First step of a budget
A bill of quantities (BoQ) is a list of work and materials with quantities and units of measure, still without prices. It only gets a price once you add a unit price for labour and materials to each item.
Until the quantities are right, every budget is only a guess and every quote prices something different.
The price column is still empty. That is exactly what the bill of quantities you send to suppliers looks like. It is also called an unpriced budget.
From quantities to price
A bill of quantities and an itemised budget are not two documents. They are one table in two states. Switch between them and try changing a quantity.
Bill of quantities example: 10 m² bathroom
| Item | Quantity | Unit | Unit price | Item price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 771.01 Wall tiling | 32 | m² | €34 | €1,088 |
| 771.02 Floor tiling | 10 | m² | €31 | €310 |
| 711.01 Waterproofing | 18 | m² | €14 | €252 |
| 721.01 Water supply pipework | 14 | m | €22 | €308 |
| 725.01 Washbasin | 1 | pcs | €180 | €180 |
| Bathroom total | €2,138 | |||
quantity × unit price = item price You can overwrite the quantity in any row. The item price and the total recalculate straight away.
Demonstration figures. The bill of quantities states the net area the wall and floor tiles are laid on. When buying tiles, an allowance for cutting is added on top; the Quotioo bathroom template allows five percent. Unit prices are indicative and vary by region and complexity.
It describes the scope of work, not its price. That is why it goes to suppliers, so they can fill in their prices.
The same bill can be priced as many times as the number of firms you ask. The brief stays the same.
When you add unit prices for labour and materials to the quantities, you get an itemised budget.
A change in quantity therefore carries through to the price on its own. Nothing has to be retyped in two places.
Where the numbers come from
Every quantity comes from dimensions and a specific building element. A wall has its area, and the door and window openings are deducted from it. Walk through the calculation step by step.
Width times height. For now the whole wall area, door included.
The door is not tiled, so its area comes off the quantity.
The net tiled area on this wall. This is what goes into the bill of quantities.
The other walls of a bathroom with a 4.00 × 2.50 m floor plan are calculated the same way. Together they give the 32 m² of wall tiling you saw in the bill above. With full project documentation, these measurements are done by the designer or a cost estimator. For a smaller renovation you work from the real dimensions of the room.
Comparable quotes
If you send three firms only the drawings, each one reads the scope slightly differently. You get three totals and no idea why they differ. When they all price the same bill of quantities, you compare the price of specific items.
| Item | Quantity | Unit | Firm A | Firm B | Firm C |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 771.01 Wall tiling | 32 | m² | €31 | €34 | €42 |
| 771.02 Floor tiling | 10 | m² | €29 | €31 | €38 |
| 711.01 Waterproofing | 18 | m² | €15 | €14 | €12 |
| 721.01 Water supply pipework | 14 | m | €24 | €22 | €31 |
| 725.01 Washbasin | 1 | pcs | €165 | €180 | €210 |
| Bathroom total | €2,053 lowest | €2,138 | €2,584 | ||
Same items, same quantities, same units of measure. Only the unit prices differ, and that is exactly what can be compared. Without a shared bill of quantities you would be comparing three different briefs. Look at the waterproofing: firm C, the most expensive overall, priced it lowest. With a difference like that, it is worth checking what the price includes: the area covered, the type of waterproofing and the preparation of the substrate.
Where to get a bill of quantities
Both routes lead to the same place. Either you take over finished quantities, or you prepare the structure of items and fill in quantities to match your brief.
A bill of quantities and a budget usually arrive in Excel from a designer, cost estimator or building firm. There is no need to retype them by hand.
The Excel file (.xlsx or .xls) exactly as you received it.
Quotioo finds the codes, descriptions, units of measure, quantities and prices in the table, if the file contains them.
Add what is missing and remove what you do not need.
Add unit prices to the quantities and you have a budget.
Quotioo recognises the usual table layout from estimating software, where each item has its own row. You always see the recognised rows and can edit them before saving. Nothing is taken over blindly.
For a smaller renovation there is often no design and no professionally prepared bill of quantities. You can still start, it just helps to know what you are holding.
From project documentation
From a template or with AI
Neither a template nor AI replaces a designer or cost estimator. They help you get started when there is no design and you need a picture of the scope and costs.
What comes next
Quantities are the first step. They then get prices, go through suppliers' quotes and at the end you compare them with the actual costs of the build.
Bill of quantities
Items, quantities and units of measure. No prices yet.
Priced budget
Unit prices for labour and materials are added to the quantities.
Supplier quotes
Firms price the same items, so the prices can be compared.
Construction
During the build you record invoices and actual spending.
Actual costs
At the end you see where you deviated from the plan and why.
The bill of quantities covers quantities, the price list covers unit prices, and the budget combines them into a structure that lasts the whole build.
Frequently asked questions
The questions we hear most often about bills of quantities.
Cannot find your answer?
Write to us →A bill of quantities contains items, quantities and units of measure, but no prices. A budget is the same list with unit prices for labour and materials and the item totals added. That is why the bill of quantities goes to suppliers to fill in their prices, which gives you comparable quotes on the same brief. A bill of quantities without prices is also called an unpriced budget.
The unit of measure says how a quantity is measured: square metre, linear metre, piece or hour. The same work can be priced in different units, so until two quotes use the same unit and the same quantity, you are comparing two different briefs.
For a new build or a larger renovation, the designer or a cost estimator prepares it as part of the project documentation. The design is the source of both the dimensions and the construction details. For a smaller renovation you can also start from the room dimensions and a list of typical items. A bill like that is used to estimate scope and costs, not as a tender document.
Yes. Upload an Excel file (.xlsx or .xls) and Quotioo finds the items with their codes, descriptions, units of measure and quantities and turns them into budget rows. You go through the rows before saving and correct anything that does not match. It recognises the usual table layout from estimating software, with one item per row. If it does not recognise the file layout, it tells you.
Detailed enough that every item can be priced and later checked against an invoice. A single row called bathroom cannot be priced, because every firm imagines something different under it. On the other hand, nobody can keep a breakdown down to individual screws up to date. A practical rule is one item per type of work, each with its own unit of measure.
That is normal, and it is the main reason the bill of quantities should stay in use. When you change a quantity in Quotioo, the item price and the whole budget recalculate, and you can still see how much the scope has changed compared with the original brief. Extra work comes from exactly these differences.
Start with quantities
Create a bill of quantities in Quotioo or upload the one you already have from your designer. Add unit prices to the items once you have them.
Want to know everything that belongs in a finished budget? Read the construction budget guide
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