Custom software for reconciling subcontractor work

What to settle before you close the spreadsheet

Say a subcontractor was to prepare documentation for a project. In the time records they logged work on the agreed documentation and an extra summary they were asked for later. The manager approved the original scope as done. The extra task is still in dispute: the team has not yet agreed whether it was part of the earlier arrangement or should have been a separate job. The subcontractor put both pieces of work on one invoice line.

The person checking this invoice has to establish which work the manager approved. They need the manager's confirmation for the documentation, and the information that the extra summary is waiting for a decision. The subcontractor's entry shows only what they reported as work done. It does not extend the manager's approval to the second task.

A useful screen would set the invoice line against both pieces of work. For the documentation, it would let you open the approval and check what it covered. For the extra summary, it would show the reason for the discrepancy and the person who has to clear it up under the company's rules. The employee would not have to rebuild this story from emails again. Judging the disputed task would still belong to the people responsible for arrangements with the subcontractor.

In such a project, linking the work to the right job and the contract scope matters more than importing hours. The same subcontractor may do several tasks for the same client. The company name and the month on the invoice are then not enough to assign the entries. If employees only work out in the spreadsheet which job the work belongs to, the app has to help clear up that gap. Automatic matching on a similar description could simply hide the mistake.

A ready system may already have the subcontractor reconciliation features you need

A time tracking SaaS and a project system can cover different parts of this work. Before you order a new program, ask the vendor or the administrator to walk through the example above in the tool you use. See whether it can tell reported work from approved work and show what an invoice line refers to.

Such features exist in ready project tools: recording subcontractors' time, expenses and materials, approving work and matching recorded costs to supplier invoices. This set of features is useful in a conversation with your system's vendor.

A detail matters here: in some programs, an invoice line has to point to a line of the subcontract to link costs to it, and without that reference the program shows only the verification status. Marking an invoice as checked may therefore give less information than an employee looking for the basis of an approval expects.

You have to confirm that the features are available in your own edition. Microsoft also notes limits on handling fixed-price subcontracting in some Project Operations scenarios. If you settle jobs that way, the vendor's demo should cover exactly that case.

How big a change you need

Configuration is enough when the current product can store the links and approvals, but the team does not use those features. The rollout work can then mean tidying the jobs and agreeing where the manager confirms the scope done. Allow for the time employees need to change their habits. An extra program helps little if confirmations still go only to the manager's private mailbox.

A small extension makes sense when work tracking runs well and what is missing is a view that compares it with the invoice. It could fetch entries and approvals from the current system, set them against the document and guide the clearing-up of discrepancies. Before choosing this path, check whether the vendor lets you fetch the information you need and later corrections. A total of hours will not tell you that the manager approved only the original scope. The connection has to carry the approval information too.

Your own app is worth considering when different jobs have different rules for describing and approving work, and employees keep rebuilding these links outside the system. It can cover only the reconciliation of subcontractor work and work alongside the accounting program you use. You do not have to assume up front that all tools will be replaced. Include a ready project module in the comparison too, if it handles your case without elaborate workarounds.

None of these options automatically needs AI. A model can help find matching descriptions of work, and textual similarity does not replace an approval. First solve the problem of the missing links between the job, the work done and the invoice.

What remains to handle after the rollout

Go back to the extra summary in the example. Once the company has settled the matter, the person responsible adds the decision. The app should keep the earlier record and show why the status changed. In the same way, a correction to the time records has to refer to the previous entry, so an employee does not take it for more work done. The next person can then understand the case without asking the spreadsheet's author what their markings mean.

If the subcontractor is to explain entries themselves, they need access to their own jobs and the comments on their work. Agree the scope of that access separately from the view of a company employee who compares invoices from many suppliers. We cover the wider topic of working with outside firms in the article on a custom request system for partner networks.

When you compare costs, include upkeep of the connections to current tools and help for employees when data for reconciling an invoice is missing. On the company side, someone has to own the current rules for approving work. The software supplier needs an agreed scope of support for the app and a way to request changes. Finishing the build does not settle these duties.

Before moving the data, decide what happens to open discrepancies and where the history of closed cases stays. The export should let you rebuild the links between work, approval and invoice. For a custom app, also discuss ownership of the code, the terms for using it and whether another supplier can take over upkeep. These arrangements affect your later freedom to change supplier as much as the ability to export data from a SaaS.

A conversation about one manual reconciliation

Syntalith builds custom apps. A possible project here is a screen that links work records to approvals and the invoice, with a place to explain discrepancies. Its scope can be limited to one type of job, to judge whether employees can follow a case without an extra spreadsheet. The choice between an extension and a separate app depends on what your current system makes available.

For the first call, it is enough to tell us about the last invoice where you had to hunt for confirmations and who helped find them. Name the tool you use and explain what you add in the spreadsheet. You need no full specification and no confidential documents. A custom app at Syntalith starts from €3,000 net (pricing).

What a subcontractor reconciliation app costs and when it pays back

Where to start

In the free process review we choose one process and count the team's volume and working time, and within 2 working days you get a written summary with a price. We build as part of AI apps, and we price maintenance separately.