Raising a claim

Choose New claim on the Claims screen. The claim opens with the contract stages already listed and the headline figures across the top of the pane.

If New claim is greyed out, the costing has no contract stages yet — there is nothing to claim against until they are set up. See Contract stages.

The figures across the top

Seven numbers sit above the tabs and stay in view as you work:

Figure	What it is
Contract price	The current contract sum
Work % completed	The share of the whole contract this claim reaches
Contract completed	The value of the stages claimed
Total variations	The value of the variations claimed
Total work completed	Stages plus variations
Total prev. claims	The approved claims before this one
This claim value	What the client is being asked for

They move as you edit the stages and variations tabs, so you can see the effect of a change without leaving the claim.

Finding a claim

The list on the left searches on claim name, claim number and invoice number, and filters to Approved or Unapproved. Trashed shows claims that have been put in the bin, which are otherwise hidden.

The fields

Field	What it is
Claim Name	What this claim is called — usually the stage
Claim number	Sequential, per job
Claim Date	The date of the claim, which usually starts the payment clock
Client	From the project
Contract Price	The current contract sum, including approved variations
Invoice number	Your invoice reference
Bank account	Payment details printed on the claim

Claim date and claim number are both required, and the number must be greater than zero — it decides which earlier claims count as previous claims, so a claim without one bills the wrong amount. If another live claim on the costing already uses that number, the claim still saves but warns you, because two claims sharing a number make “previous claims” ambiguous.

Every contract stage is copied onto the claim when it is created, carrying forward what the last claim billed, so there is nothing to add by hand. If the contract stages themselves change afterwards, Reset stage values on the Stages tab re-reads them.

Approval freezes the claim

Until it is approved, a claim is live: change a contract stage, the contract price or a variation and the claim follows. Tick Approved by client and it stops — every figure on it is stored as it stands and never recalculated, however the job changes afterwards. That is what makes the claim usable as the record of what was agreed.

Unlock thaws it. The figures follow the job again until it is approved once more, so unlock only when the client has agreed to a changed claim, not to tidy up a number after the fact.

While a claim is approved, everything on it is read-only: the details, the stages, the variations and the note. Trash and Delete permanently are refused too — an approved claim counts towards every later claim’s “previous claims”, so removing one quietly increases what the next claim bills.

Previous claims are the approved ones only. A claim that was trashed, or never approved, does not reduce the next one.

Claiming a stage

On the Stages tab, each contract stage has a Claim % — how much of that stage this claim bills, from 0 to 100. Set the stage you have reached to 100.

The edit box shows what the percentage is worth as you type, so you can see the money before you save it rather than after.

The footer totals the grid. Read Claim % there carefully: it is the share of the whole contract claimed, not the sum of the per-stage percentages — a job at deposit, base and frame reads 40%, not 240%.

Claims are cumulative against the contract: each one claims the stages reached since the last, and the running total tells you and the client how much of the contract has been claimed to date.

Worked example: the Hendricks contract

Contract sum $221,380, with the standard stages:

Stage	%	Value
Deposit	5%	$11,069
Base	10%	$22,138
Frame	15%	$33,207
Lock-up	35%	$77,483
Fixing	25%	$55,345
Completion	10%	$22,138

The job reaches frame stage. Claim 3:

Claim name	Frame
Claim number	3
This claim — frame stage, 15%	$33,207
Previously claimed (deposit + base)	$33,207
Total claimed to date	$66,414
Contract remaining	$154,966

The client can see where they are against the contract, which is what stops the “how much have we paid so far?” conversation happening by email every month.

Claim the stage you have actually reached

Claiming frame when the frame is up but not braced, or lock-up when two windows are still to arrive, is how disputes start. Most contracts define these stages precisely. Claiming a stage you have not completed gives the client a reason not to pay any of it — including the part you did finish.

Claim numbering

Number sequentially per job, starting at 1, and never reuse a number.

If a claim is withdrawn and reissued, use the next number and reference the one it replaces. Two documents both called Claim 4 is the kind of thing that gets a whole account queried.

Note templates

The templates on the Notes tab are for the claim’s note — the wording that prints on the claim — not for its stages or figures. Those come from the contract.

Load puts a template’s text into the note, Save to writes the note back over the selected template, Save as new makes a new one from what is in the note, and Rename and Delete do what they say.

Templates marked (SmarteBuild) are the ones supplied with the system. They can be loaded and copied but not changed, renamed or deleted — use Save as new to make your own version.

Worth setting up if you issue the same wording every month: standard payment terms, what the claim covers, what happens next.

Contract price must be current

The Contract Price on the claim should include every approved variation. If it does not, every stage percentage is calculated on the wrong base and every claim from here is wrong by the same proportion.

Check it against your variations before raising a claim. See How variations affect the job.

Before you send

1. The stage is genuinely complete.
2. The contract price includes approved variations.
3. The claim number follows the last one.
4. Approved variations are included — see Including variations.
5. The bank account details are right.

Then issue it.