It is the week before your tax appointment in Metro Detroit and the year looks great on the calendar. Then the profit and loss comes back thinner than it should be, and when your accountant asks which jobs carried the year, all you have is a feeling.
With job costing set up, every hour, part, permit and sub bill gets coded to the job it belongs to. Labor is loaded with its real burden, overhead gets a fair share, and a report shows estimated against actual for each job as soon as it closes.
Now you know. You raise prices on the work that bleeds, chase more of the work that pays, and catch a job going over budget while there is still time to fix it.