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EstimatorXpress Getting Started

with your trial Award-winning EstimatorXpress v.8 will help you produce accurate, professional estimates quickly and easily - every time! It’s the only estimating software to link directly to live merchant prices (including your trade discounts) and with the Total Toolkit edition and Ultimate pack you can print off friendly, detailed reports and professional quotes that will impress your customers and are proven to help improve your win rate. This Getting Started guide will take you about 30 minutes to run through and will show you how you can quickly create and estimate, enter your dimensions and look at the cost reports.

How to load EstimatorXpress® EstimatorXpress® System Requirements Either download your free Trial from www.hbxl.co.uk or if you have a Trial CD, simply insert your CD into your PC or Laptop drive and it should auto-run so that you can install the trial software. If the CD doesn’t autorun and you’re running Windows 2000/XP, select Run from the Start Menu and type D:\Trial.exe where D is the CD drive. If you’re running Windows Vista, the Run option may not be available, so type D:\Trial.exe into the Search box at the bottom of the Start Menu.

1.5GHz processor, 350MB Hard Drive Space, 512MB Ram, CD Rom drive, Microsoft® Excel 2000/XP/2003/2007/2010, Microsoft® Word 2000/XP/2003/2007/2010*, Windows® XP/Vista/7†, Internet Connection, SVGA Monitor, Pointing Device & Printer. * Total Toolkit Only.† Windows® Vista and Windows® 7 only supports Microsoft® Word and Excel 2003, 2007 & 2010. Running earlier versions of Word and Excel with these operating systems is not recommended.

LAUNCHING ESTIMATORXPRESS

1. To launch EstimatorXpress®, double click on the EstimatorXpress icon on your desktop, or select EstimatorXpress from the Start, All Programs Menu. Once the program starts to open, you may need to press Enable Macros on the Microsoft® Excel virus protection dialog box which pops up.

2. Select the version of the demonstration that you wish to

launch and click ‘Launch Selected Demonstration Version’.

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3. Having launched EstimatorXpress®, the Main Menu will appear. To get started, click My Estimates .

CREATING A NEW ESTIMATE 4. EstimatorXpress® transfers you to the My

Jobs screen. This screen lists all the jobs you have costed together with their estimated values. You can open your job at any time to make changes to the dimensions and specification and see their impact on your budget. Click on the New Estimate button.

5. Give your job a name and description such as Mr Oliver and Extension and click Next.

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Step 2 – Master Price Book (this is where your prices are saved). Click Next.

Step 3 – Extension Specification (this is a list of resources that you’ll need for the job). Click Next.

Step 4 – Valley Roof Extension (select from the ‘Group of Workbooks:’ dropdown which selects you a list of estimating calculators). Click Next.

Step 5 – Enter a start date for you job and select Small Extension build program Click Next.

Steps 6-8 – Complete with details as you wish.

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COSTING BRICK AND BLOCK CAVITY WALLS 6. EstimatorXpress® transfers you to the Job

Summary screen. The Job Summary is the hub of your estimate, showing you a checklist of the estimating calculators (or Workbooks as we call them) that you’ll need to work through. The Workbooks included in the selected job, are all the things you typically may need to quote for in a Valley Roof Extension. You can add or delete Workbooks at any time to tailor it to your actual project. There are currently no costings for any tasks as you have not yet entered dimensions. To start estimating, click on the Workbook named Brick & Block Cavity Wall and press Open Workbook button.

7. EstimatorXpress® asks you to give the walls a name, such as External Walls or Annexe Walls, for your reference. Enter a name and location, and click OK.

SELECTING A WALL TYPE 8. To speed up the estimating process,

select a template for the type of wall you are building such as ‘Single storey cavity wall ’ from the list, then click Select .

