Allowance register. A promise to find out later, tracked.
An allowance is a number the contractor carried because the scope was not selected yet. This module lists what has been found out, what has not, and what it cost when it was.
The allowance register, as it renders in the product. Fictional project. Every chart is inline SVG.
The problem this solves.
An allowance is a promise to find out later. It carries a real number in the GMP and an unreal amount of certainty, and it stays open until somebody is made to decide.
Figures are from the fictional project used throughout this site, and are arithmetic rather than an industry claim. Your own numbers are the ones worth knowing, and the calculator below computes them.
Allowances carried against what they actually cost 22 s, no voice over. Nothing loads from YouTube until you press play.All eleven films
Pre-GMP Readiness Score
It reads how complete the design is behind each allowance and returns the ones that should carry a decision date before the contract is signed.
It runs the same functions as the product, in your browser. Nothing you type is sent anywhere or stored.
Per allowance
Allowance reference, scope, carried value, actual cost, variance, decision deadline and reconciliation status. Closed allowances show the variance in either direction. Open allowances show the carried value and the date by which a decision is due. An allowance past its decision date with no decision is marked overdue in the flag color.
The register also records the design completeness at the time each allowance was set. That figure drives the confidence band in the free calculator and the exposure ranking in the baseline report.
The chart: carried against actual
A bullet chart per allowance. The carried value is the track. The actual is the bar. An overrun extends past the end of the track in the flag color. Open allowances show the track alone. The chart reads the same in print and in grayscale.
Flags it raises
An allowance reconciled above its carried value. A decision deadline inside fourteen days. A decision deadline passed. Total allowance exposure, the sum of carried values on open items, above a share of the GMP that the baseline set as the watch level.
What it is not
The register does not select finishes and does not approve scope. The owner and the design team do that. The register records the decision date, the actual, and what the variance did to the anticipated final cost and the savings pool.
Instead of the spreadsheet
Why owners pick this over the spreadsheet: a spreadsheet does not count days. An allowance decision date passes and nothing turns red, because nothing is watching. Here the deadline is a field, the overdue state is a flag, and the flag appears in the monthly report until someone decides.
Carried value as the track, actual as the bar. Overrun extends past the track end.
Questions owners ask
Who reconciles an allowance?
The contractor submits the actual cost with backup. The owner's side records it and marks the allowance closed. A reconciliation without backup is flagged, like a contingency draw without a document.
What happens to allowance savings?
Under most agreements an allowance underrun reduces the GMP or returns to the owner, and an overrun is added. The register records the direction. The anticipated final cost and the shared savings modules apply your contract's rule.
How is the confidence band set?
It is a stated rule: a band around the carried value whose width depends on design completeness when the allowance was set. It is not a measurement of anything. The calculator page explains it.
Next and previous
Previous module: Buyout tracker. Next module: Anticipated final cost. Or read how the nine fit together.
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