Sample report
Admin Time Review for Sample & Co Electrical
- People
- 30: 22 engineers, 4 in the office, 4 directors and surveyors
- Systems
- Sage Accounting, Outlook, Excel, paper job sheets
- Time found
- About 16 hours a week
Sample & Co Electrical is invented. The figures show how we lay out and work out the list. They are not results from a real client.
Summary
Most of the office's admin time goes on paperwork that arrives after the work is done: job sheets typed into Sage on Fridays, hours copied into the payroll spreadsheet, and quotes chased by hand. All three can be captured once, at the point the work happens.
The 3 biggest time-savers
01.
Job sheets typed into Sage
- Would save
- 10 h a week
- Fixed price
- £3,950
- Timeline
- 3 to 4 weeks
Where the time goes now
Engineers hand in paper job sheets at the end of the week. The office types each one into Sage to raise the invoice, and chases any that are missing or hard to read.
What we would change
A job sheet on each engineer's phone, with your price list built in. When a job is finished, the office checks a draft invoice in Sage and sends it.
About 2.5 hours a week stays, for checking drafts before they go.
How we counted it Task Each time How often Hours a week Typing a job sheet into Sage 5 minutes 120 a week 10.0 Chasing a missing or unreadable sheet 15 minutes 10 a week 2.5 Time it takes now 12.5 02.
Hours copied into the payroll spreadsheet
- Would save
- 3 h a week
- Fixed price
- Included if built with time-saver 1, otherwise £2,500
- Timeline
- 1 week, alongside time-saver 1
Where the time goes now
Engineers text their hours to the office manager, who copies them into a spreadsheet for the payroll bureau every Monday.
What we would change
Hours come from the job sheets above. A weekly summary goes to the payroll bureau automatically, with anything unusual flagged for a person to check.
How we counted it Task Each time How often Hours a week Copying one engineer's week 8 minutes 22 a week22 engineers 2.9 Checking and querying hours 60 minutes 1 a week 1.0 Time it takes now 3.9 03.
Quotes chased by hand
- Would save
- 3 h a week
- Fixed price
- £2,500
- Timeline
- 2 weeks
Where the time goes now
Sent quotes live in a spreadsheet. A week later, the office manager phones or emails each one to ask whether the customer wants to go ahead.
What we would change
Each quote is logged as it leaves Outlook. A polite follow-up email goes on day 7, and replies land in one list, so calls are only made to the customers who answer.
Calls to customers who reply stay, because they win work.
How we counted it Task Each time How often Hours a week Finding and chasing a quote 10 minutes 25 a week 4.2 Time it takes now 4.2
Together, about 16.0 hours a week
That is more than the 5 hours in our promise, so this review would be invoiced. Below 5 hours, there would be no invoice. The fee comes off any build you sign within 30 days.
What we would leave alone, and why
Building quotes in Excel
Each quote is different and takes a surveyor's judgement. A better template would help more than any software.
Van stock lists
At your size, the paper lists checked monthly work well enough. A stock system would cost more time than it saves.
