Subcontractor Billing and Compliance Using the Accordant Sage 300 CRE Web Portal

For General Contractors that use Subcontractors to fulfill their contracts, you know that managing the compliance requirements and subcontractor billing process can be time consuming and frustrating. In this article we show you how simplify and improve billing and compliance management using the Sage 300 Construction (CRE) Web Portal that we built right here at Accordant Company.

See what customers have to say about the Accordant Web Portal – Click here

Compliance Tracking and Communication

Before the first subcontractor requisition comes in, Project Managers have to determine:

• Has this Subcontractor signed their contract?
• Have they met the minimum required insurance and provided proof of insurance?
• Do we have a W-9 or Business License on file?

Sage 300 CRE already has the ability to track subcontractor compliance requirements per job and commitment, but it still requires monitoring in the system and constant communication with internal and external partners.

See Also:
Subcontractor Compliance Setup in Sage 300 CRE
Vendor Compliance Setup in Sage 300 CRE

The Billing Process

Once compliance requirements are satisfied, the subcontractor billing process begins.  Some of these issues that the Project Management and Accounting teams have to deal with include:

• Subcontractors miss their deadlines for billing so owner requisitions could be delayed
• Subcontractors bill for change orders that have not been approved yet
• For Sage 300 CRE customers that enter their subcontractors schedule of value in the commitment, Accounts Payable has to manually match the invoiced amounts with a sometimes very different schedule of values in the commitment.

Needing to manage all of these moving parts can be frustrating – but there is a solution!

Introducing the Accordant Web Portal

By using the Accordant Sage 300 CRE Web Portal – you can move the workload of managing these moving parts back to the subcontractor and allow your project managers to manage other aspects of the project.

Here are just some of the features:

• Subcontractors can view all compliance requirements and provides a mechanism to upload required documents for review
• Receive reminders and alerts when there are outstanding (or expired) compliance items
• Once all subcontractor compliance requirements are satisfied, subs can enter their own requisitions for payment against a full schedule of values.
• Sign a conditional lien waiver for the amount of the payment requisition
• Require subcontractors to enter their suppliers and 2^nd tier subcontractors with each application for payment

Once the payment application is approved, import the invoice into Accounts Payable with no manual entry required.

How it Works: Step-by-Step

Each subcontractor (or subcontractor employee) will have a secured login to your on-premise or hosted Sage 300 CRE web portal.

After login, a list of that subcontractors’ open commitments are presented to the subcontractor.

By using the compliance button, subcontractor can see a summary of the compliance documents required and the status of those documents or outstanding requirements.  By default, the compliance requirements grid leverages data from Sage 300 CRE.

Clicking the upload button will allow the subcontractor to upload the required compliance document for review and approval.

Document review and approval …

For our construction clients that do not manage subcontractor compliance in Sage 300 CRE, the web portal provides the ability to add required compliance documents specific to a job and/or commitment.

Automated alerts and emails can be configured to be sent to remind subcontractors to upload their required compliance documents.

Once compliance requirements are satisfied, the subcontractor can enter their requisitions for payment against their commitment by clicking the “Invoicing” button on the commitment grid.

The subcontractor is presented with a history of pay applications entered through the portal along with the status.

They can enter new pay applications, edit any existing that haven’t been approved and print any past pay applications.  If a subcontractor has outstanding compliance items, we can prevent them from entering a new pay application

For each pay application, the sub enters header information first:

And then is presented with the schedule of values from the commitment that is updated with the remaining balance to invoice, % complete, retainage, etc.

This works best when the schedule of values is entered into Sage 300 CRE – and not just a single line item.  If you only enter a single item commitment, we also have a way to import a new schedule of values into the portal and into Sage 30 CRE so that this functionality can be used – even in the middle of a job and commitment.

Subcontractor can enter the amounts to bill on each line item by clicking the “Edit” button on each line OR can edit all line items by clicking the “Edit All” button – this enters spreadsheet mode.

Some important things to note:

• Subcontractor is not allowed to enter an invoice amount that is in excess of the revised commitment amount for that item
• Only approved commitment change orders are displayed in the grid so the subcontractor cannot bill a change order that does not appear in the grid.

Once the invoice is entered, the subcontractor can print the AIA invoice.

Subcontractor can enter their suppliers or 2nd tier subcontractors in the next tab

And finally, submit to the Project Manager for approval by clicking the Submit Pay App button

Upon submission, the Project Manager is notified to review the pay application.  Any number of approval levels can be set.

On the pay application approval grid, the user can use the item buttons to:

• Edit the billed amounts
• Print the AIA
• Print a Commitment Change Order Log
• Send an email to the subcontractor
• Approve – pay application moves to the next approver
• Reject – enter notes and reject, route back to subcontractor or any previous approver level
• Delete

After the pay application is approved by the final approver, Accounts Payable is notified and those invoices can be imported into AP using Tools – Import Invoices with no other manual entry required.

Multiple invoices can be imported at the same time – eliminating all data entry for subcontractor payment applications!