Two Excel workbooks. The first is the one to use: a schedule of values and pay application template with 36 applications in it, a change order log that bills onto every one of them from a single entry, and 7 tie-out checks that tell you whether the application balances before a general contractor tells you. The second is a G702 and G703 template, and you need it only when your contract or your contractor requires one, in which case it has to be notarized. Work the month's billing in the first workbook using the completion percentage column, then carry the values into the AIA form if you're obliged to file one.
That order carries more weight than it sounds like it does. A G702 certifies figures that were calculated somewhere else. Filling one in directly means doing arithmetic on a document you're about to swear to in front of a notary, and that's how a wrong number becomes a sworn wrong number.
THE DOWNLOADS
TAKE BOTH. NO FORM TO FILL IN.
Schedule of Values and Pay Application Template · START HERE
39 tabs. 36 pay applications. 0.5MB.
This is the working instrument. The contract, the retainage rate and the schedule of values go in once, and every application reads from them, so the breakdown can't disagree with itself from one period to the next. The printable application carries no marks from us on it.
EXCEL WORKBOOK0.5MB39 TABS
G702 and G703 Application and Certificate for Payment · ONLY IF REQUIRED
2 tabs. 0.1MB. Needs a notary.
The AIA pair, unbranded on purpose: it gets sworn, and a third party's mark on the face of a notarized document invites a question you don't want at the notary's desk. Use it when the subcontract calls for it, and fill it from the numbers the other workbook already worked out.
EXCEL WORKBOOK0.1MBNOTARY REQUIRED
GET THEM
Pick which one and it comes by email as an attachment. The workbook is the same file SPM installs for clients, with nothing removed.
ON ITS WAY
WHICH FORM IS WHICH
ONE DOES THE MATH. ONE GETS SWORN.
Most contractors searching for one of these two things believe the AIA form is the billing. It is not. The G702 is a certificate: a statement, signed and notarized, that the amount claimed is owed for work completed. The arithmetic that produced the amount happens somewhere else, and where it happens determines whether it's right.
So the schedule of values and pay application template is the instrument for all practical purposes. It holds the breakdown, tracks what was billed in every prior period, applies retainage at the rate in your subcontract, carries stored materials separately, and checks its own totals. The AIA form is a transcription step at the end, performed only when somebody requires it.
Read the subcontract for the words. Some call for AIA forms explicitly, some call for a notarized application, and plenty call for neither.
When a G702 is required, budget for the notary in your billing calendar. A form that has to be sworn can't be emailed at 4:55pm on the deadline.
Never work the numbers on the AIA form itself. Settle them where the checks are, then transcribe.
Both documents describe the same schedule of values. If your G703 line items differ from the breakdown you agreed, that's the argument you'll lose.
WHAT IS IN THE WORKBOOK
ENTER THE CONTRACT ONCE. IT FEEDS ALL 36.
One SOV Calculator tab where the contract, the retainage rate and the line items get entered once
A Change Order Log that bills onto every application from a single entry
36 pay applications, each one carrying its own period, the previous applications, this period, materials stored, complete to date, balance to finish and retainage
7 tie-out checks that state in words whether the application balances, and by how much when it doesn't
A printable application per period with no SPM marks on it, because the general contractor receives that sheet
The reason for 36 tabs rather than one reusable sheet is carryover. Every application has to agree with the one before it, and a single sheet overwritten each month has no record to agree with. Thirty six of them covers a three year job, which is longer than most subcontracts and short enough that the file still opens quickly.
THE 7 TIE-OUT CHECKS
IT TELLS YOU IT IS WRONG BEFORE HE DOES.
Each check states whether it ties, and when it doesn't it says by how many dollars. This is the cheapest minute in the whole billing process, because a rejected application doesn't get fixed on Thursday, it goes in the next cycle and the money is a month later than it should be.
