Contech Construction Uses Jonas Software to Improve Job Costing, Eliminate Paper Processes and Gain a Competitive Advantage 
Executive Summary
Hal Andrews used the construction slowdown as an opportunity to improve his company’s operational efficiencies. Jonas Software, with eTimesheets and Document Management, proved to be an efficient, practical – and affordable – technology solution.
Customer Profile
Contech Construction is a versatile commercial specialty contractor specializing in architectural concrete formwork, structural wood framing, heavy timber work and seismic upgrades. Founded in 1987 by Hal Andrews, an Honours Graduate of Engineering from the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT), Contech performs a wide range of professional carpentry services throughout the Greater Vancouver Regional District.
After more than 20 years in business, Contech has built a reputation for quality, fairness and team building. The company’s impressive client list includes a number of prominent firms, including Stuart Olson Construction, Scott Construction Group and Dominion Construction. Contech combines solid planning with superior management and intelligent business applications to deliver innovative solutions to challenging projects.
Business Challenge
At the peak of the last construction boom, business at Contech was soaring. With $3M in annual revenues and more than 30 field staff, work was plentiful and profits were high. “We really were going through a gold rush,” owner Hal Andrews recalls. “We didn’t worry too much about our job costs because everything was going so well.” But when the construction market started to soften, Andrews used the slowdown as an opportunity to re-evaluate how he managed his company. “We needed to get more educated about our actual costs in the field,” he says.
Most of Andrews’ non-construction business colleagues were using integrated business management systems. Although Contech’s Simply Accounting software from Sage worked fine for accounting, based on his colleagues’ experience, he decided to look for an integrated construction-specific solution that would support comprehensive job costing and other industry-related processes.
Jonas Solution
After researching the options, Andrews chose Jonas Software. “I liked what Jonas had to offer. They were honest about what their software could do and, compared to the competition, I was very happy with their price,” he states. “I also liked Jonas’ personal approach. I don’t think we would have gotten the same level of service from a more corporate-oriented company.” In addition to purchasing Jonas’ construction accounting and job costing modules, Contech also purchased two applications that support paperless processing: eTimesheets and Jonas Document Management (DM).
eTimesheets is a Web-based solution that allows labor hours to be securely entered into Jonas from any remote location with an Internet connection. “The guys in the field are thrilled with this capability; it’s really amazing,” Andrews says. “Before, collecting and interpreting data for time and material jobs was really time-consuming. On one project, it took me six hours to sort through the paperwork related to a single billing cycle. For the next phase of that project, we had eTimesheets in place, which knocked that six-hour paperwork process down to 10 minutes.”
Andrews was familiar with electronic document management – a large general contractor that Contech worked for had a system in place – so he jumped at the chance to add this functionality to his Jonas system. With DM, Jonas automatically archives documents like invoices, work orders and reports. Integration with Microsoft Office allows users to also archive e-mail messages, Word documents and Excel spreadsheets. Invoice approval workflow, a robust search and retrieval engine and unlimited scalability are just a few features within DM. “Our client spends $5M a year maintaining their custom and complex integrated system,” Andrews says, “That really puts the Jonas DM system into perspective. It’s an incredible tool; so efficient, practical – and affordable.”
Benefits for Action Contractors
The slowdown at Contech has given Andrews ample time to focus on his company’s Jonas implementation. Subsequently, he is seeing early benefits that will only expand over time. “I’m happy that we are taking the time now to put the Jonas system in place because it will give us a competitive edge when the market rebounds. So far, our clients have been pretty impressed by the accurate, intelligent field data generated on-demand by eTimesheets,” he states. “Having these technology tools in place demonstrates the professional approach we take toward managing our business.”
As expected, Andrews now has greater insight into Contech’s job costs and field activity. But the Jonas DM system has delivered additional benefits beyond those basics. “When we implemented our digital estimating system, our time spent on this task was reduced by two-thirds,” Andrews says. “With DM, filing, retrieving and managing paper electronically instead of manually has delivered a similar return. For example, we used to spend an entire day looking for one piece of paper. Now, that paper is just a mouse click away. The time savings are immense.”
Contech continues to grow their DM database, recently adding human resources documents, equipment maintenance records and project drawings, photos, change orders and specifications. And a quick Jonas query is all it takes to retrieve the exact document needed. Archiving old job documents couldn’t be easier since Jonas supports the ability to archive entire folders of information. “Jonas has given us a standardized document management protocol that is both intuitive and simple to use. It’s the total cream of the crop in terms of being able to drill down in Jonas and see the original document. We absolutely love it!”
Contech will soon be implementing the latest DM time-saving feature, batch scanning of accounts payable (AP) invoices. “My controller will be able to scan invoices as a batch and then attach them individually to the appropriate transaction when she does her postings,” Andrews explains. “This is the feature that got me excited about my client’s customized system. Jonas promised me that this AP batch scanning feature was coming, and now here it is!”
Looking Forward
Over time, Andrews plans to give his field staff remote access to the company’s entire Jonas solution. “Going forward, I would really like to see our field guys looking at where they are with costs like labor,” he states. “With direct access to Jonas, our project staff will be able to monitor their jobs in more meaningful ways.”
Andrews is also looking forward to measuring the bottom line benefits of his Jonas investment. “From a financial point of view, we’ll see additional benefits when the market gets better,” he states. “I expect that, by having Jonas in place, we’ll be able to seriously reduce the number of people we have in the office as we grow because we now have more efficient, standardized processes in place. Jonas is a smart and intuitive system for managing our business.”