CONTROLQORE FOR MARINE CONTRACTORS.
Generic accounting software can't price a spread day by vessel, separate weather standby from productive in-water time, or tell you what the tow to site cost against what you bid it at. ControlQore can.
ControlQore for marine contractors uses cost codes by vessel and by phase, meaning mobilization and tow, spud setup, productive spread days, weather standby, in-water production, and demobilization, to track cost per spread day against the day rate carried in the bid. Weather standby posts to its own code rather than into production labor. Mobilization and demobilization are billed as their own schedule of values lines. Permit milestones under USACE Section 404 and state Section 401 sit on the cash forecast, because permit timing is cash timing. The WIP schedule is produced monthly from cost-to-cost percentage complete.
Marine work doesn't fail at the report list. It fails at the calendar. A P&L closes weeks after the spread demobilized, which means the day rate that lost money on this job is the day rate that goes into the bid for the next one. Cost codes built by vessel turn the same fuel, crew, and ownership cost into a cost per spread day you can read against the rate you bid. Standby on its own code tells you what the weather window cost, separately from what the work cost, and both numbers belong in the next proposal.
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 marine contractor can read cost per spread day by vessel, with weather standby coded apart from productive time, while the spread is still on the water.
WHERE IT GOES WRONG.
Spread Day Cost Pooled Into One Equipment Line
Marine work runs on barges, cranes, tugs, spuds, and workboats, and every one of them carries daily ownership cost whether the weather allows work or not. The maintenance regime is saltwater grade, which makes that cost heavier than the equipment math on a dirt job suggests. When all of it posts to a single equipment expense line, there's no cost per spread day for any vessel, and the day rate in the next bid is a guess dressed up as a number.
Weather Standby Coded as Production
A spread that sits through a blow costs the same as one that works. Environmental windows, tides, and sea state decide when the work happens, and peak-window competition alone can move dredging bids by 10 to 25 percent. If standby hours post to the same code as in-water production, the productive day rate reads worse than it is, the standby exposure reads as nothing at all, and neither number can be priced into the next job.
Mobilization Priced Inside Unit Rates
Getting a spread to the site is a six-figure event on real work: tug transit, permits for the tow, crane rigging, and spud setup. Buried inside unit prices, that money finances the owner's job until production billing catches up, and on canceled or suspended work it becomes unrecoverable. Demobilization at the back end has the same problem and gets even less attention, because by then everyone has moved on to the next award.
Federal Payment Deadlines Living in Somebody's Memory
A marine sub working under a prime on federal or port work has no lien rights against the government. The Miller Act payment bond replaces them, with its own notice and suit deadlines that differ from state lien law, plus flow-down clauses that govern and certified payroll that has to stay clean. Retainage on long federal jobs stretches the exposure further. When those dates aren't on the job record, a payment right can expire on a job that's otherwise going fine.
WHAT WE BUILD.
SPM builds ControlQore cost codes for marine clients by vessel and by phase: mobilization and tow, spud setup, productive spread days, weather standby, in-water production, and demobilization. Fuel, crew, and ownership cost post to the vessel that consumed them. Actual cost per spread day is calculated from those codes and compared to the day rate carried in the bid, so the rate that goes into the next proposal is the rate the last job proved.
Standby earns its own cost category. ControlQore carries a standby code for each vessel, so the days the window closed are counted and priced separately from the days the spread produced. Over a season that number becomes the standby allowance in the bid, and the argument about whether a job was mispriced or weather-hit stops being an argument.
SPM reviews every new marine subcontract schedule of values before signing and recommends mobilization as its own front-loaded line with demobilization as a separate line at the end. ControlQore is configured with the same line items as the subcontract, so pay app billings post against them and the mobilization cost has somewhere to be compared. The review takes one meeting and the cash effect runs the length of the job.
USACE Section 404 and state Section 401 permits, habitat consultations, and environmental windows decide when the spread can work, so those dates go on the cash forecast as milestones rather than living in a project manager's inbox. Miller Act notice and suit deadlines get calendared at contract signing, and flow-down clauses get read before the signature rather than after the dispute. Permit timing is schedule timing, and schedule timing is cash timing.
The WIP schedule for marine clients is produced monthly from cost-to-cost percentage complete by job. Underbilled positions, meaning work performed but not yet billed, are visible immediately and trigger a corrected pay app, which is worth more on marine work than most trades because the cost per day of being wrong is higher. Overbilled positions flag jobs where billing has outrun real production, which on a permit-gated schedule is easier to do than it sounds.
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.
