The Purchase Management module in a Construction Management Software holds much significance as it manages a vital area in construction projects. Advanced Construction management software with numerous modules plays an important role in managing projects. Construction management software does three basic functions namely planning, executing, and managing a project within a given cost and time frame maintaining high quality standards. Construction software like Blue Dolphin contains many modules that deal with the Construction Procurement Software above mentioned three basic departments. Purchase management is one such module that deals with purchasing of materials and managing services in the construction business.
Importance of Purchase management in construction management software:
The Purchase management tool collects data related to purchases of materials and other essentials and keeps it on a common platform. This module covers all areas related to procurement of materials involved in a construction project.
Managing purchase records is a laborious and intensive task. If proper records are not kept, it can cause loss of money and reputation for the construction company. With purchase management feature in construction management software, the task of creating, updating, managing, and reporting of the purchase data becomes much simpler and quicker. With the help of this feature, the procurement procedure within the company becomes more streamlined. It has also been observed that it acts as construction estimator to deal with cost analysis.
Purchase management in the construction management software can send Request for Quotes (RFQs) to suppliers, vendors and helps in comparing the rates. It also helps issue the purchase orders, keep records of material received or shipped to various construction sites, and supplier’s rating based on the performance and various others. This saves a lot of time for the company as no manual work is involved. A web based software can take care of these tasks more effectively.
However, it is very important that the employees of the company are well versed with the usage of construction management software. Adequate training would make a lot of difference in the performance of the staff and help eliminate human errors. Some of the important features to look for while choosing a purchase management module in construction management software are:
· Request for Quotes
· Purchase orders
· Rate comparison
· Sale and purchase of goods and services
Benefits of using purchase management feature of construction software:
Report Preparation- The materials received and shipped to a number of sites can be accessed and traced using this module. The software can create a report based on the entries which can be viewed from anywhere and at anytime.
Estimation of materials- Using the purchase management module it is possible to plan material procurement well in advance. Project managers can plan their work flow if they are aware of the amount of materials already available. This will save a lot of time and help plan the project in a better manner.