Estimating services for subcontractors
The pre-construction department behind trade contractors.
Head contractors run a commercial team: estimators who measure, contract administrators who protect the margin once the job starts, and a system that keeps the two connected. That discipline is what makes their numbers hold. We run the same function for trade contractors, sized to your tender flow instead of carried as headcount.
Get a fixed-fee quote or call 0494 779 423
- Fixed fee per job, no retainer
- Written proposal in 2 hours
- Delivered in 2 business days
- Verified by a trade-qualified estimator
The structural problem
Tender flow is lumpy. Headcount is not.
Commercial tenders do not arrive evenly. Four packages close in the same fortnight, then it goes quiet for three weeks. A permanent estimator has to be paid through the quiet stretch, so most trade contractors size their pre-construction capacity for the average rather than the peak. That is a rational decision, and it has one predictable consequence: in the busy fortnight, something gets priced fast, or gets priced at eleven at night, or does not get priced at all.
The work you decline in that fortnight is invisible. It never shows up in a report, because a tender you did not submit produces no record of the margin you did not win.
Buying measurement per job rather than per year matches the cost to the flow. In a quiet month you spend nothing. In the fortnight four packages land, you price all four, on time, with the same rigour on each.
How we work with subcontractors
Take as much or as little as suits the week.
Almost everyone starts with measurement, because that is where trust gets earned. From there it is your call how much comes off your desk.
Start here
Measure the package
Quantity schedule you can price straight off, colour-coded marked-up drawings so you can audit every number against the plan, an assumptions and exclusions page, and the crew hours to build it. Crew hours are included as standard.
When you want it priced
Priced bill of quantities
The full bill with rates, extensions and preliminaries, built from your own rates or a recognised published library. Your rates stay yours and are never used on anyone else's job.
With the bid
Tender support
Tender conditions reviewed, and your inclusions, exclusions and qualifications set out the way a head contractor expects to receive them. Written down instead of assumed, which is where most scope arguments start.
Once you win
Keeping the margin you priced
Progress claims, a variation register kept straight and priced, and delay claims assembled properly. All of it resting on quantities measured at the start, which is what makes any of it defensible.
Trades
Who we measure for.
Carpentry & joinery
Structural and finish carpentry, commercial joinery, shopfitting. Our own trade background, and the packages we measure most.
Commercial fitout
Partitions, ceilings, wall linings, flooring, painting, tiling and glazing. Whole-package or single-trade, priced the same way either way.
Demolition & strip-out
Soft strip and structural demolition, measured off the existing drawings with the extent of removal stated explicitly on the assumptions page.
Roofing & cladding
Sheet areas, flashings and penetrations, taken off the same architectural sets as everything else.
Earthmoving & civil
Bulk and detailed excavation, trenching and site strip, volumes off levels, with ground-condition exclusions stated every time.
Services trades
Electrical and hydraulic packages are measured following a short scoping call, so the basis of measurement is agreed with your team before we start.
Not listed? Send it through anyway. You will get a straight answer on whether we are the right people to measure it, rather than a quote for something we should not be touching.
Something worth being upfront about
We are a measurement house, not a bidder.
On any decent commercial tender, several trade contractors are pricing the same package. We may well be measuring for more than one of them, and we would rather say so plainly than have you assume otherwise.
That works because quantities are objective. The drawings say what they say, and two competent measurers should arrive at materially the same numbers. What turns quantities into a bid is entirely yours: your rates, your productivity, your programme, your read on the client, your margin. Your rates and pricing are confidential, are used only on your jobs, and never inform anyone else's deliverable. We also never confirm or deny whether we are engaged on a given project, because saying so would itself tell one contractor who else is bidding.
We are not competing with you. We are helping you win work.
Pricing
Fixed fee, quoted off your drawings.
Most single-trade takeoffs land between $900 and $2,500 + GST.
Quoted as a fixed fee off the actual drawing set, so the number you accept is the number you pay. No hourly rates, no retainer, no minimum commitment. Larger full trade packages and work beyond the takeoff are quoted the same way, off what is actually in front of us.
Common questions
What subcontractors ask us first.
Do I need a retainer or a minimum number of jobs?
No. Every job is quoted and paid on its own. Retainers exist for contractors running enough volume that a monthly arrangement works out cheaper, but that is somewhere you might move to later, never a condition of starting.
We already have an estimator. Where do you fit?
Alongside them, on the overflow. Tender flow is lumpy and headcount is not, so even a well-staffed contractor turns work away in a busy month. We take the packages that would otherwise be declined or priced at midnight, in a format your estimator can price straight off.
Will you work for more than one bidder on the same tender?
Yes, and we say so upfront. Quantities are objective; rates and margin are yours. Your pricing is confidential, used only on your jobs, and we never confirm or deny an engagement to anyone.
What if the drawings change mid-tender?
Tell us and we will requote the delta rather than the whole package. Every deliverable records the drawing revision and date it was measured against, so it is always clear what has and has not been captured.
What size contractor do you work with?
Most clients are commercial trade contractors of roughly 5 to 30 people who tender regularly. Smaller and larger are both fine, and established estimating firms use us as overflow capacity when their own pipeline is full.
More on process, payment and scope on the full FAQ.
Get started
What are you pricing this week?
Tell us what is closing soonest and how far you want us to take it. Send the set and you will have a written, fixed-price proposal within 2 hours, 8am to 5.30pm Monday to Friday. The work lands within 2 business days. No obligation.
Send us your drawings or call 0494 779 423