CONTROLQORE FOR TUNNEL CONTRACTORS.
Generic accounting software can't report cost per advanced foot while the advance is under way, separate a stopped heading caused by the owner from one caused by your own machine, or price what the iron costs to own per foot of advance. ControlQore can.
ControlQore for tunnel contractors uses cost codes by drive and by phase: shaft construction, machine assembly, advance, lining and grouting, and demobilization. It tracks cost per advanced foot against the rate set in the bid. Downtime posts to its own code by cause: encountered conditions against the baseline, machine failure, logistics, or owner delay. Machine and plant ownership cost, including refurbishment and the residual value assumption, is allocated per foot advanced, so it isn't left in a lump on the balance sheet. Advance rates, cutter and consumable burn, and water inflow readings are captured as job data. A differing site conditions claim is built from that same record. The WIP schedule is produced monthly from cost-to-cost percentage complete.
Tunnel contractors at $1M to $5M net 7 percent before taxes on the SPM 48-trade dataset. The CFOS target at that revenue is 10.5 percent before taxes. Gross margin for tunnel at the same revenue reads 23 percent. That figure comes from the nearest comparable trade in that dataset and isn't measured directly, so treat it as a reference point. Underground, the cost of being wrong adds up faster than in any other trade. A stopped heading uses crew, power, and plant at the same rate as when it's producing. The whole question is whose stoppage it was. The answer is either in the daily record or it doesn't exist.
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 tunnel contractor can read cost per advanced foot on an open drive, with every stopped hour coded to its cause and machine ownership cost priced into the same number.
WHERE IT GOES WRONG.
No Cost Per Advanced Foot While the Drive Is Open
Production tunneling operates continuously. The daily cost of crew, power, and plant doesn't pause when the advance rate does. Your margin is the spread between how fast the heading moves and what a day costs to operate. A monthly P&L reports the day cost weeks late and never reports the advance rate at all. So the per-foot rate in your next bid is the rate somebody remembers, when it should be the rate the last tunnel produced.
Stopped Hours Pooled Into One Labor Number
A stopped heading costs the same whether the cause was harder material than the baseline described, a cutter change, a hoisting problem, or an owner decision. Only some of those causes are recoverable. When every stopped hour posts to the same labor code, you can't tell the recoverable ones from the ones you own. So the claim gets dropped, or argued from memory against an owner with better records than yours.
A Baseline Claim With No Ledger Behind It
The geotechnical baseline report states the conditions the bid is entitled to assume. The differing site conditions clause covers the variance: conditions materially different from what the contract indicated, or unusual conditions different from what's ordinarily encountered. Both are compensable only when documented against that baseline. Advance rates, cutter consumption, water inflows, and daily logs are the evidence. If you start putting them together after the dispute begins, you've already lost the argument.
Machine and Plant Capital Left Off the Foot
The machine is project-scale capital on a long lead time. It's often built to one job's diameter and configuration, and sometimes consumed or left in place at the end. The supporting plant for separation, ventilation, hoisting, and segment handling costs about as much. Ownership cost, the refurbishment cycle, and the salvage assumption decide bids. When they're recorded as depreciation in an overhead pool, every stopped day understates its own cost by what the iron was costing.
WHAT WE BUILD.
SPM builds ControlQore cost codes for tunnel clients by drive and by phase: shaft construction, machine assembly and launch, advance, lining and grouting, and demobilization. On small-diameter work there's a shaft at each end of a short drive, and the shafts take a large share of the cost. So they're never blended into the advance. Labor, power, consumables, and plant post to the phase that used them. Actual cost per advanced foot is calculated from those codes against the rate set in the bid.
Stopped time gets its own cost category. ControlQore has separate codes for conditions against baseline, machine failure, logistics, and owner delay. The field codes each stopped hour the day it happens. That gives you two numbers where most contractors have one: what the advance costs to operate, and what the stoppages cost and who owns them. An entitlement conversation is built on the second number.
