Proposal items
Proposal Items are a central part of Kompass and control many financial aspects of the system. While explaining the fields, we will refer to the "Proposal Document". These are documents issued by your organization and prepared by Kompass BMS. They are .pdf or .docx documents and can be exported from Kompass along with details of your project. A typical example is a proposal document.
Attributes
General
- Project: each Proposal Item must be linked to one Project.
- Name: Title of the Proposal Item. This will be included in the Proposal Document.
- Description: describe the work that will be done including assumptions, notes, etc. This will be included in the Proposal Document.
- Internal Notes: notes that will not be shown on the Proposal Document. It is usually used to explain any assumption the Estimator made when creating the Proposal Item.
- Parent Proposal Item: group this Proposal Item with another one. Instead of showing separate Proposal Items, the grouped Proposal Items will be shown as one. This is useful if, e.g., you want to split out the work into multiple Proposal Items (and Tasks) but want to show just one Proposal Item to the customer. An example, Topo Survey being the parent and Traversing, Topo, Processing being separate children items under Topo Survey.
- Visibility: sets if this Proposal Item should appear in the Proposal Document:
- Show: include the Proposal Item with price and description in the document. If it has been grouped with a Parent Proposal Item, then the title and description will be added to the title and description of the Parent Proposal Item and the price will be added to the Parent Proposal Item price.
- Add price parent (only available if a Parent Proposal Item has been selected): Only the price will be added to the Parent Proposal Item. Title and description will not be shown.
- Exclude from proposal: do not show the Proposal Item or price in the Propsal Document.
- Optional: when set, this Proposal Item will not be included in the Project price unless it is accepted. It can also be shown separately on the Proposal Document. If the Proposal Item has a Parent Proposal Item, then this option can not be selected and will be controlled by the Parent Proposal Item.
- Accepted: date when this Proposal Item was accepted by the client.
- Accepted By: customer contact who accepted the Proposal Item.
- Tags: tags can be attached to Proposal Items. They can then be filtered by tags.
Staff
In this section staff resources can be added to the Proposal Item to build up the budget of planned costs. Resources generally have two types of costs (Site, Office) which are further divided into cost per day and cost per hour. The types of staff resources and unit costs are defined in the administration area and are usually fixed for a financial year. They can only be changed by a Kompass administrator.
- Quantity: how many to include
- Site Days: how many site days to include
- Site Hours: how many site hours to include
- Office Days: how many office days to include
- Office Hours: how many office hours to include
- Total (read-only): the calculated total taking the defined costs into account.
Equipment
This section budgets the working equipment needed to perform the work of this Proposal Item. Rates are only divided by day and hour. Entries can be set as editable by the Kompass administrator to allow for equipment that the company needs but needs to hire in.
- Name: generally fixed unless a resource has been set as editable
- Quantity: how many to include
- Days: how days the equipment will be required for
- Hours: how hours the equipment will be required for
- Rate per Day: generally fixed unless a resource has been set as editable
- Rate per Hour: generally fixed unless a resource has been set as editable
- Total (read-only): the calculated total taking the defined costs into account.
Subcontractor & Other Costs
This section allows to account for subcontractor and other costs that don't fall into the above two categories (Staff or Equipment). The attributes are the same with Equipment.
Financials
This section defines which department and service costs belong to and the price of the Proposal Item.
- Department: select which Department will do the work
- Service: if available, then select which Service of the Department this should Proposal Item be attributed to
- Price Type: this decides how a Proposal Item's value is measured. See chapter below for more details.
- VAT Rate: what tax rate should be applied to this Proposal Item
- Price: If it is changed, then the Gross Margin is calculated automatically taking the total Costs into account.
- if lump sum, then this is the total price of the Proposal Item.
- if rate, then this is the unit price. The total price is calculated by multiplying this price by the quantity.
- Gross Margin (%): if this is changed, then the price is adjusted automatically. Offices, Departments and Services can have separate target Gross Margins and the field will highlight if a Price is below a certain Gross Margin. Note: Gross Margin = (Price - Costs) / Price
- Budget: this field is available if the price type is "rate" and "Automatic" is unticked. It defines the budgeted quantity for this Proposal Item. If a status is recorded that is higher than this budget, then Kompass will highlight this in the Proposal Items list and the Project Status list.
- Automatic: if enabled, then the Budget will be dynamically adjusted according to the latest Status record. If it is disabled, then the Budget will be seen as an upper limit for the Proposal Item and Status records that are higher than the Budget will be highlighted in the Proposal Items list and the Project Status list.
Price Types
There are two proposal item types. Rate can be either automatic or with budget.
