For general contractors
Mark the work on the drawing.
CostWorkX is where you plan and record work on site: you mark the work on the drawing, and the quantities, the day's progress and the wages for the work done all come off that mark.
We set your team up ourselves. Talk to us about your jobs and we will set the project up with you.
It runs in the browser — on a phone, a tablet, or the computer in the site office. There is nothing to install.
The problem
Most sites keep two records of the same work.
One is the drawing. The other is everything else — the daily diary, the photographs in the site group, the muster roll, a page in somebody's notebook. Different people write them, at different hours, for different reasons, and they never quite agree.
On Friday somebody has to make them agree. Nobody in that room is lying; they are each reading a record the others cannot see. So the quantity that gets paid is the one that got argued best, not the one that got built.
That is what CostWorkX is for. The quantity you measure on the drawing is the one the day's progress and the week's wage bill are worked out from — nobody types it in twice.
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The first record
The drawing
A print in the site office, hatched in pencil as the walls go up. It is the only record that knows where the work is. It is also one person's copy, and it leaves the site in their bag.
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The second record
Everything else
The diary, the photographs, the muster roll, the notebook. Each written by a different person at a different hour, and not one of them can say where on the building the work happened.
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Friday
The reconciliation
Someone sits down with all of it and works out what to pay, from memory, with the gang waiting outside. By then the drawing has moved on, the photographs are out of order, and the muster roll says who was on site — not what they built.
How it works
From the PDF to Friday's wage bill.
The order is the same on every job: file the drawing, set its scale, then mark the work. The quantity comes off the mark. You record what was built each day against it, and the totals, the percentage and the week's wage bill all derive from those — nothing is kept as a running total.
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01
File the drawing
Drop the PDF in. CostWorkX reads its title block in the browser, on your own machine: the sheet number, the title, the issue date, who issued it and the scale printed on the sheet fill the form, each one badged as read from the drawing and each one editable. The discipline follows from the sheet number. A field the sheet does not carry is left blank for you to type — never filled with a guess — and a sheet that carries none of it is still a drawing; you type the fields in instead. Correct what it read and the correction sticks. Filing a new issue for construction supersedes the issue it replaces, so nobody builds from the old one; filing one for comment supersedes nothing. Who the drawing was issued to, and who has not acknowledged it yet, stays on the sheet.
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02
Set the scale, then measure
Calibration is two taps a known distance apart — a dimensioned grid line is best — and the real distance typed in. Where the sheet prints a scale, the derived one is checked against it and you are warned if the two diverge by more than 2%; where the sheet prints none, it says there is nothing to check against. After that a traced wall gives a length, a traced room gives its area, and a pin gives a count, with openings traced as deductions coming off the gross. Until the revision is calibrated the length and area tools stay visible but locked, and tapping one tells you why. Counting needs no scale, so it never locks. It never guesses a scale.
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03
Mark the work; the numbers follow
Work is created by measuring inside a trade: pick the trade, trace it on the plan, name it, and say which week it belongs to. Its quantity comes off the traced geometry and the drawing's calibration, times the trade's own factor — the wall height, the slab thickness. The quantity itself is never typed in. Recording happens on the same plan: tap a marking, book what the gang actually did today — a part of it, not all of it — capped at what is left, and name the men who did it. The week's report prices each day at the rate in force that day. The quantity is measured once, on the drawing; neither the day's progress nor the week's wages is entered again.
What it does
What's in it today
Six things the product does now. Not a roadmap — all of it is on screen today, in the browser. The drawing runs through all of it. A trade is a layer on the plan. A quantity is the geometry you marked, at the scale you calibrated. A wage for measured work is that quantity at the rate in force on the day it was worked.
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The register
Every drawing, every revision
Drawings filed under the structure you name them against and their discipline, with every issue listed underneath. A drawing reads ISSUED FOR CONSTRUCTION or FOR COMMENT — DO NOT BUILD, and the revision a new issue replaces reads SUPERSEDED in the revision log. Issues are listed against who received them: an unacknowledged transmittal is a claims exposure, so it is shown, never hidden.
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Take-off
Measured off the drawing
Length along a wall, area from a closed shape, counts as pins, and openings traced as deductions coming off the gross. Lengths and areas come off the marks and the drawing's calibration rather than being stored anywhere. A count needs no calibration at all, so you can tally on a sheet nobody has scaled yet.
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The week
The week is planned on the plan
Trades are layers on the plan. Mark the work, name it, put it in a week, and the activity carries its own quantity — derived from the geometry you traced, the drawing's calibration and the trade's own factor, never typed in. A trade can span several drawings and shows one total across them; where measured work sits on a drawing you have not scaled, it names that drawing and withholds the total rather than showing a partial sum.
