What Is the Project Analysis Dashboard?
The Project Analysis Dashboard is your project-level financial timeline inside BuildOps. Where the Finance Dashboard or the Service (Jobs) WIP Dashboard tells you a project might be off track, this dashboard shows you exactly what happened — billings, costs, profitability, and budget performance tracked month by month, from the start of a project to its finish.
Think of it as your drill-down tool. Once something flags on a higher-level report, this is where you come to see the full financial story on that specific project.
Where to find it:
Go to Dashboard → click the dropdown (top right) → Project Analysis Report - New
Start with the ReadMe
The Project Analysis Dashboard opens to a built-in ReadMe page by default — an 8-page guide covering the dashboard's purpose, data rules, page structure, and every metric calculation used throughout the dashboard. Click through all 8 pages before diving into the data — it's worth the minute, especially the first time you open the dashboard. If a number doesn't look right later, this is a good first stop.
Heads up on data freshness: This dashboard refreshes approximately every 40 minutes — it is not a live feed. Always check the Last Data Refresh timestamp in the top-right corner before acting on the numbers.
A few data rules worth knowing up front:
Billings only include Exported and Closed pay applications — pending or draft pay apps are excluded.
Actual costs exclude PO receipts in Pending or Bypassed status — so costs can appear lower than expected until receipts are approved and posted.
Updated budgets only include Approved change orders.
These rules keep the dashboard focused on verified, finalized financial activity — but they're worth knowing before you act on any number.
If you manage project financials, budgets, or change orders — this dashboard is for you. Here's how you'll use it depending on your role:
Role | How You'll Use It |
Project Manager | Monitor monthly billings, costs, and profitability on your active projects. Use the % Billed vs. % Cost view to catch over- or under-billing before it compounds, and track what's left to bill and spend as the project wraps up. |
Controller / Finance | Analyze billing-to-cost patterns across your project portfolio, monitor WIP risk project by project, and review budget vs. actual performance at the department and cost-type level. |
Owner / Executive | Deep-dive into any project that's flagged on the Finance Dashboard or WIP report — get the full financial story in one place, no custom extract needed. |
Key Metrics You'll See
Here's a quick reference for the terms and formulas you'll come across:
Term | What It Means |
Work Completed | The amount of work completed on the project, as recorded on pay application lines. Drawn from Exported and Closed pay applications only. |
Total Billed | Work Completed minus Net Retained Amount — the net amount actually billed to the customer after retainage is withheld. |
% Billed | Total Billed ÷ Contract Amount. How much of the contract you've actually billed. |
% Cost | Actual Cost ÷ Cost Budget. How much of your cost budget you've consumed. |
Revenue Earned | Contract Amount × % Cost. The revenue you've theoretically earned based on how far along costs are relative to budget. |
Overbilled / Underbilled | Total Billed − Revenue Earned. Positive = you've billed more than you've earned (overbilled). Negative = you've earned more than you've billed (underbilled — a WIP risk). |
Budget Profit | Contract Amount − Cost Budget. What the project should earn based on plan. |
Budget Profit % | Budget Profit ÷ Contract Amount. Your planned margin. |
Actual Profit | Total Billed − Total Actual Cost. What the project has actually earned so far. |
Actual Profit % | Actual Profit ÷ Total Billed. Your real margin based on actuals. |
Remaining Unbilled | Contract Amount − Total Billed. How much of the contract is still left to bill. |
Remaining Cost | Cost Budget − Total Actual Cost. How much budget is left to spend. |
Remaining Profit | Remaining Unbilled − Remaining Cost. The profit still expected as the project completes. |
Net Retained Amount | Retained Amount − Billed Retainage Amount. Retainage that's been withheld but not yet released. |
How to Use the Dashboard
When you open the dashboard, you'll see six pages across the bottom of the screen:
Page | What It Covers |
ReadMe | The built-in reference guide — data rules, structure, and every formula used in the dashboard. |
Project Analysis | Your core workspace — monthly and cumulative billings, cost breakdowns, % Billed vs. % Cost, over/underbilled position, and profitability. |
Project Budget vs Actual | A detailed budget-to-actual comparison, drillable by department, project, phase, cost type, and cost code. |
Project Manager Performance | Costs, revenue, and budgets grouped by project manager. |
Change Orders | A full change order log — status, dates, and financial impact. |
Project Costs Over Budget | A filterable watchlist of projects approaching or exceeding budget. |
Project Analysis Page — Your Core Workspace
What this page answers: What's the financial story on this project, month by month?