- Lump Sum: a fixed total price; status is recorded as a % (0–100%)
- Rate (automatic): a unit price multiplied by a quantity; no fixed upper limit inherently
- Rate with Budget: same as Rate, but with a budgeted quantity acting as an upper limit or warning threshold
Some examples below can provide more nuance on what each proposal item type is.
Lump Sum
Use this when the scope is clearly defined upfront, deliverables are fixed, and you can confidently price the job as a whole. Status is tracked as a percentage of completion.
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| Topographic Survey – Site A | Full topo survey of a 2-hectare greenfield site. Includes field data collection, processing, and delivery of a DTM and contoured drawing at 1:500 scale with 0.5m intervals. Fixed deliverable, fixed extent. Classic lump sum. |
| Title Boundary Investigation | Deed plan research, site inspection, and preparation of a boundary report with scaled plan showing legal boundary positions relative to existing features. Scope is defined by the title documents; no unknown variables. |
| Measured Building Survey – Ground Floor | Internal and external survey of the ground floor of an existing building. Includes all room dimensions, floor levels, door/window positions, and delivery of CAD drawings. Well-defined area, fixed deliverable. |
| Control Network Establishment | Setting out and observing a primary traverse network across a construction site, including monument installation, adjustment, and coordinate list submission. Known number of points, defined accuracy standard. |
| Aerial Survey (Fixed-Wing / UAV) – Farm Boundary | UAV photogrammetric survey of a 50-hectare agricultural holding. Includes flight, GCP survey, processing, and delivery of orthoimage and point cloud. Extent is fixed by the property boundary. |
Rate (T&M / Open-Ended)
Use this when the quantity of work cannot be predicted in advance. The price per unit is agreed, but the total depends on what's encountered. Status is recorded as a running quantity.
| Name | Unit / Rate | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Setting Out – Structural Elements | per point | Contractor requests setting out of column bases, pile positions, or slab edges as construction progresses. The total number of points is unknown at the outset; you charge per point set out. |
| GPS/GNSS Pick-ups – Additional Detail | per hour | Client requests supplementary detail picks during or after the main survey (e.g., additional manhole covers, spot levels along roads). Charged hourly as the quantity is driven by the client's evolving needs. |
| Monitoring Visits – Settlement / Movement | per visit | Periodic structure or embankment monitoring where the client may request more or fewer visits depending on observed movement or programme changes. Unit rate per visit agreed; number of visits open. |
| Asbuilt Survey – Civil Infrastructure | per km | Surveying completed drainage, kerbs, or service routes as construction progresses in linear increments. Total length depends on contractor programme and phasing. |
| Expert Witness / Boundary Dispute Support | per hour | Surveyor's time providing technical support, attending site, or preparing evidence in a legal dispute. Duration entirely dependent on the dispute's development. |
Rate with Budget
Use this when the work is T&M in nature but you want to set a ceiling for financial control, either as a warning threshold or a soft dynamic budget. This is the most common way to handle "open" survey work within a capped fee agreement.
| Name | Unit / Rate | Budget Qty | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hydrographic Survey – River Section | per day | 5 days | River survey where conditions (flow, access, weather) may affect productivity. Rate agreed per field day; budget of 5 days set as a ceiling. If more days are needed, the client is alerted before budget is exceeded. |
| Contaminated Land Survey Support | per hour | 40 hours | Surveyor time assisting a geo-environmental team with coordinating trial pit locations, setting out boreholes, and picking up reinstatement levels. Hourly rate with a 40-hour budget cap agreed with the client. |
| Ongoing Site Support – Construction Phase | per visit | 20 visits | Standing arrangement to provide survey support (levels, measurements, asbuilt checks) throughout a build programme. Budget of 20 visits set as the contracted allowance; additional visits require a variation. |
| Legal Boundary Demarcation – Complex Case | per hour | 30 hours | Researching title, interviewing parties, and physically marking a disputed boundary. The complexity is uncertain, so T&M applies; the budget of 30 hours reflects the client's cost approval threshold and triggers a review if approached. |
A note on the Rate Budget toggle ("Automatic")
In Kompass, the Automatic toggle on a Rate item controls whether the budget is a fixed ceiling or a dynamic one:
- Automatic OFF → the budget is a hard warning limit. Statuses recorded above the budget quantity are flagged in red on the Proposal Items and Project Status lists. Useful for the contract-capped scenarios above (Hydrographic Survey, Boundary Demarcation).
- Automatic ON → the budget updates itself to match the latest status record, so there's never a warning. More appropriate for internal tracking of open-ended work where no client cap exists (e.g., ongoing site support billed monthly with no ceiling).