Sector: groundworks & civils

Plant, muck-away and valuations for groundworks contractors

A groundworks job loses money in three places, and none of them are on the quote. Plant sits on site off hire because nobody sent the off-hire; muck-away goes out on tickets that never reach the valuation; and the application for payment goes in without the dates that would have made the main contractor answer it. Estimark tracks plant on and off hire with usage booked to the job, records waste by type and disposal route with its transfer notes, and raises a Construction Act payment application with the due date and final date on it.

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What actually goes wrong

Plant on hire after it left site

A dumper hired for three weeks and off-hired at six. Nobody was tracking it, and the hire invoice is the first anybody hears.

Muck-away tickets that never reach the valuation

Loads out are recorded on the weighbridge ticket in the cab, and the valuation is built from memory.

An application with no dates on it

A payer who is never told the due date is never late, and the notice clock never starts.

No dated record of ground conditions

The dig hit made ground, the programme slipped, and there is nothing written down from the week it happened.

Sector: how it works

How is plant tracked?

Owned and hired plant in one register, with rates, QR codes, recurring service schedules and a check-out log per job.

Hired items carry their hire rate, so a machine sitting on site is visibly costing money rather than invisibly costing it.
Check-out and check-in record which job the item was on, turning a hire invoice into a job cost.
Recurring service schedules run on the item rather than in somebody’s head.
A QR tag on the machine means the operator can check it out without finding it in a list.
Plant & Equipment is £19 a month +VAT.

NoteThe register knows when you told it something went off hire. It cannot know that the hire desk agreed a different date, so the off-hire confirmation is still worth keeping.

What about muck-away and waste?

The Environmental module records waste by type and disposal route with its transfer notes, plus recycling rate and project carbon by scope.

Waste recorded against the job is waste that can be recharged, and a load nobody logged is a load nobody bills.
Disposal route matters commercially as well as legally: inert to a recycling centre and contaminated to landfill are different money.
Transfer notes are held with the job rather than in the cab of whichever lorry took the load.
Environmental is £15 a month +VAT.

How does the valuation work?

Payment applications carry the cumulative valuation, retention deducted before the previously certified total, and the Construction Act dates that start the notice clock.

The due date and the final date for payment sit on the application, so the payer has five days after the due date to serve a payment notice.
Where they serve nothing, your application is the notified sum, and the record of what you served and when is the thing that proves it.
Retention is tracked to release rather than written off, with the release dates in the diary.
Payment Applications is included from Pro.

What holds the daily record?

The Site Diary: a dated log per job with weather, workforce, plant on site, visitors, delays and the work carried out.

Ground conditions, a service strike, a delayed delivery: all of them are delays, and a delay recorded on the day is worth what a delay recalled in June is not.
The plant list on a diary entry and the plant register agree, so a day of standing time can be evidenced rather than argued.
Site Diary is £9 a month +VAT.

Groundworks, in numbers

Plant register: Owned and hired, QR tagged
Waste: By type and disposal route
Valuation: Cumulative, with Act dates
Core: £129/month +VAT
Plant & Equipment: £19/month +VAT
Environmental: £15/month +VAT

Which plan

Pro

£299 +VAT/month

Pro covers up to 20 users with no job limit, which is where a groundworks firm running its own plant and subcontracting labour usually sits.

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What you get

Payment applications with the Construction Act timetable
Job costing and CVR against the valuation
Purchase orders for materials and plant hire
CIS deduction, verification and the CIS300

Plant & Equipment is £19/month +VAT, Environmental £15/month +VAT and Site Diary £9/month +VAT as bolt-ons. Core is £129/month +VAT for up to 5 users.

Every module and price →

Questions

Groundworks: frequently asked

Is there software that tracks hired plant against a groundworks job?

Yes. Estimark holds owned and hired plant in one register with hire rates, QR codes, recurring service schedules and a check-out log recording which job each item went to. That is what turns a hire invoice arriving at the end of the month into a cost sitting against the job it was actually used on.

Can I record muck-away and waste transfer notes?

Yes. The Environmental module records waste by type and disposal route with its transfer notes, plus recycling rate and project carbon by scope. Waste recorded against the job is waste that can be recharged; a load nobody logged is a load nobody bills.

Does it handle payment applications to a main contractor?

Yes. Applications carry the cumulative valuation with retention deducted before the previously certified total, and the due date and final date for payment that start the Construction Act notice timetable. Where the payer serves no payment notice within five days of the due date, the sum applied for becomes the notified sum.

How much is Estimark for a groundworks contractor?

Core is £129 a month +VAT for up to 5 users with no job limit, and Pro is £299 a month +VAT for up to 20. Plant & Equipment is £19 a month +VAT, Environmental £15 a month +VAT and Site Diary £9 a month +VAT. Every plan has a 14-day free trial.

Try it on a real job.

14 days, full access, every plan. No implementation fee. All prices exclude VAT, added at 20% at checkout.