---
title: "How To Use \"Unit Cost History\""
description: "How To Use \"Unit Cost History\""
---
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# How To Use "Unit Cost History"
"Unit Cost History" puts every price your company has recorded for a cost code in one place, without opening an estimate. It reads your own estimates and historical records, one project type at a time, and lays each cost code's most recent unit costs side by side with their trend, their range and the record each one came from. Use it to check what you have paid for a scope before you carry a number, or to see where your history is thin.
To use "Unit Cost History" follow these steps.
Press the "Unit Cost History" icon in the navigation bar on the left, just below "Estimate". Hover over the icon to see its name.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/072e722aaf18bcd935857328837e7a02098efddd419512ff56e67a9bc8832232/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30312d6e61762d6639366535343633653863662e706e67)
The page opens on the "History" tab, showing your company's default project type. Each bucket is a row of its own, with its cost codes listed underneath. Press the arrow beside a bucket to collapse or expand it, or use the arrow at the top of the "Cost Code" column to do all of them at once.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/6cd6ca4390997d3e37760e66be602cf657e626d94fd8eb11c9ecf3899eb088b5/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30322d706167652d3766366430326663303033332e706e67)
History is kept separately for each project type, so a hospital's concrete is never averaged with a hotel's. To switch, press the project type button at the far left of the filter bar and pick another. Only one project type can be shown at a time.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/41bb921389f4a29079c12772cd91d09af99cf6c9138d14a93321eb00f730485b/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30332d70726f6a6563742d747970652d3662633566306535393137302e706e67)
The rest of the filter bar is the same set of filters as the "Project Database" page, and they mean the same thing here. Use them to narrow the history to the records you care about, such as one location or one construction type. The summary and the table are both recalculated from only the records that match. Press "Clear Filters" to go back to all of them.
The summary above the table describes the records behind it. "Records" is how many estimates and historical records have at least one priced cost code. "Coverage" is how many of your cost codes have at least one price. "Bought Out" is the share of prices that came from an awarded bid rather than an estimate. "History" is the span from the oldest record to the newest. Hover over the "i" icon beside each one for a fuller description.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/42b7f973b92e60c903406d8175cd1c1461ae7193b1953a743ea1a77cdac2b1b6/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30342d73756d6d6172792d6635363231303261313464622e706e67)
Read a cost code across its row. "Coverage" is the share of your records that have a price for it; hover over the bar to see the count. "Trend" charts its recent unit costs, oldest on the left, with the latest as the larger dot on the right. "Min", "Median", "Average" and "Max" summarise every price it has. The columns after that are its most recent prices, newest first, starting with "Latest" and running back through "2nd", "3rd" and on to "8th". Scroll right to see the older ones. A "—" means the cost code has not been priced that many times.
Use the "Search for a cost code..." box above the table to find a cost code by name. Use the "Columns" button beside it to hide the columns you do not need.
Hover over any price in the table to see where it came from. The card names the project, the record and its date and market. If the price came from a bid, the card also shows the bid package it was bought out in. Below that is the record's design data, and then the arithmetic: the cost code's "Total Cost", divided by the "Quantity" in the cost code's UOM, gives the "Unit Cost". These figures are as recorded, with no escalation applied. Press the record name to open it.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/7f4a71603581886c348e22abb48e71c6d5c0a74b257e63bd1dc96da7c13746ef/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30352d717569636b2d766965772d3238333765373531306634612e706e67)
Each cost code is priced per one design field, shown in its "UOM" column. To price it per a different one, press the button in the "UOM" column and pick a design field from the list. You can type in the "Search design fields..." box to find one. The whole row is repriced straight away. The choice is saved for your whole company, so everyone sees the cost code in the same UOM. Only editors and admins can change it.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/4e7086503ba7b8d45daa3da0fb21bde34f4145df46b58dce746189497af5b573/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30362d756f6d2d6162626533643866323439632e706e67)
Unit Cost History is rebuilt every night, so a record you add today shows up tomorrow. The top right corner shows when it was last built; hover over it to see the exact time and whether it was the nightly run. To bring in new records straight away, press "Rebuild History". It rebuilds every project type, and a progress bar takes the button's place until it finishes. You can leave the page while it runs. Only editors and admins can rebuild.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/802c863d5feb1434471d7cfcfa1d21cb2a741b93f45d61fa2dbd2ce0fa0aa553/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30372d72656275696c642d3735383539646633383832342e706e67)
Press the "Analytics" tab to see which cost codes need a closer look. It uses the same project type, filters and UOM choices as the "History" tab. "Widest Spreads" lists the cost codes your records disagree on most. "Latest Price Outliers" lists the ones whose newest price is far from the prices before it. "Estimates vs Bought Out" compares what you estimated with what the work was bought out for. "Rising" and "Falling" show the biggest moves from a cost code's previous price to its latest, for cost codes priced in the last year. "Volatility by Bucket" shows how much prices swing within each bucket. Hover over the "i" icon beside each title to see how it is measured.
[](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/4f7eef8b25e2525bca0268268eb338600b484f1e464f4c3eea4d65a52d0f4322/68747470733a2f2f34353937313731372e6673312e68756273706f7475736572636f6e74656e742d6e61312e6e65742f68756266732f34353937313731372f68656c702d63656e7472652f686f772d746f2d7573652d756e69742d636f73742d686973746f72792d2d7563682d30382d616e616c79746963732d3864643835366239323565302e706e67)
Please note that Unit Cost History only lists cost codes that at least one record has priced. A cost code that is missing from the table has no price in any of your records for that project type. If a price looks wrong, open the record from the hover card and correct it there. The fix shows up after the next rebuild.
---
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