Job Costs

This section explains how to use the Job Costs command to view job costs and set job progress.

HINT-- The Goldenseal job costing software is designed to track project overhead expenses in as much detail as you need. It includes a variety of reports so you can see how well your business is doing.

JOB COSTS COMMAND
Job Costs Window | Viewing Job Types | Category Breakdowns
Item Breakdowns | Location Breakdowns | Setting Job Progress

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Accounting Software | Job Costing Software | Job Costs Software | Project Management Software

What are Job Costs?

Job Costs are a way to track expenses by assigning them to specific income-producing parts of your business (jobs). They allow you to see more directly how your expenses relate to the income they produce.

For many businesses, entering job cost information is the best way to track your expenses. They give you a snapshot of the income and expenses for a specific portion of your business, so it's easier to make decisions.

What are Jobs?

Goldenseal allows you to assign every expense to a job account. A job is any part of your business that consumes expenses and creates income (either directly or indirectly).

You'll get direct income from the following account classes:
Customers-- Those who buy things from you via Sales, or pay for project work.
Investments-- Miscellaneous assets which provide income.
Projects-- Work you do for payment via Project Billing, or your own projects which eventually create income.
Real Estate-- Properties that you own or manage

Assign indirect costs to one of the following account classes:
Equipment-- Equipment is a cost account when you use it on a project, and a job account when you maintain or repair it.
Inventory-- materials purchased and kept in inventory for later resale.
Overhead Account-- Any expenses which can't be assigned to another account.
HINT-- Projects and Real Estate are also indirect if you don't immediately sell or rent them to customers.

Basic Cost Areas

Goldenseal divides job costs and Cost Items into 5 basic cost areas:
Equipment-- expenses from Equipment Hours
Labor-- expenses from Labor Hours
Materials-- expenses that come from a Material Purchase or Inventory Used
Subcontractors-- expenses from Subcontractor Costs
Other Costs-- expenses from Other Costs

When you enter unit costs there is one more choice:
Assembly-- a combination of labor, materials and other items from an Assembly.

In a Sale or Material Purchase breakdown table you can enter some additional cost areas:
Delivery Charge-- additional charges for shipping or delivery
Sales Tax-- state, provincial or local taxes
Unlisted Item-- items that you type in on the fly (Item breakdowns only)

Cost Categories

You can allocate each expense transaction to cost categories and optional subcategories. Using a category system makes it much easier for you to track how your money is being spent.

To allocate an expense to categories and subcategories, follow these steps:

Open a cost transaction such as a Labor Hours record or a Material Purchase.
Click the New button, or choose New Record from the Edit menu.
Enter basic information for the transaction.
Click in the Category field (or the Category column of a breakdown table), and choose a cost category.
Press Tab or click in the Subcategory field, and choose a job cost subcategory.

NOTE-- If no category or subcategory is available, it's because the selected supplier uses a category system that has no categories in it.

Cost Locations

You can allocate each expense transaction to cost locations. Locations give you a second way to identify costs-- you can choose a room, building, company division or some other location.

To allocate an expense to a location, follow these steps:

Open a cost transaction such as a Labor Hours record or a Material Purchase.
Click the New button, or choose New Record from the Edit menu.
Enter basic information for the transaction.
Click in the Location field (or the Location column of a breakdown table), and enter the location.

Entering Job Costs

You'll enter most job costs via expense transactions-- Equipment Hours, Labor Hours, Material Purchases, Other Costs, Subcontractor Costs and Inventory Used. You can enter one expense per record, or you can use Category or Item breakdowns to combine many expenses into one record.
HINT-- If you are only entering an expense for the sake of job costing and don't want to track payments for it, enter Job Cost Only into the Status field. This feature is especially useful if you are entering old invoices when you first set up Goldenseal.

You can also enter purchases directly into a bank transaction via a direct purchase. Job costs also come from bank transactions for bank fees and other charges.

Job cost income comes from Sales and Billing Records if you use accrual accounting, or from Bank Deposits if you use cash accounting.

You can also make adjustments to job costs with a Cost Transfer.

Job Costs Window

The Job Cost command shows you a "snapshot" of costs and income for each of your projects, customers, and other jobs.

HINT-- Looking at job costs is a valuable way to manage your business. It shows the profitability of each part of your business, and helps you to increase the accuracy of your cost estimates.

To see a summary of job costs, follow these steps:

Choose Job Costs from the Costs menu.
You will see a listing of projects, with a simple cost analysis for each.

The first five columns for each job show the five basic expense classes, with the amount that has been posted to each project. The next column shows the amount of overhead allocated to the job.
The final three columns show the total costs for each job (from expense transactions), the original budget amount (from the project estimate), and the amount of income received for the job.

NOTE-- The initial Job Costs window shows simple job cost totals which are "posted" to each account and stored there. If you change the calculation method for job costs in Expense Preferences, in some cases the detailed breakdowns may show different totals

Viewing Job Types

To view job costs for different types of accounts, click on the Job Types popup at the upper right corner of the Job Costs window.

You can view any of the following items:

Active Projects-- All Project accounts that currently have Active status.
Inactive Projects-- All Project accounts that currently have Inactive status.
Completed Projects-- All Project accounts that currently have Active status.
Found Projects-- All Project accounts that are currently in the found set.