This page has two filters that apply across the whole page:
Filter | What It Does |
Project Number | Isolates one or more specific projects. Defaults to all projects — leave it blank to see portfolio-wide trends. |
Date Range | Sets the reporting window. Uses pay application date for billings, incurred date for costs, and approved date for change orders. |
Start broad, then narrow. Open the report with no project selected and the default date range first, to confirm you're seeing data across the portfolio — then select your project of interest. This also helps you spot whether a project's numbers look unusual relative to the rest of your portfolio.
Monthly Billings: Shows Month, Work Completed, Retained Amount, Total Billed, and Cumulative Billed — one row per month — plus a chart of Cumulative Billed over time.
Monthly Costs: Cost data broken into tabs — Total Monthly Costs, Labor, Equipment, Material, Subcontract, Overhead, Other, and Unspecified. Each tab shows Cumulative Budget, Cumulative Actual Cost, and % Budget (Cumulative Actual Cost ÷ Cumulative Budget).
Actual costs exclude PO receipts in Pending or Bypassed status. If a cost looks like it's missing, check whether the corresponding PO receipt has been approved and posted in BuildOps.
% Billed vs % Cost: A table and chart comparing how much of the contract you've billed against how much of your cost budget you've consumed. Your billing pace should stay close to your cost pace — when they diverge, that's worth investigating.
Reading it in practice: If your % Cost line is running ahead of your % Billed line, you've done the work but haven't billed for it yet — that's cash sitting on the table. If % Billed is running ahead of % Cost, you've collected more than you've spent, which is favorable but worth monitoring as the project continues.
Overbilled / Underbilled: Converts that comparison into a dollar figure per month, charted alongside the % Billed − % Cost spread.
Profitability: Three tabs — Budgeted, Actuals, and Remaining — all cumulative.
Budgeted: Contract Amount, Cost Budget, Budget Profit, Budget Profit %
Actuals: Total Billed, Actual Cost, Actual Profit, Actual Profit %
Remaining: Remaining Unbilled, Remaining Cost, Remaining Profit, Remaining Profit %
Project Budget vs Actual — Deep-Dive Budget Performance
What this page answers: How does actual performance compare to budget, at any level of detail?
Filters: Project Name, Project Department, Ledger Activity Date, Project Type, Project Status, Cost Code, Project Phase, Cost Type.
KPI tiles show three side-by-side comparisons: Budgeted vs. Actual Revenue, Budgeted vs. Actual Cost, and Budgeted vs. Actual Profit — each with a % variance shown inline.
A large variance early in a project is often expected, not a red flag — a project early in its billing lifecycle will naturally show actuals well below budget.
The pivot table below lets you drill from Department → Project Number → Phase → Cost Type → Cost Code, with columns for Current and Original Budgeted Cost, Change Order additions, Actual Cost, Cost Variance, Percentage Used, labor hours (budgeted vs. actual), and revenue/profit comparisons.
A flat table and chart below let you visualize Cost Variance by Department, Cost Type, Cost Code, or Phase.
Project Manager Performance
What this page answers: How is each project manager's portfolio performing?
Filters: Date Range, Project Manager, Project Number.
Project Costs: Grouped by PM → Project. Shows regular, overtime, and double-time hours, total labor cost, material cost, and total costs.
Project Revenue: Grouped by PM → Project. Shows pre-tax invoice totals — collapse to the PM level for their full portfolio total.
Project Budgets: Grouped by PM → Project. Shows budgeted labor hours and cost by category (labor, material, subcontractor, equipment, overhead, other) alongside the corresponding revenue budgets.
Change Orders
What this page answers: What's the status of every change order, and what's the financial impact?
Filters: Customer Name, Project Name, COR Status.
Change Order Log: Grouped by Department → Project → COR Status → COR. Shows COR Issued, Sent, and Approved dates plus Amount Requested.
Change Order Detail: The same grouping, with Days Overdue, Revenue, Cost, and Profit per change order.