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ENTERING DIMENSIONS 9. The Dimensions Wizard pops up so you can

enter the dimensions of the walls onto onscreen drawings. Type in the wall height and length, and the door and window area. Click Next to continue. Enter details for the foundations, footings, and plastering & decoration, clicking Next to go through each page. Once complete, click Finish . Once you have created one wall, you will see the dimensions on screen. From the top menu now click on Add Column, and we can create a second wall. Note the Gable dimensions button on page 1 of 4 to add gables if required. Repeat this process for each wall that you want to estimate.

LOOKING AT WHAT YOU GET FOR YOUR MONEY 10. EstimatorXpress® not only costs but

schedules brick and block cavity walls including all materials, labour and plant. The system comes with a huge Price Book of resources – kept up to date through Price Tracker. You’ll notice that the price of the walls, including an allowance for wastage, has been calculated and is shown at the top left of the screen – all based on real products and real prices from the few simple dimensions you entered. To view detailed costings and quantities, press the View Resources Output button.

TIP: You can of course apply your own discounts and add in your own products to the Price Book so it reflects your business exactly, or you can sign up to one of our merchant partner Merchant Links such as

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Jewson, Keyline, Trade Point, BuildersExpress or Travis Perkins to download your prices into the software at the click of a button. 11. EstimatorXpress® automatically

calculates the costs and quantities of materials, labour, plant, subcontract & sundry items for your project. You’ll see that every resource is shown with a label for its use, units of supply and price including discount, covering everything from digging the foundations and brickwork to insulation, plastering and the final lick of paint. Scroll down the screen and you’ll see the bricklayer and other trades together with plant for excavation and spoil removal. You can now estimate the rest of the Job in this way.

PRODUCING A BUILD PROGRAMME 12. With EstimatorXpress®, you can create

and print a well-presented build program for the bank and contractors (and the client too if you’re a builder). When you created the Job you selected a template Bar Chart to help you plan the job. To view the Bar Chart, click on the Chart Tab. A template chart, giving suggested start dates and durations for each phase of the job opens up. Tailoring the Chart to your project is quick and straightforward.

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13. Imagine the planning stage takes longer than anticipated. Click Edit Bar Chart button. (unless the tool is already loaded)

14. Select Planning Application from the

Build Phase drop down menu and increase the duration by 2 weeks. Press Cascade button to see the impact on later phases. Now press Refresh so the Chart fits on screen. You can now print the build programme if you wish. TIP: Your build program is linked to time based reports such as Material Order Schedules and Cashflow reports so its important you edit the chart dates to reflect your anticipated program of works.

PRINTING OFF COSTS & SCHEDULES 15. EstimatorXpress® automatically creates

printouts for your project including detailed costings, schedules, cash flows and customer quotes – depending on the edition – at the touch of a button. To open the reports, double click on the Reports tab. All the reports available in your chosen edition now appear on screen. You can produce a multitude of reports by filtering and sorting the estimate data – and everything is exportable to Microsoft® Excel and Word. Click on the report labeled Costs and press Open Report button.

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16. Your printout is automatically filled with the estimated costs without you typing a thing. You can adapt the layout of the report if you wish (see Help for further info) or simply print the report in its standard format. Press the Close button to return to the list of reports and repeat this process to open other reports, such as the Materials Task List.

PRINTING OFF A CUSTOMER QUOTE 17. Our EstimatorXpress® Trade range and

EstimatorXpress® Total Toolkit edition will automatically produce a word-processed quote, including your company logo. Simply click the Quote Wizard by Build Phase button from the Word Documents dropdown on the Reports Tab, select the level of detail you wish to include and click Print . The Total Toolkit edition also produces 3D charts showing profit & cash flow analysis.

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Order Hotline 0845 1234 065

Need Help or Support?

Call 0845 1234 065

Email: support@hbxl.co.uk Online Chat: http://www.hbxl.co.uk/chat If you start an estimate on your free trial copy then when you purchase we can send you a product licence key to unlock your software and keep your existing estimates.

Have you tried PlansXpress? Download it today and follow the PlansXpress Getting Started guide at http://www.hbxl.co.uk/Files/pdfs/PlansXpress%20Trial%20Getting%20Started%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf

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