116 hours recovered. A$1.55 million in claims, seven days earlier.
A privately owned Sydney commercial contractor. 46 staff. Eight active projects. 63 regular subcontractors. A$18 million in annual revenue. And a commercial team spending 161 hours every month on administration that should not have required a person.
Outcome
The client
A privately owned commercial construction company based in Sydney, delivering office fit-outs, refurbishments and small-to-medium commercial projects across New South Wales. The contractor already used established construction and accounting software. But its commercial team still maintained a collection of spreadsheets beside those systems. The systems recorded pieces of the project. They did not create one reliable commercial workflow.
Industry
Commercial construction
Location
Sydney, Australia
Employees
46
Annual revenue
Approx. A$18 million
Active projects
Eight
Regular subcontractors
63
Monthly subcontractor claims
Approx. 75
Monthly variations
Approx. 28
Monthly client claims
Approx. A$1.55 million
The problem
Every month ended with the same scramble. Good software surrounded a broken information chain.
Operational symptoms
Subcontractor claims were difficult to validate
Each subcontractor submitted claims differently. The commercial team had to manually check contract value, progress, previous payments, retention, unapproved variations and compliance documents for each of the 75 monthly claims. The process depended on experienced staff remembering where to look.
Variations were disconnected from the financial workflow
A variation could begin as a site instruction, an email, a photograph or a conversation. It was priced in one spreadsheet, discussed through email, and entered into accounting only after approval. There was no reliable connection between the work requested, the price submitted, the client decision, the subcontractor cost, and the next payment claim.
Compliance was managed through reminders
Public-liability certificates, workers compensation documents, licences and induction records were stored in folders and tracked in spreadsheets. Expired documents were often discovered when a subcontractor was due on site, a claim was being assessed, or an audit was approaching.
Management could not see commercial exposure
The director and commercial manager could see total project values. They could not immediately answer: how much work had been performed but not approved? Which variations had been waiting more than 14 days? Which claims were blocked? Which projects were likely to miss the deadline?
Month-end controlled the team
The commercial manager described the process as "reconstructing the month after it had already happened." The final week of each month was consumed by chasing site updates, reconciling spreadsheets, locating supporting evidence, confirming variation status and assembling client claim packs.
The baseline
The diagnostic quantified the administrative workload before a single line of code was written.
More than one full-time employee's month was being consumed by administration, checking and reconciliation.
How Pressense diagnosed the bottleneck
The company initially believed it needed a better subcontractor portal. The portal was only one part of the problem. Pressense followed the commercial workflow from the moment a subcontractor was appointed until the final payment and release of retention. We found one broken information chain, not five separate problems.
Five connected workflows mapped
Subcontractor onboarding
From initial appointment through company details, ABN and banking information, contract execution, insurance documents, workers compensation evidence, licences, safety documentation, site induction and approval to commence work.
Variation management
From the original instruction through scope clarification, evidence collection, subcontractor quotation, internal margin review, client submission, approval or rejection, budget update and claim inclusion.
Subcontractor claims
From claim receipt through contract-value verification, progress confirmation, variation reconciliation, retention calculation, compliance check, payment-schedule preparation, accounting approval and payment status.
Client payment claims
From monthly cut-off through site-progress capture, supporting evidence, variation status, cost exposure, claim calculation, internal approval, submission and payment tracking.
Management reporting
From project-level data through committed cost, forecast cost, approved and unapproved revenue, margin exposure, retention, claims submitted and payments received.
What Pressense built
A commercial project-control system.
The system connected subcontractor onboarding, compliance, variations, claims and payment status in one operational workflow. It did not replace the company's accounting or project-management software. It controlled the information moving between them.
Subcontractor control centre
Every subcontractor had a structured record connected to their active projects, showing contract value, approved variations, claims to date, retention held, compliance status and document expiry dates. Automated alerts were issued 30, 14 and 7 days before expiry. Subcontractors received a secure request to upload updated documents. Staff were only notified on failure to respond or when a document required review.
