The Item Detail dialog box contains all the information about a particular Item, such as the Item's Cost Codes (Material and/or Labor) and other basic information, such as how an Item is Calculated, Sizing, and Pricing. The Item Detail also allows you to specify product information (Manufacturer and part numbers), how the Item is installed, and any related Items (Chains).
The Item Detail includes five tabs - we recommend that you read this section in-order, each article builds on the previous articles:
- The General tab, you describe what the Item is. The Code, Description, UOM, and Mat. Cost Code (if Item includes material) are required (the Code must be unique).
- The Calculation tab, instructs the program how to take measurements (for instance, from On-Screen Takeoff) and convert them to a usable UOM for Materials/Labor. Section and Lab. Cost Code (if Item includes labor) are required.
- The Sizing tab is where you specify how the material or labor is typically installed or purchased, by the piece, UOM, or container, or even as a Mixture.
- The Material Pricing tab provides options for you to configure how much the Material costs by either piece, UOM, Size, Style, or by some Yield of a Mixture.
- The Labor Pricing tab (if the Item includes labor, of course) allows you to specify who performs the labor and at what base production (how much of X can they install in a day).
The three fields at the top of the dialog box (Code, Description and UOM) define the basic description of the Item.
| Field | What it does/How it is used... |
|---|
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| Code | The Item Code is specific and unique to each item. This code is used on the Condition Detail to add an item to a Condition. Numbers and letters may be used for Item Codes - letters are automatically capitalized by the program. Codes can be named to correspond to a company's existing item abbreviations for ease of reference. |
| Description | The Item description is a brief description of the item and typically corresponds to terms used in a particular trade or industry. This description is used on all Bid reports and various screens in the program. |
UOM
(Unit of Measure) | The UOM is the base measurement used to define quantities throughout the database tables including Bid Reports. The UOM also controls the options available at the Calculation, Sizing, and Pricing Tabs, and dictates the data required for the calculations. The UOM is a tag that always accompanies a quantity. When building a material record, the UOM generally corresponds with the UOM quoted by an average supplier. An Item record can hold a single UOM, only. For example, if you price Wall Covering by the linear yard, the UOM would be set to LY. If labor is attached to the same record, the labor must be priced using LY. If you prefer to price labor by the SF rather than LY, you would build a separate Labor-only item record using SF as the UOM. |
Item Detail Controls
Once you open an Item Detail, there are control buttons along the bottom of that dialog box.
The Previous and Next buttons make it easy to scroll forward and backward in the Item list. If you have opened a Bid-level Item from a Condition, Assembly, or from the Materials Tab, scrolling is limited to the Items in the current Condition (or Assembly), or the current, filtered view of the Materials Tab. The Tab selected (General, Calculation, Sizing, etc.) remains selected when scrolling through Items this way.
OK closes the Item Detail and saves whatever changes you've made.
Cancel closes the Item Detail and discards any changes you've made (of course, you will be prompted to save the changes, just in case).
Now, let's take a look at the General Tab - basic information about the Condition including the Item Setup (is it a Material, Labor, or both), how to classify the Item, Chained Items (see Related Articles) and Supplier/Manufacturer information.
How to Create Items?