Cost code

Estimates are priced line by line - so many metres of containment at a norm rate, so many terminations at another - but on site, cost arrives as undifferentiated payroll and invoices. Cost codes are the bridge: a stable identifier per scope line that actuals are booked against, so spend can be compared with the estimate at the level the estimate was actually built.

A workable coding structure mirrors how the job will be managed and claimed, commonly trade or system, then element, then activity. The discipline that matters more than the numbering convention: codes must be assigned where the hours are captured - the foreman's log or the clock-in record - not guessed weeks later in the office, and variation work needs its own codes from day one or it silently dilutes contract productivity.

Cost codes are also where earned value gets its resolution. Budgeted hours per code, earned hours from quantities installed, actual hours from the crew log: that triple per code is what makes CPI, PF and forecast figures specific enough to act on. In WBSync each L4 activity carries its cost code from the imported BOQ, and hours are logged straight against it.