Structured claim submission
Subcontractors submitted claims against the live subcontract record. The system displayed original contract value, approved variations, revised contract value, previous certifications, current claim, retention and remaining balance. Claims exceeding available value were automatically flagged. Claims containing unapproved variations could not silently enter the payment workflow.
Variation workflow
Every variation received a unique record from the moment it was identified. The record connected project, site instruction, description, photographs, subcontractor cost, internal markup, client price, submission date, approval status, schedule impact and claim status. Variations were separated into stages: Identified, Cost requested, Priced, Internally reviewed, Submitted, Approved, Claimed, Paid. Items over 14 days were escalated to the project manager and commercial manager.
Client claim workspace
Each project had a monthly claim workspace showing contract value, approved variations, current progress, previous claims, current claim, retention, unapproved variation exposure and submission deadline. Site teams uploaded evidence throughout the month. By cut-off, most of the claim was already assembled.
Commercial dashboard
Management had one live view across all active projects: contract value, revised contract value, claims submitted, cash received, outstanding claims, retention, approved and unapproved variations, projected final margin and compliance exceptions. An attention view surfaced claims approaching deadline, variations awaiting client action, subcontractors with expired documents and projects with increasing commercial exposure.
The new workflow
- 1Subcontractor emails a spreadsheet
- 2Contract administrator checks several registers
- 3Project manager confirms site progress by email
- 4Variation values are reconciled manually
- 5Compliance documents are checked in folders
- 6Errors trigger another email chain
- 7Claim is entered into accounting software
- 8Commercial manager updates reporting spreadsheet
- 9Client claim is assembled at month-end
- 1Subcontractor submits against the live contract
- 2System validates available contract value
- 3Project manager confirms progress in-system
- 4Variation status is already connected
- 5Compliance is checked automatically
- 6Exceptions are routed to the right person
- 7Approved claim moves to finance
- 8Portfolio reporting updates immediately
- 9Client claim pack is already substantially complete
Outcome
Commercial administration fell by 72%.
71%
Fewer claims requiring major rework
24 of 75 monthly claims required substantial correction. After structured submission and automatic value checking, this fell to 7.
71%
Fewer ageing variations
38 variations had been open more than 14 days across active projects. Once every variation had an owner, status, age and escalation path, this fell to 11.
98%
Subcontractor compliance completeness
Fully current compliance documents rose from 76% to 98%. Expired documents were no longer discovered only when a subcontractor arrived on site.
A$360,000 working-capital timing improvement
Before the system, the monthly client-claim process took an average of 9.5 days after the project cut-off. With evidence, progress, variations and cost information collected throughout the month, the claim pack could be finalised in approximately 2.5 days. That moved approximately A$1.55 million in monthly claims into the payment process seven days earlier.
At average daily billings of A$51,667, moving the claim cycle forward by seven days produced a working-capital timing effect of approximately A$360,000. This was not additional revenue. It represented money entering the certification and payment cycle earlier.
What changed after the first 90 days
The most important result was not that the contractor had another internal application. Commercial information stopped living in separate personal systems.
Project managers no longer kept private variation registers. Contract administrators no longer maintained a second version of subcontractor values. The commercial manager no longer spent the first week of every month rebuilding project status.
Monthly project reviews changed too. Instead of discussing whether the information was correct, the leadership team could focus on which variation required escalation, which project was drifting from its margin, which client claim was at risk, and where management attention would have the greatest effect.
The company also stopped treating every problem as a month-end issue. Because exceptions appeared as they happened, employees could resolve them during the month.
Why a custom system was the right answer
The company did not need to replace its accounting platform or abandon its construction project-management software. It needed the missing operational layer between the site, the project team, the commercial team, subcontractors, finance and management.
Off-the-shelf systems handled individual parts of the process. The custom system handled the way this particular contractor moved commercial information through the business. That distinction was responsible for the outcome.
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