Understanding what a price breakdown is for (and when you are asked for one)
The difference between unit price, breakdown, and excluding-VAT sale price
The unit price is the value that feeds your BPU or your DPGF. The price breakdown explains how you get there. Labour at unit time, materials with waste, allocated plant, then site overheads, general overheads and margin. The excluding-VAT sale price is the result. It is the price you commit to contractually, not the “finger-in-the-air” sum of the components.
The direct link with DPGF and the bill of unit rates (BPU)
In a tender package, the BPU lists unit prices by item. The DPGF quantifies and totals those items. The breakdown is used to justify a price, compare technical alternatives, or respond to a request for explanation when there is a gap with a benchmark price. For more detail, see quantifies and totals these items.
When the breakdown is a supporting document and how to anticipate it
- Public contracts and certain private contracts. Analysis of a bid considered abnormally low, request for clarification, or final negotiation.
- Subsidised or controlled works. You will be asked for traceable assumptions, consistent with your quantities and site resources.
- Anticipation. Prepare a template by work category, with productivity rates, unproductive time, loss coefficients, and revision rules.
Building the direct cost: the reliable quantified base
Labour: unit time × loaded hourly cost (without forgetting unproductive time)
Direct cost starts with labour. Begin with a unit time per work item (installation, adjustments, clean-up, self-checks), then multiply it by a loaded hourly cost. What makes the difference in a price breakdown is also including unproductive time. Internal travel, supply runs, scaffolding erection, safety briefing, access constraints. Without that, you end up selling at a loss while still “holding” your headline price.
Materials: quantities, waste, offcuts and consumables that “eat into” the margin
Price the quantities from the quantity take-off, then add a waste and offcut coefficient by family (insulation, fixings, vapour barrier). Don’t forget consumables. Sealant, tapes, screws, anchors, PPE, small sundries. They are small items, but taken together they eat into the margin if you leave them “in the lump sum.”
Plant: tools, hire, equipment, and allocation to the right work item
Decide what you allocate to the work item. Small tools covered by depreciation (hourly allowance), specific equipment (dedicated line), hire and plant (actual duration). The goal is simple: every intervention carries its share, with a trace you can use in the DPGF and the bill of unit rates.
Moving from direct cost to excluding-VAT sale price: overheads + profit + contingency
In a price breakdown, direct cost is the base. To sell without losing money, you add what does not appear on the work item line, then you secure the margin. The excluding-VAT sale price is built item by item.
Site overheads: setup, travel, protection, waste management
Price site-allocable overheads for setup, welfare facilities, protection, handling for access, travel, parking, skip hire, sorting and disposal. Spread them as a lump sum per site or pro rata to hours. Record the assumption on the quote.
General overheads: what your company has to cover no matter what
Your general overheads cover the structure and obligations: management, administration, insurance, shared tools, premises, vehicles, RGE certification, accounting, training. Calculate a rate from your profit and loss account. Apply it to productive hours or direct cost.
Profit and contingency: securing the unit price without overselling
Margin funds investment and cash flow. Add a separate site contingency line when the risk is real: restricted access, phasing, rework, subcontracting, weather, supply issues. The more your assumptions are written down, the more your unit price stands up in the DPGF and BPU. For more on calculating margin and overruns, see calculating margin and hour overruns.
Calculating the sales coefficient (and why there is no universal value)
Calculation method: from direct cost to excluding-VAT unit price in one clear formula
Your sales coefficient is the multiplier that turns direct cost (labour, materials with waste, allocated plant) into an excluding-VAT unit price. If your rates are built on direct cost, keep it simple. Excluding-VAT unit price = Direct cost × (1 + site overheads + general overheads + profit + contingency). Just make sure your rates use the same base; otherwise you convert before multiplying.
What changes your coefficient in 2026: organisation, charge rates, risks and schedule
The coefficient mainly shifts with your organisation. Real unproductive time in the hourly cost, productivity depending on access and overlapping trades, management share, hire and depreciation, subcontracting, claims history, and risk level. In 2026, schedule pressure and the risk of penalties or tied-up resources quickly outweigh one point of margin.
How to justify your coefficient to a client, project manager or buyer
In the price breakdown, you show your assumptions rather than “a coefficient.” Unit time, loaded hourly cost, productivity rates, losses, resources, then overheads and margin. It is readable, defensible, and reusable in a DPGF or BPU when a supporting document is requested. To avoid confusion between margin, mark-up rate and coefficient, rely on the concepts of gross margin, mark-up rate and sales coefficient.
Full worked example on a standard item (from breakdown to BPU)
Starting assumptions: unit times, hourly cost, materials with waste, allocated plant
Example item. Loose-fill insulation of lofts, unit m². Unit time 0.18 h/m². Loaded hourly cost 46 €/h, built with unproductive time (travel, loading, after-sales support). Materials. 8 kg/m² of cellulose wadding, increased by 7% for offcuts and adjustments. Allocated plant. Blowing machine 35 €/day and vehicle 60 €/day, spread over 250 m²/day.
Price breakdown table: direct cost, overheads, profit/contingency, final excluding-VAT unit price
| Item | Base | Value | Unit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Labour | 0.18 × 46 | 8.28 | €/m² |
| Materials (with waste) | 8 × 1.07 × 0.65 | 5.56 | €/m² |
| Allocated plant | (35 + 60) / 250 | 0.38 | €/m² |
| Direct cost | Total | 14.22 | €/m² |
| Site overheads | 8% | 1.14 | €/m² |
| General overheads | 12% | 1.71 | €/m² |
| Profit + contingency | 10% | 1.42 | €/m² |
| Final excluding-VAT unit price | 14.22 × 1.30 | 18.49 | €/m² |
Your price breakdown remains defensible if you keep the same percentage logic across the whole lot, then adjust according to access, difficulty and actual productivity.
Reporting in the DPGF/BPU and the natural output: your quantity take-off page
In the DPGF, you keep the description, unit, quantity and excluding-VAT unit price. In the BPU, you lock in the unit price and send the breakdown as a supporting document when requested. The natural output is your quantity take-off sheet. Usable area, target thickness, access, carrying distance, protection, and daily productivity retained. That is the take-off that explains the gap with a lower bidder. The free Argile quantity take-off sheet records quantities from plans or enters them by lot for painting, flooring and plastering, then exports to CSV.
