Log Labour Costs Every Day, Not at Month-End

If your labour reconciliation happens at month-end, you're always flying blind. By the time you know you've overspent, you're already three weeks into the next month doing it again.

Why daily tracking matters

Labour is typically the largest single cost on a construction project, and it's also the most controllable — if you catch problems early enough to do something about them.

Tracking daily gives you three things monthly tracking doesn't:

1. Early warning. If you're consistently running 12% over your labour allocation by Wednesday each week, you know by Thursday — not by the 5th of next month.
2. Accurate forecasting. A running total of actual hours lets you project completion cost with real data rather than estimates.
3. Dispute resolution. When a worker or subcontractor disputes their hours, you have a timestamped record, not a memory.

How Con-trak's labour log works

Con-trak has two modes to suit different sites:

• Attendance mode — Mark workers present, absent, or on half-day. Con-trak calculates cost automatically using each worker's daily rate.
• Timeclock mode — Log start and finish times for precise hour-based costing.

You can switch between them per entry, so you're never locked into one approach across mixed crews.

The attendance summary bar at the top of the log shows today's headcount at a glance. Before you leave site, you know exactly how many workers were logged and what the day cost.

Subcontractors and subbies

Subcontractors often get missed from daily tracking because they're "someone else's payroll." But their cost still hits your project. Con-trak lets you track subbies separately with a dedicated subcontractor toggle — same daily log, separate line in your reports.

The discipline of daily logging

The hardest part isn't the tool — it's the habit. Con-trak makes this easier by:

• Saving your roster from the last entry so you're not re-adding 22 workers every morning
• Remembering each worker's rate so you never have to look it up
• Syncing immediately so even a 30-second log on your phone updates the dashboard

If your site supervisor spends 4 minutes on the labour log each morning, you'll have data your accountant would otherwise spend half a day reconstructing at month-end.