What goes into a rate
Every rate is built up from the resources it takes to do one unit of the work:
- Labour - how long one unit takes (the output, e.g. hours per m²) times the all-in cost of the gang per hour.
- Materials - how much one unit uses, plus an allowance for waste and cutting, times the delivered price.
- Plant - mixers, hoists, excavators and the like, either per unit or spread across the items that use them.
- Overheads and profit - added as a percentage, either to each rate or once on the total.
A worked rate build-up: blockwork per m²
100 mm dense blockwork in a cavity wall, measured in m²:
| Resource | Build-up | Per m² |
|---|---|---|
| Labour | Bricklayer and labourer: 0.9 gang-hours per m² at £52.00 a gang-hour | £46.80 |
| Materials | 10.0 blocks per m² (+5% waste = 10.5) at £1.85 | £19.43 |
| Materials | Mortar: 0.009 m³ per m² (+10% waste) at £180 per m³ | £1.78 |
| Plant | Mixer and scaffold share | £2.50 |
| Net rate | £70.51 | |
| Overheads and profit at 12% | £8.46 | |
| Rate in the bill, per m² | £78.97 |
Example figures only, to show the method. Use your own labour costs, outputs and supplier prices.
If the bill has 240 m² of this wall, the item total is 240 × £78.97 = £18,952.80. Keep the build-up: when the labour rate or the block price changes, you change it once and every item that uses it moves with it.
Items that aren't rate times quantity
- Preliminaries - site set-up, supervision, welfare, scaffolding, insurances. Price them from the programme: most are time-related (per week) or fixed (set-up and clearance).
- Provisional sums - amounts the client has set for work that can't be measured yet. Carry them as written; you usually add only your attendance and profit where the bill asks for it.
- Daywork - percentages on labour, materials and plant for work valued at cost. Fill them in where the bill asks.
- Lump sum items - one price for the item, with the build-up kept behind it.
Before the bill goes out
- Check that every item has a rate, or is marked as included elsewhere.
- Look for rates that stand out against similar items, and against past jobs.
- Re-add the section totals and the summary - a pasted value or a broken formula is the classic spreadsheet slip.
- Check that the quantities you priced are the ones in the issued bill, not an earlier version.
- Have someone else look over it before it's issued.
Spreadsheet or bill software
A spreadsheet is fine for a small bill. On bigger ones, the risks are broken formulas, out-of-date versions and rates that aren't reused from job to job. Metre2 Quantum is bill of quantities software in your browser: it works like a spreadsheet (Type, Tab and Enter, copy and paste with Excel, undo anything), measures from PDF drawings, keeps every version with a review step before issue, and suggests what comes next from your team's past projects. Metre2 BOQ files (.sk and .m2x) open in it directly.