In this article
- Labour applications
- How to input labour applications
- The labour bill page
- Inputting a labour application
- Want to know more?
Labour applications
Labour applications can be received in various formats, such as handwritten or spreadsheets. Managing incoming labour applications can be one of the biggest reasons costs can escalate beyond budgets and out of control. Chalkstring enables you to make checks for inaccuracies or overclaims at the point of application approval and allows the cross checking of multiple contractor applications at the same time.
To cross check the data from multiple different subcontractors, in different formats, it needs rationalising into a standardised format and structure. The labour bill has fully searchable and filterable interface to allow you to input what is being claimed by each of your contractors and generate a structured data file which Chalkstring can use to interrogate the data.
How to input labour applications
- Expand the main Chalkstring black menu bar and click on the ‘Projects’ menu.
- Search for and click the 'Project' required.
- Within the project homepage, click the ‘Project hub’ sub-menu.
- Expand the main Chalkstring blue menu bar and click ‘Labour’.
- Click on the ‘Labour Bill’ sub-folder.
- Select the package from the ‘Package’ drop-down for the labour data required.
The labour bill page
A. Filters
- The search activities filter can be used to find a specific material by name.
- Clicking 'Advanced' will provide additional advanced filter options.
- Clicking the 'Zones' or 'Activities' filter buttons will allow filtering of the existing zones and acivities within the labour bill. Click the required filter button, select the activity or zone(s) you wish to view using the filters and click 'Apply selection' to apply your selected filters to the labour bill.
To select multiple zones or activities, hold the ctrl button on your keyboard when clicking each item to add them to the filter.
B. Total and zone figures
C. Labour activity details for each zone and activity
The cell displays:
- ‘In progress/Work in progress’ – What the current progress sliders positions of all products / groups equate to as current unpaid/approved progress for this labour activity in this zone.
Click the 'i' buttons for for additional information.
- ‘Required’ – The cumulative total of this activity from within the rate build ups of all products in this zone.
- 'Progressed' - What the current progress sliders positions of all products / groups equate to as progress for this labour activity in this zone.
- ‘Applied (Approved)’ – The cumulative total of what has already been paid out. A list of historical applications for an activity can be viewed by clicking the 'Applied (Approved)' value hyperlink.
- 'Of which Contingency' - Total of labour that has already been paid out from outside of your measured works for this activity in this zone.
- ‘Applied (Unapproved) ’ – The cumulative total of applications from other subcontractors for this activity in this zone, which are in the ‘'Review Applications’ section.
- The current live ‘Balance’ – The difference between the assessed scope and what has been paid or applied for payment of already.
- ‘In Draft' – What has been added to the application that is currently being worked on.
D. Adding labour applications
E. Labour activity details
Displays information for each specific labour activity.
Click the 'i' buttons for for additional information.
F. Bulk adding activities for a zone
To bulk add quantities to an application for a zone, click the + button next to the zone name and enter he percentage of the remaining work in progress you want to add to the application. For example, entering 50% will add half of all the remaining balances for all the activities within that zone.
G. Bulk adding activities for an activity
To bulk add quantities to an individual activity across multiple zones, click the + button in the labour activity name box and enter the total quantities to be added to the application. The quantities added will be taken from the balances of the activities from the zones starting from the first and each subsequent zone until the required quantities have been fulfilled.
For example, if you enter a quantity of 200 m2 for the activity 'Plasterboard ceiling' the application, and the current outstanding balance for this activity is 80 m2 in zone one, 100 m2 in zone two and 500 m2 in zone 3. 80 m2 will be added from zone one, 100 m2 from zone two and 20 m2 from zone 3, leaving a balance remaining in zone 3 of 480 m2.
If a balance that exceeds than the total remaining balance for the activity is added to the order, the additional quantities will be added as contingency within the first zone on the labour bill.
H. Changing displayed units
Inputting a labour application
1. Have a copy of the subcontractor application open.
2. Work through the application, item by item, inputting the activity and measure quantity being claimed for in this current period by the subcontractor.
Always input what the contractor is applying for. The review, edit and approval takes place once all subcontractor applications have been input. This is to ensure all applications can be compared against each other and the progress metrics.
If the contractor is applying for something not already in the labour bill, then it is not already in the priced scope. In this situation ‘contingency’ labour items can be added to the labour bill and included in labour applications. See KBA ‘How to add and review contingencies items on live projects’ for further details.
3. Click 'Bill actions' and ‘Save draft’ in the top right corner.
4. Enter an effective date for the application.
5. Select the subcontractor by clicking on the drop-down menu, click ‘Save’.
The application will be saved in the ‘Review Applications’ section.
6. Continue this process until finished inputting all the received labour applications