Estimating

Overview#

• A Product Estimate prices a product built from a Product setup.
• The estimate takes the product's Parts, materials and services, works out the quantities, waste and costs (see Costings), and prices one or more quantities. It is added to a Quotation as a line (type EPD), and can be copied to a Work Order and used to create or update a material.

Before you create Product Estimates, set up the Products and Costings you use, and the BOS Professional Version setting that offers Products on the Quotation's Estimate button.

For step-by-step instructions, see the Product Estimate Tutorial.

How to Create a Product Estimate#

1. Create a new Quotation and select a customer.
2. Click Estimate (button) and select the product you want to estimate. An Estimate is created, and the Description defaults to the Product name.
3. Enter a Description, Size and one or more quantities in the fields provided.
4. Uncheck the Adjust checkboxes on the Costing tab to exclude items from the overall adjustment (optional).

Estimate Screen#

Buttons Explained#

Header Explained#

Specification (tab)#

The specification screen for the Product's type, for example, labels, signage or corrugated boxes (see Product Estimate Type Tutorial).

Input (tab)#

Parts#

Click Add to add a Part from the Product's Part setups, or Update to update the selected Parts from their setups.

• Reel widths that are narrower than the Die width cannot be selected.
• If the Die is changed after the Substrate is selected, a warning appears if the Die width exceeds the reel width.

Components#

The materials and services the product needs, on the tabs Pre-press, Printing, Finishing, Services, Materials, Packaging, Delivery and All Costs. Click Add to add a component from the Product setup, or use the arrow on Add:

• Custom Item: adds a custom component.
• Material: adds a new material. You can add an existing material to a costing, or create a new material on the popup and add it.

Update updates the selected components from the Product setup.

Costing (tab)#

• The Costing tab provides detailed costings based on the specifications captured in the estimate.
• The Component filter looks up the Description.
• Group by groups the costings by None, Part, Group, Type, Provider, Component or Description. The arrow buttons expand and collapse the groups.
• The waste fields (%, Min and Waste Qty) show the waste for the selected costing.

Click Update (button) to update the selected costings and select one of these options:

• Update from Costings: The selected costings are updated, and changed materials revert.
• Update Costs from Materials and Cost Centres: The costs on the selected costings are updated from the linked materials and Cost Centres.

Context Menu (right-click an entry)#

Pricing (tab)#

One row per quantity.

• Click Add with Batch Update Qty, to and step filled in to add a range of quantities, for example, 1 000 to 5 000 in steps of 1 000.
• Enter a percentage in Set MU % and click Set to apply it to every quantity.
• From version 26.05, with Override checked, Set applies the MU % or C % to the selected quantities.
• Delete removes the selected prices.

• If the cost on the estimate is zero, the selling price is always zero.
• You cannot enter an adjustment or selling price if there is no cost on the estimate.
• As well as changing the adjustment for each quantity, you can set the Total (Exc), Total (Inc) and /Unit (Exc) fields.
• When the price is fixed in the Fixed column, it is highlighted in red, and a warning bar appears.
• If you edit the Unit, Total or sq.m price, the price is marked as fixed automatically.
• When Override is unchecked, the price fix is also unchecked.
• MU%, Override and Min Price above the grid set the estimate's markup, let you override the default markup, and set a minimum price. From version 26.05, C% and the commission type appear next to MU% when the product uses commission (see Pricing & Accounting in Products).
• With a commission, Total (Exc) = Total Cost + Profit + Commission. The Quotation item gets the full price, including the commission; the commission itself is stored only on the estimate.
• When you fix the Total or Unit Sell, or the Min Price applies, the commission is calculated from that price and the profit is what remains.
• The cost summary shows a Commission line after Adjustment when there is a commission. As in Standard Estimating, the commission counts as a Direct Cost, so it is not part of Value Added.

Description and Notes#

• The Description is automatically generated. The Material and Printing sizes (Depth x Width from the Input tab) are added to the Description if they are populated.
• Each Part adds a line to the Description according to its Desc setting: None, Desc or Desc (Size) (see Parts).
• When the Description is regenerated, the Part lines pick up changes to the part name and size, unless the line is overridden.
• Right-click a Description item and select Auto, Override (to change it manually; the caption is highlighted in yellow) or Hide.
• You can add Notes for internal use, which are also copied to the Work Order.

Quantity Up#

• When printing on reels, the Qty Up is not displayed because it is the same as the estimate quantity.
• When printing on sheets, the Qty Up is the number of parts on a worksheet.

Output#

For the data available on output templates, see Output Data Pipelines.