Like labour, you can set up different equipment rates and apply them to different jobs. You may have different rates for different clients, or for remote locations. Set up as many Equipment Rate Types as you need and point to the correct rate on a job by job basis.
Before you set up equipment rates, you’re going to want to identify the groups of equipment you operate. You may have a 100 compressors. It would be tedious to enter a rate for every compressor you own. Instead, you’ll identify compressors as a group, and say how their rates will be set up. You’ll mark each compressor as a member of that group. And then create equipment rates for that entire group. You may even want to group disparate types of equipment, to simplify setting up rates.
First, navigate to the equipment rate group screen. Select item [g] Equipment on the navigation panel, and under that heading, select item [u] for Setup, then item [d] for Equipment Rate Group Entry:
The list tab will show you a list of groups. Select a group, or go to the Details tab and use action ‘A’ to enter a new group. At this point, you’re just going to tell Abio what kinds of rates you will use when billing this type of equipment:
You can also tell Abio which cost centre to use when you enter equipment timesheets on the web app. The web app offers a simpler interface than the desktop, and doesn’t assume the user has any knowledge of the job costing setup. You can change the centre when you review equipment timesheets on the desktop.
The next step will be to set up rates for each group. Navigate to the equipment rate group screen. Select item [g] Equipment on the navigation panel, and under that heading, select item [u] for Setup, then item [c] for Equipment Rate Type Entry:
The ‘transfer based billings’ section on the Details tab refers to a style of billing appropriate to very large jobs. Rather than billing every day, for each piece of equipment, you can elect to bill based on equipment being on a job site:
For our purposes, we want to set up the rates that will be used on equipment timesheets. Click on the Rates tab. For this Air Compressor group, we’ve entered regular and standby rates for hourly, daily, weekly and monthly billing periods:
When you enter an equipment timesheet and specify a regular status and an hourly billing period, the timesheet will apply the $6/hr rate to that timesheet. When you bill your customer, they will be billed this amount.