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The day
Book what was actually done
Open an activity and book what was actually done — a part of it, not all of it. A 39 m² wall booked 20 m² today and 19 m² tomorrow reads IN PROG, then DONE, with both days visible. You cannot book more than remains. The booking carries the men who did it, the skilled and casual count, and a note in the foreman's own words.
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Make-ready
The week ahead, against eight checks
The week ahead is listed against eight checks — information, materials, plant, crew, access, external, preceding work, method — with anything not yet looked at sorted to the top. Each is due by the planned start minus its own lead time, so lateness is arithmetic, not opinion. A check clears on a reference: the delivery docket number, the approved revision, the gang confirmed. Never a bare tick box, and chasing is recorded as chasing — asking is not answering.
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Labour and wages
The Friday wage bill
Measured work is paid by the piece: quantity done × the rate in force on the day it was booked. A rate agreed on Wednesday leaves Monday's work at Monday's price. People on a day rate are ticked present on the day roster and land on the same sheet, counted by the days they were there. The pay week runs Saturday to Friday, because the gang is paid on the Friday. The report prints from the browser.
Straight answer
What's built and what isn't
This is an honest list. If it is not in the left column, it is not in the product yet.
We publish it because the quickest way to lose a contractor is to show him a screen that does not exist. Some of what is missing is specified and close behind; some of it is a long way off. None of it is what you would be using next week.
Working today
- The drawing register
- Drawings filed under their structure and discipline, their revisions, supersession recorded as an act, and transmittals with their acknowledgements.
- The title block, read for you
- Drop a PDF and the sheet number, title, issue date, issuer and printed scale come off the title block; the discipline comes from the sheet number. Each read field is badged and stays editable.
- Two-point calibration
- Set the scale against a dimension you pick: tap two points, type the real distance. Where the sheet prints a scale, the derived one is checked against it. Length and area stay locked until the revision is calibrated — counting works either way.
- Take-off on the plan
- Length, area and count, with openings deducted from the gross. Lengths and areas come off the marks and the sheet's calibration rather than being stored.
- The trades manager
- Create, rename, recolour and re-scope a trade across drawings, edit its factors, set a new dated rate, and delete one after a warning that names what it carries.
- Planning the week on the drawing
- Mark the work, name it, and put it in a week. The activity carries its own quantity, derived from the geometry you traced.
- Recording the day
- Partial bookings clamped to what remains, the named workers who did it, the skilled and casual count, and a note in the foreman's own words.
- Make-ready screening
- Eight checks against the week ahead, every open constraint dated back from the planned start by that check's own lead time, and no way to clear one but recording the evidence or chasing the owner on the record.
- Piece rate and day rate on one sheet
- Piece-rate wages are priced from the quantity done. People on a day rate are ticked present on the day roster, and their day rate lands on the same weekly payroll beside them.
- The weekly report
- Planned, done and remaining per activity with who did it, the daily breakdown, and what each person is owed for the week. Prints through the browser's own print dialog.
- Runs in the browser
- Phone, tablet or computer. Marks, measurements and the day's bookings are written to the device as you make them, not to a server — once the page is open you can carry on with no signal, and the work is still there after a refresh.
Not built yet
- iOS and Android apps
- CostWorkX runs in the browser. There is nothing to install, and there is no iPhone or Android app today.
- Field work shared between devices
- Your marks and bookings stay on the device that made them. Sending them up is specified and not yet built; pulling a colleague's work down comes after that.
- Managing your own team in the app
- There is no members screen. We set your people up ourselves, at the role you tell us.
- RFIs and the site walk
- Both are named sections with no screen behind them yet, including the RFI that clears an information constraint.
- Materials
- Materials is a name in the menu today. Opening it gives a placeholder saying it is not built yet. The materials check in make-ready screening is a different thing, and it works.
- Earned value and the office view
- The read-only view for the office, and earned value — what the work is worth against a weekly target — are later phases. The money the app shows today is labour: what the week's work owes the gang.
- Flattening a drawing to PDF
- The weekly work-done report prints through the browser's own print dialog. Flattening markings onto a copy of the drawing is later work.
- Buying your own seats
- There is nothing to buy on this page. No subscription can be bought online yet, so we agree a price with you and set your organisation up ourselves.
Last updated 5 August 2026.
Plans
Pricing
There are no prices on this page yet, and that is deliberate. We are setting them with the first contractors using CostWorkX, against the size of their teams and the kind of work they run.
What is settled is the shape: you buy seats. The two plans differ by how many seats, not by which features you get — what a person can do is set by their role, not by their plan. Both can be quoted monthly or annually, and the annual figure works out two months less than paying by the month.
