# Engineering & Fabrication > ERP for subcontract machinists, fabricators and engineering firms working to drawing, to order and to a promised date. **URL:** https://cubeerp.co.uk/industries/engineering-fabrication Quote from real cost, plan against real capacity, and find out what the job made before the next one is quoted. Subcontract engineering is a business of one-offs and small batches, where every job is slightly different and the estimate is frequently the only thing standing between a profitable year and a busy one. The systems that fail here are the ones that assume repeat production. CubeERP is built around the job: an enquiry with a drawing attached becomes an estimate, the estimate becomes a works order with a routing, the shop floor books against it, and the finished job reports what it actually cost against what was quoted. ## Figures - **Per job** Quoted versus actual, every time - **Per operation** Time booked where it happened - **Attached** Certification issued with despatch ## Common problems in this sector - **Estimates built on memory:** Quoting from what a similar job "usually takes" works until the mix changes. Without recorded actuals there is no feedback loop, so the same optimistic assumption is repeated for years. - **Drawings and revisions everywhere:** Customer drawings arrive by email, get saved to a shared drive, and are superseded without the shop floor being told. Parts made to a superseded revision are scrap plus a difficult phone call. - **Material buying by the job:** Bar, plate and section bought per job, with offcuts nobody records. Stock exists physically and not in any system, so it is bought again. - **Capacity promised by feel:** Delivery dates are agreed in the sales office based on how busy the floor looked that morning. The plan is a whiteboard and the sequence changes with whoever asks last. - **Certification as paperwork:** Material certificates, weld procedures, NDT reports and inspection records live in folders. Producing a full pack for a customer is a manual retrieval exercise every time. ## What CubeERP does about it - **Estimating from real data:** Material, machine time, labour and treatment costed line by line, with a comparison to what similar jobs actually cost rather than what they were quoted at. - **Routings for one-offs:** Operation sequences per job, including sub-contract heat treatment, plating and coating, with set-up and run times separated so batch size affects the price properly. - **Shop-floor booking:** Clock on and off jobs at a touchscreen, with scrap, rework and downtime captured at the operation rather than reconstructed at the end of the week. - **Material and offcuts:** Bar, plate and section tracked with remnant management, so usable offcuts are visible before more material is bought. - **Certification packs:** Material certificates, test results and inspection records held against the batch and issued with the despatch documentation automatically. - **Job profitability:** Quoted versus actual on every job, by customer, part and machine - which is the only reliable way to find out which work is worth having. ## Use cases ### A customer nobody wanted to lose **Scenario:** A machining subcontractor had one customer accounting for a large share of turnover and assumed it was their best account. Job cost was never recorded at part level. **Outcome:** Actual job costing showed two part families were consistently loss-making. Prices were renegotiated on evidence, the customer accepted most of it, and the account stayed - profitably. ### Set-up time nobody charged for **Scenario:** Set-up was bundled into an hourly rate. Small batches of complex parts were priced almost identically to large ones, and the small ones were the popular repeat orders. **Outcome:** Set-up and run time were separated in estimating. Small-batch pricing rose to reflect reality, and the work mix shifted towards batches the shop was actually set up to make. ## Implementation 1. **Discovery:** A structured session mapping how you work now - the systems, the spreadsheets and the bits held together by one person’s memory. We come back with what the platform covers as standard, what needs configuration, and what needs building. 2. **Configuration:** Your sites, warehouses, price lists, approval limits, document templates, workflows and permissions set up to match the business - not a demo tenant with your logo dropped on it. 3. **Data migration:** Customers, suppliers, parts, bills of materials, price lists, open orders and stock balances brought across and reconciled. We migrate, you check the numbers against the old system, and only then do we cut over. 4. **Training & rollout:** Role-based training so the order desk learns the order desk and the warehouse learns the warehouse, with a pilot group first where it makes sense. Documentation and short screen recordings left behind for new starters. 5. **Ongoing support:** UK support from the people who built the platform, with a named contact, agreed response times, and a product roadmap you can influence. ## Frequently asked questions **Does it work for one-off and prototype work?** Yes - that is the normal case in a job shop rather than the exception. Jobs can be created from an estimate without a pre-existing part record, and a repeat order can be created from a past job in a couple of clicks. **Can we attach customer drawings to a job?** Yes, with revision control. The revision issued to the floor is recorded, and superseding a drawing flags any open works orders built to the previous revision. **Do you handle sub-contract processes?** Heat treatment, plating, painting, NDT and similar are routing operations with their own purchase orders. Material sent out is tracked, and receipt books straight back into the job. **What about remnants and offcuts?** Remnants can be booked back into stock with dimensions and located, so the next job that needs a similar size finds them before purchasing raises an order. **Will it work with our CAD or nesting software?** Bills of materials and cut lists can be imported, and the API allows a nesting or CAM system to push part and time data in. We would rather integrate what works than replace it. ## Relevant solution pages - **Job Costing Software** - Know what every job actually cost - materials, labour, sub-contract and overhead - while it is running, not six weeks later. https://cubeerp.co.uk/software/job-costing-software - **Quoting & Estimating Software** - Build quotes from live material costs, labour rates and real availability - then convert the winners to orders without retyping them. https://cubeerp.co.uk/software/quoting-software - **Manufacturing Software** - Bills of materials, works orders, routings, shop-floor booking and real job costing - for businesses that make things to order. https://cubeerp.co.uk/software/manufacturing-software - **Production Planning Software** - Schedule works orders against real capacity - people, machines and shifts - and see the effect of a rush job before you accept it. https://cubeerp.co.uk/software/production-planning-software ## Related industries - **Plastics & Rubber Moulding** - ERP for moulders and extruders - tooling, cycle times, cavity counts, regrind and machine data from the shop floor. https://cubeerp.co.uk/industries/plastics-rubber - **Automotive & Vehicle Parts** - ERP for automotive suppliers and parts distributors - schedules and call-offs, EDI, traceability and delivery performance that is measured. https://cubeerp.co.uk/industries/automotive-parts - **Building Products & Construction Supply** - ERP for manufacturers and suppliers of building products - configured items, site deliveries, call-offs and long-running projects. https://cubeerp.co.uk/industries/building-products ## Contact - **Product:** CubeERP - **Trading name of:** Cube Systems Limited (company number 17220899, ICO registration number ZC216972) - **Email:** hello@cubeerp.co.uk - **Sales:** sales@cubeerp.co.uk - **Support:** support@cubeerp.co.uk - **Telephone:** 01234 672 617 (+441234672617) - **Address:** Unit 11, Olney Business Park, Osier Way, Olney, Buckinghamshire, MK46 5FP - **Opening hours:** Monday to Friday, 9am to 5.30pm - **Part of:** Crushed Ice Group (https://crushedicegroup.co.uk)