Active Customers-- Totals for job costs assigned directly to all Customer accounts that currently have Active status.
Inactive Customers-- All Customer accounts that currently have Inactive status.
Found Customers-- All Customer accounts that are currently in the found set.

Equipment-- Expenses used to maintain equipment, and income that results from equipment use.
Investments-- Expenses used to maintain real properties, and income that results from rentals.
Real Estate-- Expenses used to maintain investments, and income that results from the investment.
Overhead-- Expenses assigned to Overhead accounts, and income that results from overhead allocations.

Category Breakdowns

To see a detailed breakdown of costs by cost category, double-click anywhere in the row of the job you'd like to see.

You'll see a list of cost categories, along with the expense amounts posted to each category.

HINT-- The breakdown only shows the categories that have a contract amount or an expense amount. If you'd like to include all cost categories in the display, hold down the Shift key when you double-click on the row.

If you double-click in the Equipment, Labor, Material, Subs or Other column, you'll only see costs of that type. If you click in the Income column, you'll only see income transactions for the job. If you click in any other column you'll see all costs.

To see further details for costs within a category, double-click in its row. If the selected category has subcategories, you'll see a list of its subcategories, with a breakdown for each. If the selected category does not have subcategories, you'll see a breakdown of individual expense transactions.

HINT-- To bypass the subcategory display, hold down the Shift key when you double-click on the row. That way you'll see a list of expense transactions for the category.

When you are finished viewing the category breakdown, click the Close button, and you will return to the list of jobs.

Item Breakdowns

To see a breakdown of specific cost items for a job, follow these steps:

Choose Job Costs from the Costs menu.
Click on the Details popup menu at the bottom of the window, and choose Item Breakdown.
Double-click in the row of the job for which you'd like to see a list of items. If you double-click in the Job column, you'll see a list of all costs. If you double-click in the column for one of the expense classes, you'll only see items of that class.
A list of specific cost items will be shown.

HINT-- Material cost and other cost amounts are the original expense amount, or the adjusted amounts, depending on the settings in Expense Preferences. Equipment, labor and subcontractor costs are based on the Job Cost Amount in the expense transaction.

Location Breakdowns

To see a breakdown of job costs by location, follow these steps:

Choose Job Costs from the Costs menu.
Click on the Details popup menu at the bottom of the window, and choose Location Breakdown.
Double-click in the row of the job for which you'd like to see the breakdown.
You'll see a list of locations for the job, with job costs for each.

Setting Job Progress

You can use the Job Costs command to track project completion, and get a prediction of the final project cost.

HINT-- The completion percentages are also used for progress payment billing. If you entered percentages of completion in the Billing command, they'll also show up in this report.

To track progress by cost category, follow these steps:

Choose Job Costs from the Costs menu.
Click on the Details popup menu at the bottom of the window, and choose Progress by Category.
Double-click in the row of the job for which you'd like to see the breakdown.
You'll see a list of categories, and the costs to date for each.
Enter the percentage done for each category.
The predicted cost for each line item is shown in the Predicted column for that row. The Variance columns show you the difference between the predicted cost and the original budget-- as both a dollar amount and as a percentage.
The predicted cost and net profit for the entire project is shown at the top of the dialog window.
To save the changes you have made, click OK. Click Cancel to leave the progress window without saving changes.

To track progress by location within a project, follow these steps:

Choose Job Costs from the Costs menu.
Click on the Details popup menu at the bottom of the window, and choose Progress by Category.
Double-click in the row of the job for which you'd like to see the breakdown.
You'll see a list of locations and the costs to date for each.
Enter the Percentage done for each location.
The predicted cost for each line item is shown in the Predicted column for that row. The Variance column shows you the difference between the predicted cost and the original budget.
The predicted cost and net profit for the entire project is shown at the top of the dialog window.
To save the changes you have made, click OK. Click Cancel to leave the progress window without saving changes.

Job Cost Income

Goldenseal gives you several options for the display of income in the Job Costs windows. You can show any of the following items:

Accrued Income-- Goldenseal will show income when you earn it-- from project Billing Records, customer Sales and Rental Transactions.
Cash Income-- Goldenseal will show income when you receive the cash-- from Payment Receipts and Bank Deposits.
Cash and Accrued-- Goldenseal will show all cash and accrued transactions. For a total, it will show you the larger of the accrued and cash income for each account.

NOTE-- Cash income may come in slower than accrued income, if you send out bills and then wait for payment. It may also come in faster than accrued income, if customers pre-pay money "on account".

To set the options, choose Preferences from the Options menu, and choose Income from the submenu. Choose an option in the Job Cost Income field.

Labor Burden

Besides the direct cost of employee labor, there are additional labor costs due to employer taxes, insurance, and employee benefits. Collectively, these costs are often called labor burden.
Labor burden costs are added to the labor costs, and distributed along with the direct cost of labor. Labor burden is automatically assigned to different jobs, depending on the hours worked on each.
The additional cost of overtime hours can also be allocated between jobs, either across-the-board, or by individual assignment.

Job Cost Reports

To see an "estimated vs actual" breakdown of job costs for a specific project, choose Projects from the Reports menu, and choose Costs by Category, Costs by Class, Costs by Subcategory or Costs by Location from the submenu.

To see a summary of job costs for each project, choose Projects from the Reports menu, and choose Project Job Costs from the submenu.

To see a detailed list of job costs for one project, , choose Projects from the Reports menu, and choose Itemized Costs from the submenu.