Bringing a quote into the BOQ

A recorded quote is only useful once it is priced into the bill. This is how it gets there, and what to keep hold of on the way.

Push a quote into the bill and the rate lands on the items it covers.

Against items

Where the quote prices your items, apply it to them directly. On the quote, Award this quote with Update the estimate items too ticked: each item takes the quoted quantity, the supplier’s product and the quoted rate, and keeps a Related bid link back to the quote. To take only some lines, open each one and tick Also put this product and quantity on the estimate item, and star it so it is the chosen price - see Choosing lines.

Set the supplier on those items at the same time. It takes a moment and it means the purchase order later assembles itself.

Lump sums

Most subcontractor quotes are one number for the whole scope. You have two options.

Carry it as a single item. Add one BOQ item for the trade, with the quoted total and unit item or sum. Simple, and right when you will order and pay it as one lump.

Put the scope in Includes — the vanity, the mirror, the screen, and what is excluded. Bathroom fitout — $8,500 tells nobody anything a month later.

Spread it across items. Where you want detail — to compare against another job, or because you will order parts of it separately — allocate the lump across your items.

The trade-off is honesty about precision. Splitting a $17,000 roofing quote across six items means inventing six rates that add to $17,000, and none of them is what the subcontractor actually quoted. Fine for reporting; misleading if someone later treats one of those rates as a real price.

Lump sum in, lump sum out

If you will order and pay it as one lump, carry it as one item. The detail you gain from splitting is invented, and it will be treated as real by whoever reads it next.

Keep the link

However you bring it in, keep the quote attached and the Related bid link intact.

It is what answers three questions later:

• Who quoted this?
• What were their exclusions?
• Is the rate on this item a real quoted price, or my own allowance?

That third one matters when the job is won and you are raising orders. A rate that came from a quote can be ordered against with confidence; one you allowed yourself needs checking first.

Quotes that arrive after you have priced

Common — you allow a rate, submit the tender, and the subcontractor’s price arrives afterwards.

Record it, and compare it against what you allowed:

Quote vs allowance	What it means
Lower	Margin you did not know you had
About the same	Your allowance was sound
Higher	You are short on that trade — and now, not on site

Do not silently overwrite the allowance on an estimate you have already submitted. That changes what your tender says the job costs. If you want to see the effect, duplicate the estimate and update the copy.

Expiry

Quotes expire. Where the price carries a validity period, note it — in the quote name, or on the item.

A price accepted four months after it was quoted is not a price, and finding that out when the order is rejected is worse than finding it out now.