10 Things That Construction Subcontractors Need to Consider for Finding the Right Construction Accounting Software
By: Scarlett Jonathon
Tags: Microsoft, Construction, Construction Software, Accounting Software, Business Central

Photo by Becca Tapert on Unsplash

When it comes to survival in the construction industry, the construction subcontractors or specialty contractors are the people who need to evolve to meet the changing dynamics and requirements of the construction projects.

This includes adopting the technology solutions that are designed to overcome complexity and can help meet the goals on time and within budget. Moreover, these solutions must be designed to meet the futuristic requirements of the business while giving necessary insights to foster intelligent decision-making.

Since working on large size construction projects demand extensive control on accounting, CRM, ERP, and Project Management, it becomes even more crucial to look for integrated construction accounting software that can help with these processes along with financial decision making and budget projections. Besides this, it should be a solution that can offer support on other tasks such as bidding, labor resource planning, change order management, and more.

Here we have 5 quick tips that must be kept in mind by the construction subcontractors whenever they need to choose a construction accounting software. Let’s find out in detail:

Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash

Check Your Business Needs

First of all, make sure you never make the mistake of choosing a product simply because it is ruling the market. as every business has its own unique needs, it is essential to choose software that aligns with your requirements. Thus, it is necessary that the process of finding the right construction accounting software must begin with the consideration of actual business requirements and not what is preferred by others. However, this must involve a detailed and informed assessment of your business operations to ensure that all your goals are achieved.

Estimates, Bills, and Payments

Since the primary phase of project lifecycle management is all about estimation, construction subcontractors must keep this factor in consideration. It is always an innovative idea to invest in software that can assist with bidding, estimates, and other bills or payment management-related goals. When working on large projects, billing clients is an essential practice that defines the financial efficiency of the project as well as contractors. Therefore, it is always an innovative idea to adopt a construction accounting software that can manage all the expenses with ease.

Furthermore, it should be a software technology that can help contractors to meet their true potential of defining the scope of work and projects. And choosing an integrated construction accounting software could help subcontractors to take near-exact estimates while driving productivity through the financial direction.

Cost Tracking & Profit Management

Construction projects demand continuous tracking of the expenses for all the labor, resources, and equipment spent on the project. Therefore, specialty contractors who need to invest in construction accounting software must opt for a solution that can help in active resource tracking with detail to job costs.

Also, working on such a solution can help project managers to identify and prevent any cost overruns that might affect the final or expected profit margin. And to avoid such chances of failure at revenue generation, contractors should consider a technology solution that can provide accurate insights on efficiency, customer relationships, and of course the profits.

Always Choose A Cloud Based Solution

When it comes to site teams, Project Managers often need to work at various locations without losing access to real-time information. Using construction accounting software enables subcontractors to track all the information related to financial transactions using the cloud even when they are not available at the site.

Apart from this, using cloud-based construction accounting software allows contractors to create estimates from anywhere. The ongoing support features available on the cloud allow project managers, project owners, and contractors to stay on the same page. Besides this, the data available on the cloud can help create invoices and generate billings from any location simplifying the entire task of project management.

No Unwanted Expenses from Legacy Practices

When it comes to construction services, time is the most key factor that determines the success and viability of the project. Using a construction accounting software that is based on an integrated cloud platform can help subcontractors have a precise allocation of time and resources. All transactions and data are in real-time which means there is no lag in data. This makes it an infinitely better choice than a legacy system when it comes to productivity and overall project efficiency.

Preventing Over Expensive ERP

For the past decade, construction firms as well as contractors have significantly moved towards technology, especially ERP solutions. As most of these contractors believed it to deliver improved workflow, most of them didn’t bother with the price that they pay. But since the goal with the adoption of ERP solutions was preventing profit loss, investing in an expensive ERP solution didn’t fill the gap much.

Luckily, contractors could simply invest in cloud-based ERP technology which can help achieve the desired goals without any heavy investments in infrastructure. Moreover, these ERP solutions offer process-inclusive dashboards and interface for easier navigation on the project data which helps in streamlined reporting, team collaborations, profitability, and more.

Though ERP solutions can offer extensive support to the construction contractors, it is still very crucial for contractors to invest in ERP software that can provide end to end integration along with cloud support. This can also be of great advantage to the essential accounting operations such as progress billings, accounting, payroll data, and other retention processes essential for business success.

Seek Built-in Productivity Features

Maintaining the cash flow is one of the most important goals of the project management process and subcontractors must opt for solutions that can offer integrated productivity features. As these features can help streamline the processes related to billings, invoices, and other operations, subcontractors could get a huge save on time with routine operations related to finances.

Also, automated processes over manual processes available on the integrated construction accounting software could encourage faster processing when it comes to special tasks. These tasks may include processing billings for AIA formatting or just in case, subcontractors need to measure the expenses or actual budget for the defined contract lines with or with retention for the given project.

Implementation & Migration

The ever-growing competition among the construction subcontractors has worked as fuel to the fire with the adoption of advanced construction technology. However, a subcontractor must only choose a solution provider that can help with implementation and migration.

Subcontractors should only consider those software solutions that can help with implementation and migration support for their unique business needs. To ensure this, subcontractors could even ask for a complete training schedule on the solution where master setup, onboarding, and other migration-related details could be easily exchanged and discussed.

Organizational and Staff Training

Adopting a new and unique construction accounting software is a big decision as it involves an entire crew of subcontractors who need to be a part of the process. Therefore, successful business transformation through technology involves an intense understanding of the training process along with the implementation.

The right organizational training can help all your field teams as well as project managers and office staff to be informed of the IT process involved with software. Also, following such a process-based practice helps subcontractors to easily align with a process and ensure productive use of technology.

Advanced Reporting Features to Get Better Business Direction

Using construction accounting software can help with the essential business progress since project teams could simply check on system dashboards to measure the performance. Since construction accounting software allows a detailed view of every project activity, users can explore dashboards to work on all tasks related to finances, billings, payments, resource allocation, and more.

Also, project managers can use the integrated features of the software to analyze cash flow patterns that can help foster future projects as well as simplify the process of bidding, estimation, reporting, and even get the critical business direction.

Conclusion

Looking at the present scenario, the construction industry has learned about the value and importance of integrated construction accounting and project management technology. Even for the subcontractors, it has turned out to be a business essential that can keep them aligned with all the historical data as well as financial projections of the project. Also, subcontractors have understood the need for technology and the benefits it can offer while strengthening their financial stature and developing business opportunities.

Concluding it all, choosing the right construction accounting software can be a great deal when you need to have the right command on your projects. It can help you get real-time access to finances, resources, project progress, productivity, as well as anything that can affect the product or the expected profit margins.

And if you are a subcontractor who needs to take the advantage of added flexibility for your business, make sure you stick with the above-suggested factors and features while choosing your integrated construction accounting software solution.

All the best!