1. Schedule of values plus change orders equals the total contract
2. Total billed to date equals the work complete to date
3. Billed to date plus balance to finish equals the total contract
4. Carryover matches the last approved application
5. No line is billed past its scheduled value and no line is billed backward
6. Every funded line is open where you can see it
7. Retention held equals the retainage rate times the amount billed
THE HABIT THAT PAYS FOR ITSELF
FRONT LOAD THE BREAKDOWN, THEN NEVER ARGUE.
A schedule of values gets agreed once and then governs every dollar on the job. Two things decide whether it works for you. The first is granularity: enough lines that progress on each one is observable, and not so many that every application becomes a negotiation. The second is the weighting of the early lines, because mobilization, submittals, bonds and general conditions are real costs incurred in the first weeks, and a breakdown that spreads them evenly across the job has you funding the front end out of your own working capital.
That conversation happens once, before signing, and it's worth more to cash flow than a quarter of chasing invoices. It's also the single item most subcontractors skip, because reviewing the breakdown feels like arguing over paperwork. It's arguing over money.
$10.7M+
Client AR Recovered Since 2023
48
Active Trade Specializations
60 DAYS
Average Onboarding Time
COMMON QUESTIONS
SCHEDULES OF VALUES, ANSWERED.
A breakdown of the contract into the line items you'll bill against, with a dollar value on each one, agreed before the first application goes in. It's the spine of construction billing: every pay application reports a completion percentage per line, and the sum of those lines has to equal the contract plus every executed change order. Contractors who treat it as paperwork sign one that groups too much work under too few lines, and then spend the job arguing about percentages nobody can verify.
They're two halves of one instrument, which is why this template treats them as one. The schedule of values is the agreed breakdown and it's set once. The pay application is the monthly claim against it, reporting how far each line has progressed, what was billed before, what's billed now, what retainage is held and what's left to finish. Sending a pay application without a schedule of values behind it means asking a general contractor to approve a number with no way to check it.
Only if the contract or the contractor requires it. Plenty of subcontracts never mention the AIA forms and are billed perfectly well on a schedule of values and a pay application. When a G702 is required it comes with an obligation that catches people out: the certification on it's sworn, so the form has to be notarized. Read the subcontract for the words before you assume either way.
Work the billing out first, then transcribe it. Use the completion percentage column in the SOV and Pay Application template to work out the amount for the period, let the tie-out checks confirm the application balances, and then carry those values across into the G702 and G703 and take it to a notary. The AIA form is a certificate rather than a calculator, so filling one in directly means doing arithmetic on a document you're about to swear to.
Because material delivered and not yet installed is money you've already spent, and most subcontracts allow you to bill it. Contractors who leave that column empty are financing their own material out of working capital until the work gets installed, which on a long lead item can be two or three months of cash sitting on a job site under a tarp.
Catching an application that doesn't balance before a general contractor catches it. There are 7 of them and each one states in words whether it ties, and by how many dollars to the cent when it doesn't. A rejected application costs a month, because it goes back in the next cycle rather than getting fixed the same week, and the most common cause is arithmetic that nobody checked.
Both workbooks are published in full and emailed to you as attachments. We will never sell your information. The 36 pay application tabs carry no SPM marks at all, because a general contractor receives that sheet and it should look like your own document. The internal tabs where you enter the contract are branded, which is the honest trade: we would like you to remember where it came from, just not on the page that goes to the person paying you.
Never Miss Payroll Without Taking On Debt is a 6 part series on making payroll out of work already performed, without reaching for a line of credit. One of the sessions is this page:
Former commercial project manager and master electrician: 150+ projects worth $2.1B combined, from $50,000 to $300M. Now fractional CFO to commercial subcontractors.
Bring one subcontract and the schedule of values that came attached to it. Twenty minutes and you'll know whether that breakdown lets you bill in front of your costs or behind them.
You don't hire a CFO because it's safe, you do it because the real risk isn't having one.
