BranchSiteBack to Home

Add Expenses to Visits

Record one-off costs against completed work so job margins reflect what you actually spent.

Expenses capture the small, unplanned costs of doing the work — a dump fee, a rented attachment, materials picked up on the way — and attach them to the visit where the money was spent. Recorded expenses count toward the job's costs, so margins and job-costing reports reflect reality.

Before you start

Expenses are added from expense items: entries in your Items catalog with the Expense category. Set up your recurring expense types (dump fees, permits, fuel surcharges) ahead of time, or create one on the fly from the dialog below.

Add an expense to a visit

Expenses are recorded against work that has actually happened, so the section only appears once the visit is Completed or its parent job is Approved.

  1. Open the visit's detail sheet from the Calendar.
  2. In the Expenses section, click Expense.
  3. In the Add Expense dialog, pick the Expense item. If the right one doesn't exist yet, choose + New item to quick-create an expense item with a name, a Default unit cost, and an optional Reimbursable flag.
  4. Enter the Quantity and Unit cost.
  5. Click Add Expense.

The expense appears in the visit's Expenses list with a running total, and on the job it shows in the Line Items area's Actuals & Expenses section, marked with its source (Visit expense). Lines there are managed from the visit — they count toward the job's totals but can't be edited from the estimate.

Reimbursable expenses and the purchase order bridge

If the expense item is flagged Reimbursable, the dialog also offers a Vendor field. Pick a vendor (or + New vendor) and BranchSite creates a draft purchase order for the expense at the same time — a head start on the paperwork for reimbursing whoever paid, ready to review and approve under Purchases. Leave the vendor blank to record the expense without a PO.

Note: Adding an expense requires permission to write jobs. The Vendor field only appears for members who can also write purchases, since that's what creating the draft PO requires.

Where expenses show up

  • The visit's detail sheet, under Expenses, with a total.
  • The job's Actuals & Expenses section, alongside lines posted from purchase orders.
  • Job-costing and P&L reports under Reports, where expense totals appear as their own column.