Most residential design firms estimate freight on an item by item basis. So for example, when they enter an item for a sofa, they will assign a freight sub-charge for the sofa. When they add a table lamp, they will assign a freight sub-charge for the lamp.
In contrast, the majority of commercial firms prefer to calculate the freight, and other sub-charges, based on the total, or aggregate, amount all of the items in a project.
For example, if total aggregate price of all of the items on a proposal is $50,000.00 and the firm wants to add 10% to cover freight, then they would add a line item for freight and set it to $5,000.00.
Using the Aggregate Charges feature you don't have to do the math manually and then add the items manually because DesignSmart will do this for you.
Setting up the Aggregate Charges Feature
There are a few tasks that must be completed before you can use Aggregate Charges. Click here for more information.
Getting Started
In the following example, we will assume that there are just two sub-charges that we want to add to a proposal based on the Aggregate Charges method: Freight and Warehouse. This method works for all sub-charges you might have set up in your system, but we will just use freight and warehouse for this example.
The assumption is that no items in the project have freight or warehouse charges.
In this example we want to estimate freight charges to be 10% of the total proposal amount with a 15% markup on top of the freight estimate. Also we will assume that the warehouse charge will be 12% of the total proposal amount.
Note: In the Project Detail view you have set Freight and Warehouse have been set to show as subtotals, as shown below.
Step 1 - Preview the Proposal
Create and preview a proposal the way you normally would.
There should not be a freight or warehouse subtotal in the summary numbers. They do not appear in the screen shot below.
Step 2 - Click the Aggregate Charges tab
Step 2 - Enter the sub-charge percents or amounts
The Aggregate Charges tab will show the sub-charges with $0.00 charges.
Step1
Enter 10% in the % field for Freight.
Enter 15% in the Markup % field for freight.
Enter 12% in the % field for Warehouse.
Note1 : Just like in the Pricing Tab on the Item Detail View, rather than enter %s you could enter the actual amounts and the % would be calculated.
Note 2: The Subcharge % and the Markup % that are set in the Markup and Allowances Tab in the Project Detail View are not automatically set in this tab. You will need to manually enter them here.
Step 2 When finished click the Update Proposal button.
Step 3 - Preview the Proposal with the added sub-charges
As shown below, the proposal will be updated to show the sub-charges. The sales tax has also been updated.
Step 4 - Click the Create Proposal button
If the amounts on the proposal are correct, then click the Create Proposal button (not shown on the screen shots).
What happens when you save a proposal with an aggregate charge
When you click the Create Proposal button that has added Aggregate Charges to the proposal (as described above) DesignSmart will create a new item. The Item number will start with PA for Proposal Aggregate.
In the screen shot below, PA-1 was added to the project and linked to Proposal 1 along with the other items that were on Proposal 1.
When you click on the Details button you will see the sub-charges amounts, markups and whether they were taxable or not.
In the example below, both Freight and Warehouse were marked as taxable. You can change the tax status by clicking on the Edit Taxes button, then recreating the proposal again including this item PA-1.
