When to use custom items
The Ensign database covers a wide range of products, but there will be times when you need to add something that is not listed — a specialist product, a bespoke allowance, or a particular item from a manufacturer not yet in the system. The software provides several methods for handling these situations:
- Free type — one-off items for the current job (covered on this page).
- Contractor's choice — custom items saved to your database for reuse in future jobs (see Contractor's Choice).
- Subcontract and specials — specialist quotations and subcontractor packages (see Subcontract and Specials).
- Labour only — tasks with no material element (see Labour Only and Comment Lines).
Free type
Free type lets you add a one-off item to the current job with your own description, cost, and labour time. The item exists only within this job and is not saved to the database for future use.
- 1
Click the Free Type button on the left-hand side of the takeoff screen.
- 2
Select a category for the item. This determines which markup group the item falls into on the summary table — for example, classifying a free-type cable item under Cable means it will be marked up alongside other cable products. Choosing the correct category ensures your markup percentages are applied consistently.
- 3
Enter the item description. Write something clear enough that you and your colleagues will understand what the item represents when reviewing the estimate later.
- 4
Enter the quantity, unit labour hours, and unit material cost.
- 5
Press Confirm to add the item to the current section.
Prime costs and provisional sums
Free type also supports prime costs and provisional sums. When you open the free type screen, the category list includes options for these alongside the standard material categories.
- Prime cost — use this for items where the exact cost is not yet known and will be confirmed later (e.g. a specialist product to be procured during the project).
- Provisional sum — use this for allowances that may or may not be required, depending on site conditions or client decisions.
Select the appropriate option from the category list when adding the item. Prime costs and provisional sums appear separately on the summary table and in your tender documents, making them clearly identifiable.
If you find yourself adding the same free-type item to multiple jobs, consider creating it as a contractor's choice item instead. This saves the item to your database so you can browse to it in future rather than re-entering the details each time.
Using net rates directly
If you have a specific net rate from a supplier quotation rather than a trade price and discount, you can enter the net rate directly into the unit material cost field. The item will use this value as-is, without any discount calculation.
This is useful for specialist products where you have received a fixed price quotation and simply need to include the cost in your estimate.