Keep each dig’s quantities, machine hours, haul loads and progress claims on one record.

An excavation contractor strips topsoil, digs foundations and trenches, grades sites, loads spoil and brings in fill. The work is priced by the cubic metre, by the hour or as a lump sum. Machines are the main cost, and every hour of one is money.

Most firms track those hours on paper tickets, in driver notes and in a foreman’s phone. Excavation software joins them to the job. Quantities, hours and claims then come from one source. The estimator, the foreman and the accounts clerk then work from the same quantities, the same machine rates and the same load tickets, rather than from three private copies.

A builder, a developer or a utility asks for a price. An estimator reads the drawings, measures the cut and fill, notes the soil and the access, and prices machine hours, trucks, labour, disposal and any hired plant. The quote is lump sum or by unit rate. Once it is accepted, a job is opened and a programme set with the start date and the machines needed. Quantities are agreed on paper before the first machine arrives, and every later change to the cut depth or the haul distance has to be written against that same page.

On site, operators dig and load. Truck drivers carry loads to a tip or to another site. A foreman keeps a daily log of hours, weather, loads and any extra work the client asked for. Fuel is drawn from a bowser or a tanker. Machines are serviced in the yard at set hours. At month end, progress claims are raised on measured quantities, and variation items are argued from the log. A thin log makes a thin claim. Rain days count too.