Managing Costs

Costs are the line items that make up the financial detail of an event or quote. Each cost represents a service, product, or expense — with a unit cost (what you pay) and a unit price (what you charge the client). Together with the pricing mode and management fee, costs determine the event's total price and profit.

Getting There

• Event costs — Open an event and click the Costs tab (available after the event is contracted).
• Quote costs — Open a quote within an event and click its Costs tab.

Note: The Costs tab on an event only appears once the event reaches a contracted status. Before that, costs are managed via quotes.

Cost Line Items

Each cost line item has these fields:

Essential Fields

Additional Fields

Calculated Values

For each cost, EventWorks automatically calculates:

• Total Cost = Unit Cost × Cost Quantity
• Total Price = Unit Price × Quantity × (Billable?) − Discount
• Markup = Total Price − Total Cost
• Margin = Markup ÷ Total Price (as a percentage)
• Profit = Total Price − Total Cost + Commission

Percentage Shortcuts

You can enter percentages in the unit price or unit cost fields:

• Setting Unit Price to 20% calculates it as Unit Cost × 1.20 (a 20% markup)
• Setting Unit Cost to 20% calculates it as Unit Price × 0.80 (a 20% margin)

Organising Costs

Cost Groups

Group related costs together under named sections:

• Click Add Group.
• Enter a name (e.g., "Catering", "AV Equipment") and optional description.
• When adding costs, assign them to a group.

Groups appear as collapsible sections on the costs page and as sections on exported documents. You can reorder groups by dragging them.

Cost Tabs

For complex events, tabs provide a higher level of organisation above groups:

• Click Add Tab to create a new tab.
• Name it (e.g., "Day 1", "Day 2", or "Conference", "Dinner").
• Assign groups and costs to tabs.

Each tab shows its own totals and can:

• Hide specific columns (e.g., hide unit cost from client-facing views)


• Hide cost details entirely on documents (showing only the tab total)


• Have its own description and footer text

Pricing Modes

The pricing mode determines how the management fee is calculated:

Percentage Mode

A percentage fee applied to the total of all cost prices. For example, a 15% management fee on £10,000 of costs adds a £1,500 fee.

Flat Fee Mode

A fixed currency amount added as the management fee, regardless of total costs. For example, a flat £2,000 management fee.

Fixed Price Mode

The total price charged to the client is fixed at a specific amount. Costs are still tracked internally, but the client price doesn't change regardless of what costs are added. Useful for fixed-price contracts.

Contingency

Contingency adds a buffer to your pricing:

• Output contingency — A percentage added to the total price (e.g., 5% contingency), with an optional minimum amount
• Input contingency — A percentage added to the total cost

Service Charge

A percentage service charge applied on top of the total price (after management fee and contingency).

Bulk Actions

You can perform actions on multiple costs at once:

• Change Supplier — Update the supplier on selected costs
• Change Status — Update the status of selected costs
• Reconcile — Mark selected costs as reconciled
• Delete — Remove selected costs
• Bulk Update — Update multiple fields at once

Filtering Costs

The cost page supports filtering by:

• Cost type
• Primary status / Secondary status
• Transaction type
• Reconciliation status
• Billable / Non-billable
• Assigned user
• Free-text search (description, notes, supplier name)
• Tab

Exporting Costs

Click Export to download the cost data as an Excel or CSV file. You can also download a PDF summary of all costs.

Importing Costs

Costs can be imported from spreadsheet files if your organisation has this feature enabled.

Tips & Best Practices

Tip: Use the "Billable" toggle to track internal costs that shouldn't appear on the client's quote or invoice. This keeps your internal cost tracking separate from client-facing pricing.

Tip: The per-head pricing option is powerful for catering and similar costs. Set the unit price per person, enable per-head, and the total adjusts automatically when the guest count changes.

Tip: Use cost groups to mirror the sections of your quote. When the quote is accepted, the groups carry over to the event's costs, keeping everything organised.

Frequently Asked Questions

They work identically. Costs on a quote represent your proposal. When the quote is accepted, those costs are copied to the event where they become the actual project costs.

Yes, once the event is contracted. The Costs tab on the event lets you add costs directly.

Edit the quote or event settings (depending on where the costs live) and change the pricing mode. The management fee recalculates automatically.

Existing invoices are not automatically updated. You'd need to create a new invoice or credit note to reflect the changes.

Related Articles

• Quote Cost Line Items
• Cost Statuses and Approvals
• Using Packages
• Managing Resources