Monday morning, and an engineer disputes the figures
The engineers are self-employed and work on a split: a percentage of each job after parts, with different rates for night work, for jobs they found themselves and for agency work. Every Monday the owner builds the statements in a spreadsheet from the week's job sheets.
By Monday afternoon, one engineer has queried theirs. A job is missing. A cylinder was charged at full retail rather than cost. Cash the engineer kept from a night job has been deducted twice. The owner spends an hour going back through paper to find out who is right, and sometimes cannot.
The statement is built by hand from things that were never joined up
Commission depends on several things that live in different places: the job and its price, the parts taken from stock, the payment and who received it, and the rules for that engineer and that job type. The spreadsheet pulls them together by hand every week.
- Jobs are copied from paper sheets or the job system into a spreadsheet.
- Parts costs are looked up or guessed, and the basis varies week to week.
- Cash collected by the engineer is tracked separately and easy to miss or double count.
- Rate rules (nights, own leads, agency jobs) are applied by memory.
- The engineer sees only the total, not the lines behind it.
The split itself, and how self-employed engineers are engaged, is for you and your accountant or adviser to decide. The problem we deal with is the arithmetic and the evidence.
Disputes that damage trust
Every disputed statement costs the owner time and the engineer's goodwill. Engineers who suspect they are being short changed start looking at other firms, or start keeping their own records and taking private work on the side. Mistakes in the business's favour and against it both happen when statements are built by hand, and either kind erodes trust.
Statements generated from the job records
We build a statement engine on top of your job records, van stock and payment data.
- Each engineer has a rate profile: the split for each job type, night and weekend rules, and any lead or agency deductions you have agreed.
- Each completed job carries its price, the parts used (from van stock records, at the cost basis you choose) and how it was paid, including cash held by the engineer.
- At the end of the week the statement is calculated job by job, and every line shows the job, the charge, the parts, the rule applied and the result.
- Cash already held by the engineer is netted off once, from the payment record, not from memory.
- The engineer sees their draft statement in an app or by email and can query a specific line, which goes to the owner with the job attached.
- Once agreed, the statement produces the payment amount and can generate a self-billing document or remittance in your accounting software, if that is how you work.
| Line on the statement | Where it comes from |
|---|---|
| Job and charge | Invoice for the job |
| Parts deducted | Van stock usage at your chosen cost basis |
| Rate applied | Engineer's rate profile and job type |
| Cash held | Payment record on the job |
| Net due | Calculated from the above |
Monday stops being argument day
Statements appear without anyone typing them. Engineers can see each line and its source, so most queries are answered before they are raised. The ones that remain are about a specific job, which takes minutes to check. Rate changes are made once in the profile. The owner gets their Monday back and the relationship with the engineers is on firmer ground.
A normal week then looks like this. Engineers close jobs on their phones as usual, picking parts and payment type. On Sunday night the statements calculate themselves. On Monday morning each engineer gets their draft, glances down the lines, and either accepts it or queries one job. The owner deals with one or two specific questions instead of rebuilding a spreadsheet, and payments go out on time.
Recognise this?
- You build engineer statements in a spreadsheet every week.
- Engineers regularly query their figures.
- Parts costs on statements are worked out by hand.
- Cash kept by engineers is tracked separately.
- Engineers cannot see the job-by-job detail behind their pay.