Goldenseal Job Costing Software

Job Costing Basics

Goldenseal is job costing software that is designed specifically for tracking costs against a project estimate or budget. With it, you can allocate every expense to a specific project or overhead account, and know exactly what you need to change to be more profitable.

We built Goldenseal from the ground up to do accurate job costing-- the job cost features are not just tacked onto a general accounting program. Goldenseal is one of the best accounting programs for construction companies and other businesses that need to track project costs, and compare them to an estimate.

The Goldenseal job cost accounting software is available for Macintosh and Windows computers. Click here for software pricing.

For more about Goldenseal, click here . For more about its general accounting features, click here.

Job Cost Expenses

Goldenseal makes it easy to record the raw data for job costing-- there are separate transactions for equipment hours, labor hours, material purchases, subcontractor costs, other costs and inventory used on projects. You can assign each expense to a project or overhead account, to an optional cost category and subcategory, and to different job cost locations within the project.

Equipment, labor and subcontractor expenses include a separate job cost amount (which can include payroll burden, markup, overhead and other adjustments). That way your job costing reports will show the "true" job costs, which may be different from the amount you've paid directly.

If you want more detail in your job cost tracking, use a transaction breakdown to itemize each expense into specific costs.

Goldenseal posts each expense automatically to job costs. It also uses them for accounts payable, time and materials billing, material price updating and payroll-- so you only need to enter data once.

You can also allocate job costs to allowances, bids, change orders, purchase orders and work orders-- when you do that, Goldenseal adjusts billing amounts, and makes sure that you don't overpay on your bids and purchase orders.

Project Job Costs-- Quick Report

Choose Job Costs from the Costs menu to see a quick "cost control" report of expenses and income for each project. The first thing you'll see is a list of active projects with the current cost information.

The Job Costs report is a quick way to see overhead and project costs, so you can make cost control decisions about future work. It can even help you decide which of your employees are most productive.

Double-click on a project to see a cost breakdown by category.

Double-click on a category line to see a subcategory breakdown or a list of specific expenses in that category.

The project costing window also lets you see a breakdown of job costs by room, or a list of all cost items for the entire project.

Job Cost Progress Reports

The Goldenseal job cost software includes a progress window where you can enter the percentage completion for different phases of the project. You can then see a prediction of the final project cost. Just choose Job Costs from the Costs menu, and choose Progress by Category or Progress by Location in the details popup at the bottom of the window.

Use the progress report for your project cost management-- you can see exactly where you are making money and where you are losing, within each project. It's a very useful tool for management decisions.

Goldenseal works for construction costing, and for cost tracking on any other types of projects.

HINT-- Goldenseal also uses the percentage completion for progress payment billing.

Estimated vs Actual (Variance) Job Cost Reports

The Goldenseal costing software also provides several estimated vs actual reports that compare current job costs with the original estimate for a project. To see them, choose Projects from the Reports menu, and choose Costs By Class, Costs By Category, Costs By Subcategory or Costs By Location. They show estimated costs, actual costs, and the variance.

More Job Costing Reports

You can also use the Job Costs command to view job costs for overhead, real estate and equipment accounts. Just click on the Job Types field at upper right and enter a different item.

You can also see reports of the basic expense transactions-- choose Expenses from the Reports menu, and choose Equipment Hours, Labor Hours, Material Purchases, Subcontractor Costs or Other Costs from the submenu.

Job Costing Links

For more about job costing in the Getting Started manual, click here.
For more about job costing in the Reference manual, click here.
For more about job costing in Special Topics, click here.
Form Goldenseal job costing software Tech Answers, click here.