The change you forgot to bill: a monthly sweep for the extras nobody logged
A mechanical contractor's coordinator opens a binder to find one ticket. Several signed tickets for relocated sprinkler heads sit behind it, with no price or change number. The work was recorded on site, but its commercial path stopped there.
Compare the work records with the change log regularly and trace each unmatched event to its next required action. Read daily reports, time-and-material tickets, instructions and design responses for possible changed scope, then ask the project manager to review the contractual position. A monthly sweep is a backstop, not the timetable for notices. Finding a signed ticket does not establish that the work is approved, recoverable or ready to bill.
Follow the event rather than the paperwork pile
- Choose the period and record set. List the reports, tickets and instructions included in the sweep. Check for missing days or trade submissions so the review does not quietly exclude the places where unlogged work may sit.
- Identify possible scope departures. Highlight descriptions of relocation, revised access, repeated work or a changed sequence. Compare them with the agreed scope before labelling them extras; an instruction may clarify included work rather than change it.
- Match the event to the log. Search by location, instruction reference and date as well as the ticket number. Group supporting records for the same event. Avoid creating several commercial entries merely because one event generated several tickets.
- Assign the missing action immediately. Have the authorized project manager check notice requirements, recipients and dates. Record whether the event needs clarification, pricing, approval review or billing follow-up. Do not wait for the sweep to finish before escalating a time-sensitive item.
- Build the support for the price. Reconcile labour, materials and equipment to the event, with duplicated or already-paid items removed. State assumptions and unresolved authorization clearly rather than presenting every discovered cost as agreed revenue.
- Report stages separately. Show amounts identified, priced, submitted, approved and billed under the company's method. Name the owner of each next step. Reconcile the next sweep to those entries so a submitted item is not reported as newly found again.
Common mistakes
- Adding every signed ticket to approved revenue.
- Counting the same event from both the daily report and its ticket.
- Waiting for month-end to send an urgent item for notice review.
Action list
Close one missing commercial path
- Name the event and scope question.
- Link its reports, tickets and instruction.
- Check for an existing log entry.
- Assign the next action and actual required date.
- Keep identified cost separate from approved revenue.
Check your understanding
A ticket is signed but the change log has no approval entry. Can the sweep count its amount as approved?
