Price the Change Before the Crew Starts
A small extra can consume a surprising share of a job’s profit. The crew sees another task. The customer sees a helpful adjustment. The operator needs to see the added scope, cost and time together.
A useful documentation pattern
AIA Contract Documents’ summary of its G701–2017 change order describes a record of agreed changes to the work, contract sum and contract time. That is a useful organizational pattern. The worksheet below is my operating approach, not a reproduction of the AIA form or a statement about anyone’s legal obligations.
The cost of an unpriced extra
Hypothetical illustration: a job has $10,000 of revenue and $8,000 of direct job costs, leaving $2,000 of gross profit before overhead and taxes. Extra work costing $600, with no added revenue, reduces that gross profit to $1,400.
If the same extra instead has an agreed $1,000 price and the assumed $600 cost, total revenue becomes $11,000 and direct costs become $8,600. Gross profit becomes $2,400. These are invented estimates, not a customer quote or a recommended markup. Actual overruns could change the result.
My four entries before an elective change
- Scope: describe what changes and attach the relevant photo or drawing.
- Cost: list added materials, labor, disposal and subcontract work.
- Price and time: state the proposed charge and the effect on the schedule.
- Decision: record the authorized decision through the project’s agreed process, then update the job budget.
My preference is to make those entries before committing a crew to discretionary extra work. Urgent safety situations require their own response under the project’s procedures. This article does not advise delaying necessary protective work or ignoring an existing contract.
The operator’s advantage is visibility: every approved change should reach both the field plan and the budget. A note that never reaches one of those places leaves the business working from two versions of the job.
Source and data date: AIA Contract Documents, G701–2017 summary, 2017 form edition; webpage publication date not displayed. Reviewed October 19, 2026. Original operator commentary; no contract form is reproduced.