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Manage project budgets in Intuit Enterprise Suite

by Intuit•3• Updated 4 days ago

Project cost tracking in Intuit Enterprise Suite gives you two ways to estimate and manage costs, depending on how each project works. Use Basic costing to enter unit costs directly on a project estimate, or Detailed costing to build a separate internal budget and track costs at a granular level. With flexible project costing, you choose the approach per project — not once for your entire company .

Basic vs. Detailed job costing — which should you use?

Use this table to compare the two modes at a glance.

	Basic job costing	Detailed job costing
Best for	Fixed-fee or flat-price projects	Cost-plus or time-and-materials projects
How costs are tracked	Enter unit costs directly on the project estimate	Build a project budget; costs flow into the estimate
Source of truth for estimated cost	Project estimate and change orders	Project budget
Source of truth for estimated income	Project estimate and change orders	Project estimate and change orders
Markups	Set on the project estimate and change orders	Set on the project estimate and change orders

Use Basic when you and your customer have agreed on a fixed price and you don't need a separate internal budget. Enter costs directly on the project estimate, set markups, and send the quote. It's the faster setup and a good fit for smaller or more straightforward jobs.

Use Detailed when you're managing a complex project where costs need to be tracked separately from what you bill the customer. Build a project budget with line items for labor, materials, and overhead. The budget feeds the project estimate, so you get real-time visibility into budget vs. actuals.

The rest of this article discusses using budgets in Detailed mode.

What you’ll need

An active Intuit Enterprise Suite subscription.
If you want to use budgets, set your project to Detailed mode.

Set your default costing mode

Your default costing mode for all new projects is automatically based on your industry and subscription, but you can change it in your Projects global settings.

Go to Projects (Take me there).
Select Settings.
Under Project costing, choose Basic or Detailed.
Select Save.

When you create or edit a project, under Project costing you can switch from Basic to Detailed without losing data you’ve entered.

Important: Once you’ve switched to Detailed, you can’t switch back to Basic for that particular project.

Create a project budget

Once a project is set to Detailed mode, you can add a budget directly from the project. Benefits include

Track costs at a granular level. Break down labor, materials, and overhead separately by product or service item.
Separate internal and external views. Your budget is internal; your project estimate is what the customer sees.
Monitor budget vs. actuals in real time. See where you're over or under as work progresses.
Choose the right approach per project. Use Basic for fixed-fee work and Detailed for cost-plus or time-and-materials — all within the same account.

To create the budget, you can either input it manually, or upload your budget data from a spreadsheet. Our integrated AI system interprets data columns and lines, reducing manual effort and potential errors. Once the import is done, review all the matches and save the budget.

Go to Projects (Take me there).
Select the project.
Select Budget in the project navigation.
Add line items for each cost. For every line, include the product or service, the quantity, and the unit cost.
Select Save.

Create a budget from financial planning

Go to Reports , then Financial planning, then Budgets (Take me there).
Select Create budget.
Choose the Project based option.
Use the dropdown menu to choose one of your projects.
Choose an available setup option, then select Next.
Now create your project budget against your products and services.
Once you’ve entered your budget details, select the down arrow next to Save and publish, then Save as draft. This allows for flexible planning without finalizing numbers.
Once the budget details are refined and formally approved, it’s time to ‘Lock’ the budget. This formally closes its value. Select Save and publish to lock this budget version.

Results

Once you save, the budget becomes the source of truth for estimated costs on the project. Unit costs from the budget flow into the project estimate automatically.

Switching a project from Basic to Detailed changes how your linked budget is structured. Review your budget after switching.

You can view the Audit history of your budget to see version states, such as Draft and Locked, as well as any revisions, by when, and whom. Any changes made to the budget after it's been published will update the version status to ‘Post-locked’. When viewing a budget, select Version history.

Frequently asked questions

How are project budgets different from P&L and B/S company budgets?

Parameter	Project budgets	Company budgets
Scope and Focus	Specific to individual projects, detailing all project-related expenses.	Covers the entire organization's financial plan, including operational, marketing, and income expenses.
Audience	Project managers and execution teams.	Top management, finance teams, and other stakeholders.
Type	Based on products and services	Based on chart of accounts.

What's the difference between a project estimate and a project budget?

A project estimate is the external-facing document — it shows what you're quoting the customer. A project budget is internal — it tracks your expected costs in detail. In Detailed mode, the budget feeds cost data into the estimate. In Basic mode, you enter costs directly on the estimate without a budget.

Can I use both Basic and Detailed costing in the same account?

Yes. With Flexible Job Costing, you can use Detailed costing for some projects and Basic costing for others — all within the same account. The mode is set per project.

Can I change the costing mode after a project has started?

You can switch a project from Basic to Detailed at any time without data loss. Switching from Detailed to Basic isn't currently supported. Your default mode is set based on your industry and subscription, and you can override it on any individual project.

Who can access flexible project costing?

Flexible project costing is available to all Intuit Enterprise Suite subscribers and to QuickBooks Online Advanced users with the Construction add-on. Basic job costing is available to all Intuit Enterprise Suite and QuickBooks Online Advanced users. Detailed job costing requires Intuit Enterprise Suite or the Construction add-on.

Why are the unit cost fields grayed out on my project estimate?

This happens when the project is in Detailed job costing mode — unit costs are driven by the project budget and can't be edited directly on the estimate. To edit costs inline, switch the project to Basic, or update the unit costs in the project budget.

AI assisted import

Project budgets uses AI to streamline the import process:

Intelligent column mapping: The AI automatically identifies and maps columns from your spreadsheet to the appropriate fields in your budget, minimizing manual work.
Matching spreadsheet items to products and services: The AI auto-matches some items to save you time.

Next steps

If you need to edit a project budget, you can do so in your project. Changes to the budget update the project estimate the next time you open it. Existing reports aren't affected.

Go to Projects (Take me there), then select the project.
Select Budget, then Edit.
Update line items as needed.
Select Save.

Cost tracker widget

Visit the Projects (Take me there) page, select a project and go to the Overview tab to see the Cost tracker widget. This widget displays a line graph which shows your budget, actual cost, and forecast. This helps you monitor your project finances and indicates if you’re running over budget. It can forecast overages for up to 12 weeks.