody priced per unit, and a permit window that cost a season, and none of the three are visible in a P&L.
THE NUMBERS GENERIC SOFTWARE MISSES.
WHAT IT IS.
ControlQore is a job costing and WIP platform for contractors that tracks cost by job and cost code, so a bridge contractor can read cost per unit against each measured bid item, with falsework, cofferdams, and causeways carried as their own cost centers, while the structure is still going up.
WHERE IT GOES WRONG.
Temporary Works Priced Inside General Conditions
Cofferdams, falsework, shoring, and causeways are engineered structures built inside the project, with their own design, materials, and erection cost, and they can rival permanent line items before they demobilize as pure expense. Carried inside a general conditions allowance, none of that cost is measurable against what the bid assumed. Underpricing temporary works is the classic wound in this trade, and it repeats every time because the last job never produced a number to correct it.
No Cost Per Unit Against the Bid Item
DOT work pays on measured quantities at unit prices, which means overruns and underruns are ordinary rather than exceptional. Without actual cost per unit by bid item, an overrun looks like extra revenue and an underrun looks like nothing at all, when the truth depends on whether that item was priced above or below what it costs you to build. Final measurement is the wrong time to find out, because by then the crew is on the next structure.
In-Water Windows Nowhere on the Cash Forecast
USACE Section 404 and state Section 401 authorizations, fish passage restrictions, and flow limits decide when piers, cofferdams, and in-channel work can proceed at all. A window missed by two weeks slides that work a season, and the cost of the slide is carried in crew, equipment, and bonding capacity and not in any single line item. When permit dates live in a project manager's inbox instead of on the forecast, the slide is discovered as a cash problem months after it became a schedule problem.
Rehab and New Construction in One Blended P&L
Federal inspection standards keep the bridge inventory on a rating cycle, and those ratings drive continuous deck replacement, painting, and rehabilitation work alongside new structures. Rehab runs different economics: phased traffic control, unknowns inside an existing structure, and containment on older coatings. Blended into one P&L with new construction, neither market has a margin history, so both get bid off the same overhead assumption and one of them is subsidizing the other.
WHAT WE BUILD.
SPM builds ControlQore cost codes for bridge clients on both axes. The bid item axis mirrors the DOT schedule of quantities, so labor, material, and equipment post against the same items the pay estimate measures and actual cost per unit is calculable every month. The phase axis covers mobilization, temporary works, foundations and piers, steel erection, deck, and rehab, so a structure can be read the way it's built. Variance over 10 percent on any unit price item triggers a review.
Every cofferdam, falsework system, shoring scheme, and causeway gets its own code with the full lifecycle inside it: design, materials, erection labor, rental or ownership carry while it stands, and removal. That's the only way to compare what a temporary structure cost against what the bid carried for it. After two jobs, the estimate stops guessing at temporary works and starts pricing them from history, which is the single largest correctable leak in the trade.
SPM puts the permit calendar on the cash forecast as milestones: authorization dates, in-water window open and close, and the environmental commitments attached to each. Mobilization is planned around those dates rather than against them, and the slide contingency is priced into the bid instead of absorbed after the fact. When a window closes early, the forecast already carries what the season costs, so the funding decision gets made before the week starts rather than after the account is short.
Rehab work is set up in ControlQore as a separate division with its own cost codes for traffic phasing, existing-structure unknowns, and coating containment, so it builds a margin history that new construction can't dilute. On the input side, most DOTs publish fuel and steel price-adjustment clauses, and those clauses have to be elected in the estimate and then administered against the published index for the life of the contract. SPM tracks the election and the index administration on the job record so a multi-year contract collects what it's owed.
Bonding capacity is the practical growth ceiling in bridge contracting, and both the aggregate and single-project limits come out of the balance sheet and WIP schedule the surety reads. The WIP for bridge clients is produced monthly from cost-to-cost percentage complete by job, with underbilled positions triggering a corrected pay app and overbilled positions flagged before they become a restatement. Accurate WIP and retained equity are business development in this market, not just accounting.
FLAT MONTHLY FEE. NO SOFTWARE INVOICE.
Three tiers, priced by your trailing twelve month revenue. ControlQore comes with Strategic, and it never appears as its own line item on an SPM invoice. Which tier you're in depends on how much of the work you want off your desk.
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.
