Construction companies and contractors cannot afford to compromise when it comes to accuracy. If you want to provide a competitive bid that’s error-free, you can no longer afford to produce takeoffs and cost estimates with common spreadsheet software like Excel. As the commercial construction industry adopts the use of digital tools for creating takeoffs, are you keeping up or being left behind?
The proportion of large corporations that have had substantial financial losses due to spreadsheet errors is quite alarming. Microsoft has indicated 88% of all Excel spreadsheets have mathematical errors. Some sources put it at one in five. For large construction projects that go on for several years, the cost of errors in spreadsheet data could run into hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars.
Using manual data entry to create and manage takeoffs with spreadsheets is still commonplace, but it causes serious errors in estimates used while bidding for contracts. This isn’t limited to construction alone. Analysts in other industries now agree that spreadsheets are a time bomb waiting to explode with catastrophic consequences.
The problem is that not only do spreadsheet errors lead to wrongly informed decisions, but the corrupted numbers also hide where you can’t easily separate them from accurate figures. This can cause even more decision-making errors after the project has started.
Another reason why you should do away with manual data entry is that it’s time-consuming, and it poses a high risk for both small and large construction companies.
No matter how small or big your company is, you’ll always have to compete with others who are trying to use cutting-edge technology to outwit you. With ever-increasing competition and high financial risks in the commercial construction industry, your company must adapt and modernize operations to stay competitive.
The question is: Is your estimation software putting you ahead or pushing you back?
In a survey of construction industry leaders, over 98-percent agreed that using digital tools is vital for the future of their business. And the adoption of building information modeling software is expected to save about $2 trillion annually across the industry within 10 years.
Using a cloud-based platform for pre-construction estimates enables you to create accurate digital takeoffs straight from your blueprints. This saves you time, minimizes human error and gives you accurate bids. Enterprise-grade software like Sage Estimating offers you a user-friendly interface, a streamlined estimating process and the ability to easily export of data into multiple formats.
Sage Estimating software offers the following benefits:
If you want to learn more about how your construction company can boost profits and eliminate errors in calculations while creating estimates for bidding and takeoffs, contact us now for a software demo with one of our consultants.
