Understanding Expenses and Services

Expenses and Services are two related but distinct ways of tracking costs and charges on a project. This article explains the difference and where each appears in the system.

Expenses vs. Services

An Expense is something you've actually spent money on — mileage, airfare, a hotel stay, or a permit fee you paid on the client's behalf. Expenses have a direct, out-of-pocket cost.

A Service does not have a direct cost, but is something you charge the client for anyway. Common examples include:

• A flat fee for filing a permit application (separate from the permit fee itself, which would be an expense).
• A per-visit charge for site visits.
• In-house plotting or printing, since the cost of that equipment, paper, and supplies is part of your overhead rather than a direct, itemized expense.

The distinction comes down to whether there's a direct cost behind the charge: if you paid money out for it, it's an Expense; if you're charging for time, effort, or overhead-based work with no direct cost tied to that specific charge, it's a Service.

Billable vs. Non-Billable Expenses

On a project's Expenses and Services tab, expenses are split into two categories:

• Non-Billable Expenses — costs you've paid and want tracked against the job for cost purposes, but that you won't be billing to the client (for example, staff mileage for running errands).
• Billable Expenses — costs you've paid and intend to bill the client for.

Billable expenses show a Billing Status toggle. Once an expense has been billed, this toggle turns green, and selecting the invoice icon next to it jumps directly to the invoice it was billed on.

Adding a Service

To add a service to a project, go to the Expenses and Services tab and add a new service line. You can select a service you've already set up in the system (such as plotting) or add a custom one.

When adding a service:

1. Enter the price (services with a set system price, like plotting, may pre-fill this).
2. Add a description of the work performed and why, for the client's reference.
3. Select the phase the service should count toward.
4. Save.

Once added, the service's Billing Status shows as unbilled (typically shown in blue) until it's included on an invoice, at which point it turns green with the same invoice-jump icon used for billable expenses.

Where Expenses and Services Can Be Used

• Expenses can be charged to projects, proposals, and other areas of the system such as admin.
• Services are restricted to projects only, since services are specifically meant to be billed to a client.

Markup

Expenses can optionally include a markup. Services do not support markup — the assumption is that the price you've set for a service already reflects whatever margin you intend to build in.

Reviewing Expenses and Services

Beyond the individual project view, you can review all expenses and all services across the system from their own tabs, where you can run reports and queries — for example, checking which services on a given job haven't yet been billed.

Best Practice

Use Non-Billable Expenses to keep accurate cost records even when you're not passing a cost through to the client — this keeps your project cost data complete. When setting up recurring charges that don't have a direct cost (plotting, site visits, permit filing fees), set them up as Services rather than Expenses, since Services are the correct way to bill for overhead-based work without an itemized out-of-pocket cost behind it.

Summary

Expenses represent actual money spent (billable or non-billable), while Services represent charges to the client with no direct cost, such as flat fees for permit filing or plotting. Billable expenses and services both show a Billing Status that turns green once invoiced, with a link to the relevant invoice. Expenses can be used on projects, proposals, and admin; Services are limited to projects. Expenses can optionally include markup; Services do not, since their set price is assumed to already include any margin.