In a previous article, we showed you how to track job costs with our Job Summary report. This article explains how to use our Weekly Labor Cost report. Both reports show total hours and labor costs by job and the employees who worked each job.
However, the Weekly Labor Cost (WLC) report is unique in many ways.
How the Weekly Labor Cost Report is Unique
Runs for only one week at a time. You select the date range for the Job Summary report.
Calculates labor costs using a fully loaded pay rate that includes payroll taxes, worker's comp, etc. We will talk more about that.
Factors overtime into job costing with OT hours calculated at 1.5x for each job.
Shows who hit overtime at each job.
Gives the difference between budgeted dollars and actual dollars.
Displays totals across all jobs.
The Fully Loaded Pay Rate
The Weekly Labor Cost report uses a fully loaded pay rate to give you more accurate job costing. The fully loaded rate should include your payroll taxes of 7.65% + worker's compensation + other benefits.
Enter your fully loaded pay rate at My Account, Company Set Up, Labor Rate Multiplier, and save.
A Screenshot Example of the Weekly Labor Cost Report
The top yellow section covers the variables we track, showing a division of the three big areas: hours, labor cost, and set dollar budget.
Each job is separated by a dark gray bar with every employee who worked the job above the bar. See Big Box Store Main St in Red.
The totals across all jobs are at the bottom in green.
Let's Look at the Big Box Store Budget
Take a look at the Big Box Store. The "Set Dollar Budget" column shows that I budgeted $225 weekly, but the "Total Labor Cost" column shows that I spent $379.23.
How did I go over by $154.23 or 70%?
The Hours section shows I budgeted 12 hours but worked 16, and most enlightening, 5 hours were overtime.
And the Labor Cost section shows how deadly overtime is to my budget.
I should've been paying more attention to Jimmy's hours and shifted someone in his place before he hit overtime. You can monitor overtime with our Over 40 report.
Do you want to start using the Weekly Labor Cost report?
Setting Up the Weekly Labor Cost Report
The setup for the Weekly Labor Cost Report is the same as for the Job Summary Report. The only difference is the WLC report requires a weekly value for budgeted dollars and hours because you can't run it for more than one week. Both reports pull from the same fields for their reporting, so using both may not be practical.
The WLC is more powerful in breaking down overtime by job and using fully loaded pay rates.
Take a peek at our new platform, Chronotek Pro. We take job costing to the next level!
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