1. Company profile
"BuildRight Interiors & MEP Contractors" (fictional): commercial interiors, electrical/HVAC installation, annual maintenance contracts (AMC). 10–15 sites running at once; 120 site workers (mostly not Odoo users).
2. Pain points
Material sent to site isn't tracked; site profitability is known only at the end; progress billing (RA bills) in Excel; technicians' visits not recorded.
3. Apps
CRM, Sales (quotation sections/templates), Project, Purchase, Inventory, Accounting (analytic), Planning (incl. field service in v20), Timesheets, Documents, Sign, Fleet, Maintenance (customer equipment), Subscriptions (AMC). Industry package: General Contractor (v20 rename of Construction Builder).
4. Design decisions
| Topic | Decision |
|---|---|
| Project = site | One project + one analytic account per site (analytic plan "Sites") |
| Estimation & quote | Quotation sections (Civil, Electrical, HVAC) and section templates (v20); description-only lines for scope text; margin editing per line (v20) |
| Billing | Milestones for progress (RA) bills; retention via payment terms or a separate line; down payments for mobilisation advance |
| Material to site | One site location per project (WH/Sites/Project-X) or a dedicated warehouse; deliveries from the main store → site location; returns back; consumption by inventory adjustment or a "Consume" transfer |
| Direct purchases to site | PO with delivery address = site and analytic distribution = project (drop-ship route) |
| Subcontractors | Vendor bills with analytic = project; purchase agreements for rate contracts |
| Labour | Supervisors log timesheets for crews; employee cost for labour cost |
| Field service / AMC | v18–19: Field Service app (tasks with worksheets, signatures, map). v20: folded into Planning (live map, travel fees, routing, worksheets) |
| Equipment at customer site | Maintenance equipment + AMC as a Subscription (v20: maintenance contracts via Subscriptions) |
5. Configuration steps
- Accounting: analytic plan Sites (mandatory on purchases & expenses via applicability rules).
- Project template "Site project" with stages and milestone list (Mobilisation 10 %, Civil 30 %, MEP 40 %, Handover 20 %).
- Sales: products "Interior work – milestone" (service, based on milestones, create project from template).
- Inventory: location per site or warehouse per big site; a route "Send to site".
- Purchase: approval thresholds; vendor price agreements.
- Planning/Field service: shift templates, worksheets (checklists + photos), customer signature, map view.
- Dashboards: per-site P&L (analytic report), committed costs (POs not yet billed), budget vs actual (analytic budgets).
6. KPIs
Site margin vs estimate, cost-to-complete, billing vs progress %, retention receivable, technician first-time-fix rate, AMC renewal rate.
7. Pitfalls
- Make the analytic distribution mandatory, or costs will miss the site.
- Material returned from site must be received back. Otherwise site cost is overstated.
- Odoo 20 licensing: site workers kept as employees without users now cost Light User fees. Decide who must be an employee record.
8. Version notes
| v18 | v19 | v20 |
|---|---|---|
| Field Service app, milestones, analytic budgets | Gantt improvements, task scheduling from templates, field-service geo tracking | Field Service → Planning, live technician map, travel-fee invoicing, routing optimisation, WBS view (Property Developer), section templates, description-only lines |