Day rate schedules

Day rate schedules record contractual sell rates for day work. A schedule belongs to your company or to one client. Each schedule has one or more revisions holding its lines, terms, and effective dates. Your ordinary rates catalogue remains the source of internal costs. Estimators pick day-rate lines straight into a work item’s build-up, where they’re priced at the schedule rate with no markup. Each project has its own set of schedules, fixed at one revision each. See Day rates in a project and Adding day rates to a build-up. Admins can create, edit, and issue schedules. Members can open any schedule, export and print it, but can’t change it.

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The schedule register

Open Rates & resources → Resource library and select Day/Card rates. The register is a read-only list of your schedules: Select a row to open the schedule. Each row’s menu has Open and, for admins, Edit. The header keeps Show archived schedules, + New schedule, and Import Schedule of Rates. Duplicate, archive, and restore are on the schedule’s own page.

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Open a schedule

Opening a schedule shows it on a full page at /rates/day-rates/schedules/:scheduleId. The page opens on the revision in force today. A schedule that hasn’t been issued yet opens on its draft. Use the Revision selector in the header to switch to another revision. Each revision has its own address, so you can bookmark it or send the link. The page shows:

• The header: the schedule’s name, status, and client, with Back to day/card rates.
• The facts: revision, In force from (or Starts for a draft), Until, Contract reference, Line wording (Ours or The client’s), and Inherits from.
• Terms: the revision’s terms text.
• Schedule lines: code, unit, kind, rate, Maps to, and internal cost for each line.
• Revision history: every revision with its status, dates, and when it was issued. The Issued date uses your company’s time zone.

Everything on the page is read-only until you select Edit. That includes Maps to.

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Page actions

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Edit a schedule

1. Open the schedule and select Edit, or choose Edit from the row’s menu in the register.
2. The same page turns into inputs and the header shows Discard and Save changes.
3. Make your changes.
4. Select Save changes.

Everything you change is saved together. If something can’t be saved, nothing is: the page stays in Edit and shows the problem next to the field. If someone else saved the revision after you opened it, Stralos says so and offers Reload. Reloading shows their changes and drops yours. If you try to leave with unsaved changes, Stralos asks whether to save them, discard them, or keep editing. What you can change depends on the revision: A superseded revision can’t be edited. An archived schedule is read-only until you restore it.

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Lines

On a draft, every line in the Schedule lines table is an input row:

• Code: optional.
• Unit: the line’s unit.
• Kind: Flat, Fixed, or Cost plus.
• Rate: for Flat and Fixed lines, the day rate. For a Cost plus line, enter the % over cost instead.
• Maps to: optional links to rate items or activities for internal cost and margin. See Map a line to an internal cost.

Select Add line below the table to add a line. To delete one, use its delete button and confirm Delete line. The line leaves the draft when you save, and once saved the delete can’t be undone. A draft has never been issued, so nothing has relied on it yet. The lines table has no description column. A new line’s description starts from its code, or reads “New line” when it has none. With exactly one link, select Use the mapped name as the description to take that item’s or activity’s name. Exports and the day-rate picker show the line’s description. Day rate schedules have no separate pricing-rules section. A Fixed line is always charged as one set price, and a Cost plus line takes its percentage from % over cost. Stralos keeps the rule each kind needs for you. Minimums and loadings, such as night or Saturday rates, aren’t part of day rate schedules.

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Issue a draft

1. Open the draft.
2. Check its dates, terms, and lines. The Effective from date must be later than the revision in force.
3. Select Issue.

Issuing makes the draft the current revision. The previous revision closes on the day before the new one starts. An issued revision’s rates, dates, and terms can’t change. Linking is optional. You can save and issue a schedule with some or all lines unlinked.

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Update estimates after issuing

Straight after you issue, the Update estimates using {schedule}? dialog opens. It lists every in-progress estimate whose project uses this schedule, grouped by project. For each estimate it shows the estimate, type, status, the number of lines using the schedule, and the current total, new total, and difference.

1. Tick the estimates that should move to the new rates. Nothing is ticked to start with.
2. Select Update n estimates, or select Skip to move nothing.

An estimate with 0 lines can still be ticked. That moves its project to the new revision, so future picks use the new rates, without changing any lines. The dialog shows when the new revision starts. If the date is in the future, estimates you update take the new rates straight away. For each ticked estimate, Stralos:

• moves its project to the new revision;
• moves each of its day-rate lines to the matching line in the new revision;
• keeps any rate an estimator edited by hand;
• leaves a line that isn’t in the new revision on its old rate, marked No longer in the schedule.