Advance rates by day, cutter and consumable burn against the geotechnical class the baseline predicted, water inflow readings, and grout takes are captured in ControlQore next to the cost they generated. A differing site conditions position is then a report you print, with nothing to reconstruct. The encountered conditions and the money they cost are in the same record from day one. This is the trade's second set of books. Treat it as paperwork and you leave entitlement on the table.
SPM builds the machine and plant into ControlQore with an ownership rate per operating day. The refurbishment cycle is spread across the tunnels the machine will bore, and the residual value assumption is written down. That rate posts to the advance phase, so cost per advanced foot includes what the iron costs to own. When the heading stops, the report shows the capital cost next to the idle crew. That's the honest size of a stopped day.
Payment is based on metered advance and installed lining against a schedule of values, verified by the owner, and each pay item is only as billable as the survey, segment records, and grout takes behind it. SPM configures ControlQore with the same schedule of values line items as the contract, so billing posts against them and an item missing its documentation is visible before the pay application goes out. The WIP schedule is produced monthly from cost-to-cost percentage complete, with underbilled positions triggering a corrected pay application.
FLAT MONTHLY FEE. NO SOFTWARE INVOICE.
Three tiers, priced by your trailing twelve month revenue. ControlQore comes with Strategic and Platinum, 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.
Built for subs doing $1M to $12M. Above $12.5M we quote.
| Last 12 months revenue | Core | Strategic | Platinum | One-time onboarding |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Under $1M | $1,900 | $3,100 | $3,300 | $2,500 |
| $1M to $3.5M | $2,600 | $4,100 | $5,300 | $4,500 |
| $3.5M to $6.5M | $3,800 | $5,900 | $8,300 | $6,000 |
| $6.5M to $9.5M | $5,100 | $7,600 | $11,800 | $7,500 |
| $9.5M to $12.5M | $6,100 | $8,900 | $14,900 | $9,000 |
| Above $12.5M | Quoted | Quoted | Quoted | Quoted |
The onboarding fee covers migrating your books back to the start of your last taxable year and getting you fully operational in 60 days. It's billed once, with your first invoice. It's the same for all three tiers, and it moves with your revenue band. Your first month is prorated, and your monthly engagement starts on the first of the first full month.
Just want the setup? Onboarding only is the same onboarding work with no monthly service after it, one time, at the onboarding fee plus $2,000. Start a monthly engagement later and $2,000 counts toward it. It starts at $4,500, and the price for every band is on the pricing page.
The three tier columns are the whole price. Which one fits depends on how much of the work you want off your desk. No payroll. No hidden line items. The onboarding fee is right here in the table.
- Online software only: QuickBooks, Sage, Viewpoint and similar. No VPN or hosted desktop.
- Not in any tier: payroll, pay applications, collections on receivables.
- Pricing valid through 2027.
CFO work. Your own bookkeeper keeps doing the books.
We build your plan every month. Your team does the work.
You get the CFO work: job costing built to match the way you estimate, a 13 week cash forecast, WIP every month, and a monthly meeting that ends with decisions.
Your bookkeeper still does the books.
Core, plus bookkeeping and bank reconciliations, plus job costing and WIP software set up and managed for you. Use your own online accounting software or we supply it, one price.
We build the plan, track it and adjust it every month.
We only work with trade subcontractors. We know what to look for, and we fix problems while they're still small. Everything in Core, plus the bookkeeping and bank reconciliations done for you, and the job costing and WIP software set up, loaded with your cost codes, and managed every month. Use your own online software, or move to ours and we pay for it.
Our team does the bookkeeping and the reconciliations. We don't do payroll.
Strategic, plus a controller who handles payables and receivables the way an in-house controller would. You approve every payment.
We manage the money side for you, every week.
Everything in Strategic, plus our team does the controller work. We handle your bills and receivables the way an in-house controller would: we call vendors, pay the bills and keep the accounting current. We plan the cash flow first, and you approve every payment because it is your money.
Our team does the payables and receivables. We don't do payroll, pay applications or collections.
FREQUENTLY ASKED.