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One seat
Individual
For a quantity surveyor, or a contractor running their own jobs. One seat, one person signed in.
- Unlimited drawings in the register, with their revisions, supersessions and transmittals
- Two-point calibration, then length, area and count on the plan, deductions included
- Your trades with their own colours, factors and dated rates
- The week's payroll report, printed from the browser
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Per seat, minimum three
Company
For a contractor with a site team. A seat for each person, from three upwards.
- Four roles, set when we add someone: admin, manager, foreman, and office, which is read-only
- We set each person up ourselves — you tell us who is on the team and at what role
- Plan the week on the drawing, then record the day against it: part of an activity where only part was built, and the workers who did it named one by one
- Make-ready screening: eight checks on every activity, each cleared with a reference rather than a bare tick
Nothing you have recorded is deleted over a late payment. That is a commitment we make, not a switch in the software: if a subscription lapses we stop new work going in and leave everything already recorded where it is — the drawings, the bookings and the weekly report stay there to open, read and print.
Questions
Questions we get asked
Straight answers, including where the product is not finished yet.
Do I need PDF drawings?
Yes. CostWorkX works off the drawings your architect and engineer already issue — you upload the PDF and file it in the register under its sheet number. A CAD export fills the form in for you: the sheet number, title, issue date, issuer and the printed scale are read off the title block, and the discipline follows from the sheet number. Each one is badged as read from the drawing, and each one is editable before you file. A scan has no text in it to read, so you type those fields yourself.
What if the drawing has no printed scale?
Then you set the scale yourself, which is the method we trust anyway. Tap two points on a dimension you know — a gridline, an opening you have measured — and type the real distance. Where the sheet does print a scale, we compare the two and warn you if they diverge by more than 2%. It never stops you: you tick to say you checked the points, and carry on. A sheet genuinely plotted off-scale is exactly what two-point calibration is for. Until a drawing is calibrated the length and area tools stay locked, and tapping one tells you why. Counting works either way.
A new revision arrives. What happens to the work already marked on it?
It stays. Drop the new issue on the register and it is recognised as the same sheet rather than filed as a second one: the activities planned on that drawing stay attached to it. Filing it for construction supersedes the issue it replaces; filing it for comment supersedes nothing. Filing a revision also compares the text on the two PDFs — dimensions, notes, labels, title-block fields — and drafts the note of what changed, for you to correct before it goes in the log.
Does it work without internet?
On the machine you are using, once the page is open. Everything you record — the marks on the drawing, the bookings, the workers you name, the calibration — is written to that machine as you go rather than sent to a server, and it is still there when you come back to it. Two things are not done. The page itself still has to load, so this is not yet something you can open cold on a site with no signal at all. And sharing field work between devices is not built: what you mark on the site tablet stays on that tablet — it does not appear on the office computer. We will not describe that as finished before it is.
Is there an Android or iPhone app?
Not yet, and we would rather say so than show a store badge that goes nowhere. There is nothing to install from a store: CostWorkX runs in the browser, on a phone, a tablet or a computer, and the layout follows the size of the window rather than the device. On the drawing you can pinch and tap, or zoom with a scroll wheel and move about with the keyboard; on a phone the controls are sized for a thumb rather than a cursor.
Who is CostWorkX for?
General contractors, and the quantity surveyors and site managers inside them. The work it fits is measured work on issued drawings — walling, plaster, concrete, the trades a gang is paid piece rate for. It is written for two people: the QS who calibrates the sheet and sets the rates, and the foreman who marks what was done on the plan. The week's report prints off those same marks. Until field work is shared between devices, both jobs happen on the same machine. It suits a firm that already works off a drawing register.
How do you charge?
By the seat. Individual is a single seat. Company is quoted per seat, with a minimum of three. Both can be quoted monthly or annually, and the annual figure works out two months less than paying by the month. We are still setting the numbers with the contractors using it, so nothing is published here. Tell us how many people would sign in, and we will quote you.
How does my team get in?
We set them up ourselves. You tell us who should have access and at what role — admin, manager, foreman, or office, which is read-only — and we set each person up. We stay close while the first drawings are filed and calibrated. It is early, and working this way is deliberate.
Where are you?
Nairobi, Kenya. CostWorkX is built here, on live jobs, with contractors we can go and stand on site with. That shows up in the details rather than on a badge: money in KES, the pay week running Saturday to Friday because the gang is paid on the Friday, measured work worked out as quantity done times the rate, and a booking that names the men who did it.
Get in touch
Talk to us
CostWorkX is early. We work closely with the contractors using it, which means you can reach the person building it, and the things you ask for get built. Write to us, tell us about your jobs, and we will set your project up ourselves.