Potential change orders (PCOs)
PCOs can result from owner directives, bulletins, clarifications, or changes to the original plans. Any of these changes might require a change to your contract with the owner and possibly the contracts with your subcontractors. PCOs are sometimes referred to as cost control numbers (CCN), change estimates, anticipated cost numbers, proposed change orders, and change proposal requests.
A PCO is the starting point for the change order process. You can use PCO items to track possible and actual changes, as well as their impact on the budget and cost. As a PCO moves from being a possible cost to being part of a change order, you can update the PCO to track the impact of the changes.
The PCO includes a banner for information from the PCO grid, which includes the following budget and cost information:
- Estimate: The estimated amount, typically entered by the project manager, project engineer, or appropriate general contractor.
- Proposed: The proposed amount provided by the trade contractor.
- Approved: The approved amount that is agreed upon.
- Applied: The amount that is applied to the budget or resulting subcontract change order (SCO). This amount is set automatically to the same value as the nearest right-hand column and can be manually changed as needed.
- The Potential Change Orders view displays the estimated amounts for unlocked records and the approved amounts are for locked records.
- The Links panel displays the change order requests (CORs) and prime contract change orders (PCCOs) that the PCO is linked to.
- In the Potential Change Orders view, click the PCO.
You can create PCOs to track possible and actual changes.
- Enter a description for the PCO.
- Click Create.
- In the Requested Days field, enter the number of days needed to complete the work.
- On the Potential Change Order tab, add the PCO items and default markups.
- Edit the description.
- Click Copy.
The new PCO includes the details and PCO items, but not the comments and links, from the original PCO.
A budget and cost allocation must be selected for each PCO item. As the PCO moves through the change order process, you can update the allocations and the proposed and approved amounts for each item. The amounts are applied to the budget if the PCO is approved.
- Only committing contracts can be selected in the Contract Number column of the Potential Change Order Items grid.
- The Applied column is updated if its value is 0 and then a value is entered in the Proposed column or if a value, including 0, is entered in the Approved column.
- The (Budget) Applied column isn't updated if:
- The PCO is associated with a PCCO, and there are locked AFPs in the period associated with the PCCO’s date.
- The PCO is associated with a PCCO, and that PCCO has been locked by a subsequent PCCO.
- In the PCO, click the Potential Change Order tab.
- To view additional details for an item, click chevron_right (Open) on the row.
- To navigate to the previous or next PCO item in the PCO, click (Previous) or (Next).
- On the Potential Change Order tab, click Add.
- Enter a description.
- In the Information panel, enter additional details.
- Enter the budget and cost amounts.
- In the (Budget impacts) Estimate cell, enter the rough estimate or order of magnitude that you'll need (from the owner) to pay for the item.
- In the (Cost impacts) Estimate cell, enter the estimated amount for the subcontractor to complete the change.
- In the (Budget impacts) Allocation and (Cost impacts) Allocation cells, select the allocations.
- In the Budget Code cell, click , and then select the budget code that the cost will be applied to.
- In the Contract Number cell, click , and then select a contract.
- Click arrow_back Done.
To edit the item description, you can also click in the grid.
If you don't have the Can Access PCO Items for All Companies permission, your company is displayed in this field.
In the Contract Number cell, the contract list displays the contracts that are linked to the selected company.
When you create an SCO, the Search dialog includes the PCO items that are linked to the contract's company.
If you don't have the Can Access PCO Items for All Companies permission, the list only displays the contracts in which the To Company matches your company.
In the selected contract, the PCO item amount is added to the banner. When you create an SCO, the Search dialog includes PCO items that are linked to the contract. If the contract is deleted, it's also removed from the PCO item.
You can update the PCO item later with the proposed and approved amounts.
- In the budget or cost cell, click edit (Edit).
- In the Unit Price field, enter the unit price with 2 to 4 decimal places.
- In the UOM field, enter the unit of measurement.
- In the Quantity field, enter the quantity with 2 to 7 decimal places.
- In the Amount field, enter the amount, which is rounded to 2 decimal places.
- To copy the Quantity field value to the other budget columns for this PCO item, turn on the Roll Qty to Budget Columns toggle.
- To copy the Quantity field value to the other cost columns for this PCO item, turn on the Roll Qty to Cost Columns toggle.
- Click Save.
- In the Unit Price, Quantity, and Amount fields, you can enter positive or negative numbers.
- If you change the Unit Price field, the Amount field is updated by multiplying the quantity by the new unit price.
- If you change the Quantity field, the Amount field is updated by multiplying the unit price by the quantity.
- If you change the Amount, the Unit Price field is updated by dividing the amount by the quantity.
- Enter the amount in the appropriate budget or cost column.
To copy all the budget or cost amounts from the Estimate column to the Proposed column or from the Proposed column to the Approved column, click the arrow in the column heading and then click Push to Proposed or Push to Approved. The amounts, quantities, and unit prices are copied to the appropriate column for each unlocked PCO item.
Copying amounts from the Estimate column to the Proposed column
- In the (Budget impacts) Allocation and (Cost impacts) Allocation cells, select Cancelled.
The applied amounts are removed from the budget and from the banner of the associated contract.
The markups aren't recalculated automatically if the PCO items total changes.
- On the Potential Change Order tab, click Default Markups, which is available if there are markups in the record settings.
- Edit the budget and cost amounts.
- If the markups don't have budget codes, click , and then select a budget code for each one.
- If the markups don't have allocations, select a budget and cost allocation for each one.
The markups are calculated based on the current totals in the PCO.
- On the Potential Change Order Items tab, select the checkbox for the markup.
- Click Remove.
- On the Potential Change Order tab, click Default Markups.
Markups that were removed from the PCO are restored. The rows for markups that were deleted in the settings are empty except for the description.
The requested days in the PCO are displayed in the PCCOs and CORs that it's linked to. For CORs, the requested days in the Information panel are entered separately and aren't based on its linked PCOs.
The approved days in the PCO affect the PCCOs and CORs that it's linked to. For SCOs, the approved days are entered separately.
- In the Information panel, enter the number in the Requested Days field.
- In the Information panel, enter the number in the Approved Days field.
You can approve a PCO so the budget and cost amounts are applied to the budget.
- Applied if the item is not part of an SCO.
- Applied if the item is part of an approved SCO.
- Not applied if the item is part of an unapproved SCO.
The affected columns depend on the selected budget and cost allocations for each PCO item.