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Your BuildingWorks Estimate module subscription comes with an automatic update of materials and prices via our Price Checker web service, which instantly updates your estimating rates library.

But where do the material prices come from we hear you ask?

We have a dedicated pricing service in place which scours the web on your behalf for the latest prices on thousands of products to keep your BuildingWorks software up to date with price rises (I’m afraid there are rarely any reductions!).

We use a range of techniques ranging from the sophisticated (clever software algorithms which scan the web for price rises) to the more traditional (literally a pricing research team continuously reviewing online merchant’s catalogues). These are released in the form of a software update once a quarter.

Significant price inflation makes it critical to stay on top of price rises when quoting

It’s so important to stay on top of current pricing to avoid under-pricing and undercharging customers. Price inflation on certain materials has increased by double digits over the last year. If you don’t account for this it will make a massive dent in margins.

Whatever your opinion on Brexit or The Daily Mail, an investigation by The Mail on Sunday into the effects of the Brexit referendum has identified sweeping price rises of up to 35 per cent on some building materials. Products include loft insulation (+12%), plasterboard (+10%) and chipboard (+7%), timber (+10%) and sand and aggregate (around 5%) rising at their fastest rate for 25 years.

There’s more on the subject from This is Money and Building

Choose your estimating software carefully

Many software packages expect you to populate the Price Book yourself. Afterwards,  go on to maintain them, but who has time for that? Certainly no building firm or designer that we know.

As prices are so flipping critical, we believe it’s an essential service that we offer and should be a mandatory “thing” that your BuildingWorks software can do – so check carefully if you are looking at alternative providers. BuildingWorks comes pre-populated with over 15000 priced “BIM objects”. This will go on to be updated quarterly throughout your subscription so you are always on top of things. What’s not to like?

For instant access to a free trial of BuildingWorks go to the download here.