The Cost Tracking tab is where you watch the money on a job. You compare what you planned to spend against what you're actually spending, line by line, and Riffle does the math for you in real time so you always know whether the job is on budget.
The Basics
To give you a head start, Riffle automatically pulls planned costs from the latest version of your estimate when the job enters the Project WIP stage. From there you record actual costs as they come in, and every planned-vs-actual difference recalculates automatically. Your work saves as you go — no save button.
Tip: You can move quickly with the keyboard. Tab jumps to the next field and Enter applies a change.
The Three Summary Rows
At the top of the page, three rows stay pinned so your headline numbers are always in view. These aren't cost categories you edit like the rest — they're your job's bottom line:
Overall Contract Value: The total you're charging the customer for the job, compared against your total costs to-date. This is your at-a-glance "am I still making money?" line. If your costs climb past the contract value, the row turns red.
Sales Commissions: Any sales commission on the job, tracked here for your reference.
Overall Estimated Costs: A live running total of all the planned and actual costs in the categories below. This one is calculated for you, you don't edit it directly.
Cost Categories and Line Items
Below the summary rows, your costs are organized into categories (cost groups), each with its own line items. For each line you track a Planned/Budgeted Costs amount at the cost group level and an Actual Costs at the line item level. Riffle shows the % Difference and $ Difference amounts. That makes it easy to see exactly which parts of the job are running over or coming in under.
Related: How Do I Customize Cost Groups?
Reading the Numbers
Planned/Budgeted Costs: what you expected to spend (seeded from your estimate, and editable).
Actual Costs: what you've actually spent so far.
Difference (% and $): planned vs. actual, shown in dollars and as a percentage, updating the moment you enter a cost.
When actual costs go over what was planned, Riffle highlights it in red so problem areas jump out before they eat your margin.
Tips
Record the projects costs regularly rather than all at once. The closer your updates are to real-time, sooner you'll know when a job is going over budget.
Use line-item notes whenever the costs don't match your expectations. This will make it easier to understand what happened when you review the job later.
Keep an eye on the Overall Contract Value row. It's the quickest read on whether the job is still profitable.