QuickBooks is among the most popular accounting software for construction companies, with built-in tools that allow users to create custom reports. Accurate job costing is essential use historical experience to forecast job expenses and minimize any potential cost overruns. In this how-to guide, we’ll show you how to assign expenses and revenue to specific Job Costing in QuickBooks, so you can track your financial performance by customer. This process allows you to make budgetary adjustments in real time and avoid any unpleasant surprises upon completion.

For construction companies, realizing profit on a completed project depends heavily on having the right tools. It could be the physical implements needed to build an office complex or the financial analytics to determine if a project is on-budget. Both types of assets help contribute to your success.

How to set up job costing in QuickBooks
The examples we use below are based on QuickBooks Online, and job costing is only available with Pro or Advanced subscriptions. Those with Simple Start or Essentials will need to upgrade in order to track financial performance on specific projects.

If you are using QuickBooks Desktop, the specific language may differ slightly — we’ll include specific instructions for that platform as well.

Step 1: Enable Job Costing in Account Settings
You can create a list of current projects by starting out on the Home screen in the QuickBooks Cloud. From the Business Overview screen, click on the “Gear” icon in the upper-right corner of the screen and then select Account and Settings from the list.

Turn on customized transaction numbers
From there, the Sales tab lets you select customized transaction numbers. You’ll eventually need this to track and review invoices in progress.

Track expenses by customer
At this point, you can navigate to the Expenses tab and let QuickBooks know you want to track expenses by customer. You can also make expenses billable to those customers by choosing that option on the Bills and Expenses menu.

Turn on automatic invoices (optional)
Any estimates you create can be instantly transformed to customer invoices further along in the process. To enable this, open Advanced options and choose the “Automatically invoice unbilled activity” selection under Automation settings.

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