With Excel spreadsheets, there is no way to avoid having to create multiple versions of the spreadsheet if more than one team member needs to work together on the estimate. A rogue decimal point or an untracked change to a cell’s formula can have major impacts on your final estimate, and estimates made with errors can cost you the job. In fact, IBM reported that 88% of all spreadsheets contain at least one error. Manual processes like spreadsheet-driven calculations leave enormous room for error. We’ll reiterate this point because it’s important. You now have a knowledge gap you need to fill – and fast. Imagine that person just left your company the day before the RFQ came in. When you use spreadsheets, the specific approach calculations used to arrive at a particular estimate essentially come from your estimator – not the spreadsheet. Even if your firm has created templates in Excel, there is still no standardized database of rates that you can reference and reuse for similar projects. The estimator would have had to create a custom spreadsheet for the project at hand.

If this firm did not have an estimation and invoicing software solution, their response process would have looked a bit less ideal. Let’s revisit the engineering firm from the top of this article that is pulling together a bid for their prospective client.

Providing a big that will drive profitabilityĮach of those considerations present a lot to balance – and yet, many companies continue to create estimates using spreadsheets or legacy systems that lend themselves to oversights and inaccuracies in the estimating process.

Preparing a project quote, especially if it needs to be done quickly or is for a new type of project, can be challenging, as you need to aggregate information from different parts of your business. In today’s competitive landscape, winning the bid is heavily determined by your project cost estimation. At Certinia, we offer Services CPQ software, a cloud-based Configure Price Quote solution that automates price quoting – making it an easier and more accurate process than traditional estimating methodologies. Step 1: Automating Your Estimating Processīefore you can send the invoice, you need to provide the estimate. With the availability of estimate and invoice software, it’s easier than ever to create estimates on the spot and eliminate many of the inaccuracies and oversights that can accompany manual processes, such as using Excel spreadsheets to record project data and generate new bids.

Professional services organizations across industries – especially those offering complex and configurable services, are tasked with providing existing and prospective customers with accurate estimates, and subsequently to follow up with corresponding invoices. Not only is your response time impressive to the client, but your estimate is competitive, detailed, and accurate, creating confidence that your firm is the best choice.ĭoesn’t this sound like an ideal scenario? You’d love to win this bid, and luckily you have an automated estimate and invoice software solution so you can quickly generate a quote and send it over.

They’re wrapping up the procurement process for a new project and are looking for an estimate from your company – and they need it yesterday. Your engineering firm just got a call from a prospective client. Why Your Professional Services Business Needs Estimate and Invoice Software 5 Ways an Estimating and Invoicing Solution Improves Competitiveness and Profitability

Estimating and invoicing software