Just below your project markup tools, you’ll find the “Alternates” and “Components” tool. This is where you can create and edit new alternates and components for your project. We’ll talk about each one separately, but these are both essentially sub-sections of a project, that have some special properties. They are very useful for organizing your reports and making them look professional!
Alternates are almost the exact same as components, instead, these parts will not be included in the entire project. Alternates are separated from the project and the cost of the alternate is not included in the cost of the project.
For example,let’s say that the customer wants to see the price of a new deck, but doesn’t want it to be included yet. You would create an alternate for a deck and add all the parts you want for that deck into the alternate. On the report, this deck alternate will show up below the total project cost and indicate the total cost of the alternate (not line-by-line like the components are shown).
If an alternate gets accepted, just click on it in the alternate/component list then change it’s status to “Accepted” at the top of the Alternate tool. Then, click “Component” at the top to change the alternate to a component. Now it will show up on your report (and include the total in the project cost) as any other component would.
Alternates are perfect for showing your customers how much something would cost, without including it with the rest of the project. They are also great for creating change orders!