The result column then reports each estimate, for example “Updated 4 lines”. Unticked estimates show Not ticked — left on its current rates. Only in-progress estimates are listed. Submitted, won, and saved-version estimates never change. Estimators can update a skipped project later from Project settings → Day/Card rates.

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Cut a new revision

To change the rates in force, open the current revision and select New revision. Stralos copies its lines and mappings into a new draft and opens it in Edit. A schedule can have only one draft. If one already exists, the page says A draft already exists and links to it with Open the draft.

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Map a line to an internal cost

Maps to links a line to up to 20 rate items or activities. You can mix both on one line. Each link is an alternative charged at the line’s one sell rate; Stralos never adds their costs together. For a combined cost, such as a truck with an operator, link one activity whose build-up includes both. Links let Stralos work out internal cost and margin. They don’t change the sell rate, estimate totals, or the schedule issued to a client.

1. Select Edit.
2. In the line’s Maps to field, type into Add a resource or activity (optional) to search.
3. Select a choice from Rates or Activities. Repeat to add another link. Each link appears as a chip; use its remove button to remove it independently.
4. Select Save changes.

If the activity you need doesn’t exist yet, choose + New activity… in the list, or + Create new activity with the name you typed. A panel opens with the name and the line’s unit filled in. Save it and the new activity is added to the line’s links. Add its build-up later on the activity’s own page: each linked activity has an Open activity link under the field, which opens that page in a new tab. A line can have up to 20 links. Already-linked choices aren’t offered again. Reopening the revision keeps the links in the same order. You can remove every link if you don’t need internal costs. You can change links on a draft or on the revision in force. Older revisions are read-only. A new revision, copy, inherited schedule, or rebase keeps all links. On a draft with exactly one link, if the linked rate or activity uses a different unit, Stralos offers Use the mapped unit. If its name differs, it offers Use the mapped name as the description. Neither is applied unless you select it. The rates group offers one choice per active rate item. Stralos stores a representative active option for that item and works out the live Standard cost for its pricing owner and location. A stored inactive or expired target stays visible on existing lines but isn’t offered for new ones.

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Review costs and margins

The Schedule lines heading shows how many lines are linked. Show unlinked lines filters the table to lines without links. With several links, Internal cost and margin show a low–high range across the alternatives that can be costed. Hover over or focus the cost to see each link’s figures and the names of any links that couldn’t be costed. One link shows a single figure; no links shows Not linked. Overall margin also shows a low–high range and says how many linked lines it covers. The low end uses each line’s highest cost; the high end uses each line’s lowest cost. Unlinked lines and lines with no usable cost and margin are left out. When both ends match, it shows one figure. If a line can’t be costed, the Internal cost column explains why:

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Export a revision

Select Export on the schedule’s page:

• Print / Save PDF opens a print layout in the browser. Use your browser’s Print function to save it as a PDF.
• Download Excel downloads the revision as an .xlsx workbook.

Print on the page header opens the same print layout directly. A superseded or draft revision’s print layout carries a notice above the schedule title. A superseded revision states the dates it was in force. A draft states that it hasn’t been issued. The Excel workbook doesn’t carry this marking, so check the workbook before sending it to a client. Both exports show the date they were generated, in your company’s time zone. The print layout shows the revision number; the Excel footer includes the revision identifier. Fixed lines read “Fixed charge” and Cost plus lines read “Cost + n%”. The Excel workbook’s sheet is named Day-Card rates.

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Review base changes

When a schedule inherits from a base schedule and the base has been updated, the register shows Review required and the page says This revision requires base review. Select Review base changes to open the review page. The review page groups every line outcome. Base pricing rules, such as a Fixed line’s charge or a Cost plus percentage, are grouped separately. For Removed by the base lines, tick the lines you want to remove. Unticked lines become independent local lines rather than being deleted. Your removal ticks are saved as you work. If you leave the page and come back, your ticks are restored, provided the base hasn’t changed while you were away. If it has, you’re asked to check every outcome again. When you’ve reviewed everything:

• Create draft revision applies the base changes in a new draft revision and takes you back to it. Only the revision in force can create this draft.
• Acknowledge — keep Rev n records that you reviewed the changes without changing the contractual lines. The revision stays pinned to the old base until a draft is created from it.

If a draft already exists, Create draft revision is unavailable until you issue that draft. See Managing the rates catalogue for creating, importing, duplicating, archiving, and restoring schedules.