Use this page to track approval health. Filter to COR Status = "Sent for Approval" and sort by Days Overdue to see which change orders are waiting on customer sign-off. Unapproved change orders don't flow into your budget — so delays here directly affect the budget vs. actual numbers everywhere else in the report.
Project Costs Over Budget — Your At-Risk Watchlist
What this page answers: Which projects need attention right now?
This page has a single Costs Budget Percent filter with a min and max input. The filter uses decimals, not whole percentages:
Projects at 90%+ of budget: min = 0.9, max blank
Projects already over budget: min = 1.0, max blank
A specific range (e.g. 80–100%): min = 0.8, max = 1.0
The table shows one row per project with a direct link to it in BuildOps, Total Costs/Budget %, Total Remaining, and individual breakouts by Labor, Material, Equipment, Subcontractor, and Overhead. Rows where costs have exceeded budget are highlighted in red.
💡 Use this as a weekly review tool. Set min to 0.8 at the start of each week to catch any project crossing 80% of budget before it becomes a bigger problem.
Exporting and Scheduling
Any view in the dashboard can be exported to Excel or PDF. You can also schedule automated exports — daily, weekly, or monthly — delivered directly to any email inbox.
Click the folder icon in the bottom-left corner of the screen.
Click Export to download the current view immediately.
Click Schedule export to set up a recurring automated delivery to any email address.
What Data Is Included (and What Isn't)
What's Included | Why |
Exported and Closed pay applications only | Draft or pending pay apps haven't been finalized — including them would inflate billings with unconfirmed revenue. |
Approved and Posted PO receipts only | Pending or Bypassed receipts haven't been confirmed and could still change. |
Approved change orders only | Unapproved change orders represent potential, not confirmed, revenue or cost. |
Cumulative figures throughout | Every financial figure on the Project Analysis page is a running total through the selected date, not a single-period amount — project financials are lifecycle metrics. |
Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: A project I know is active isn't showing up. Why?
A: Most likely, the project has no Exported or Closed pay applications, or no posted cost lines, within your selected date range. Try widening the date range first. If it still doesn't appear, confirm in BuildOps that at least one pay application has been exported or closed, or that at least one cost line has a posted, approved PO receipt.
Q: My billings look lower than I expected. Why?
A: The dashboard only includes Exported and Closed pay applications. If a recent pay application is still in Draft or Pending status, it won't appear in your billing totals yet.
Q: My costs look lower than I expected. Why?
A: Actual costs exclude PO receipts in Pending or Bypassed status. If a purchase order has been issued but the receipt hasn't been approved and posted, that cost won't show up yet. Check the receipt status in BuildOps.
Q: I approved a change order, but my budget numbers haven't changed. Why?
A: Updated budgets only include change orders with an Approved status. If it's still in Draft, Submitted, or Sent for Approval, it hasn't been added to the budget yet — it'll flow in on the next data refresh once approved.
Q: What does "underbilled" actually mean, and is it a problem?
A: Underbilled means you've incurred more cost (as a % of budget) than you've billed (as a % of contract) — you've done work you haven't collected for yet. It's not automatically a problem: some front-loading of costs is normal. But persistent underbilling can signal a cash flow issue or a billing process that isn't keeping pace with progress. Use the Overbilled/Underbilled section to see the exact dollar exposure.
Q: Why don't my numbers match my accounting software?
A: This is expected. The Project Analysis Dashboard reflects operational data in BuildOps. Your accounting system remains your system of record. Gaps typically come from unposted pay applications, pending PO receipts, or sync timing, and should converge once everything is finalized and synced.
Q: The numbers on Project Analysis and Project Budget vs Actual don't quite match. Why?
A: These two pages pull from different sources and use different date filters. Project Budget vs Actual is powered by the Project Ledger and filtered by Ledger Activity Date. Project Analysis uses pay application dates for billings, incurred dates for costs, and approved dates for change orders. Small differences are expected — if the gap looks significant, confirm the same project and date range are selected on both pages.
Q: Can I see individual technician costs here?
A: This dashboard breaks costs down by project, cost type, and cost code — not by individual technician. For technician-level cost and profit analysis on service work, use the Technician Profitability Dashboard instead.