What it produces
A clean PCO log, priced owner change orders, matching subcontract change orders, and an ERP where contract, budget and commitments agree.
Workflows
Change Orders
a process that modifies an original contract's scope, cost, or schedule after work has already begun
The job in one minute
Who owns it
The project manager, with the subcontract administrator, legal, AP, the superintendent and the project accountant.
How often
Daily, every time something changes in the field.
Why it hurts
A superintendent accepts a directive on site and it never reaches the log. The same event gets logged twice. A PCO goes out priced from a phone call. Markup lands on the wrong base. The owner change order is signed but the sub's is not, so the sub bills against a commitment the ERP has never heard of. Meanwhile the notice clock, often 21 days from the event, keeps running.
Systems it touches
The ERP, Procore or the owner's Primavera Unifier, Outlook, Excel rate sheets, SharePoint, DocuSign or Adobe Sign, and subcontractor portals.
Connectors are good at moving a record that is already right. The agent checks whether it is right, and works through the screen where no connector exists, including the owner's system when you are only an invited user.
- ERP
- Procore or the owner's Primavera Unifier
- Outlook
- Excel rate sheets
- SharePoint
- DocuSign or Adobe Sign
- Subcontractor portals
12 steps · 7 actions · 4 decisions · 1 human reviews
The workflow, step by step
Action Decision Human review Select a step in the flowchart to jump to it.
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Logged
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Priced
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With owner
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Executed
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Posted
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Action · Agent
Open a PCO from its trigger (RFI answer, architect instruction, field directive, daily report delay, owner request) and link the source.
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Decision · Agent
One event, one PCO. A matching source goes to the PM as a possible duplicate.
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Decision · Agent
The contract table sets the notice deadline, and the PCO carries it from day one.
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Action · Agent
Request quotes from affected subs and read each into lines: labor, material, equipment, markup, exclusions.
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Decision · Agent
Arithmetic ties, labor rates match the rate sheet, markups sit within contract caps.
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Action · Agent
Assemble the owner package with quotes, self-performed estimate, markup and time request.
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Human review · PM
The PM approves price and time; above a threshold, an executive approves too.
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Action · Agent
Submit through the owner's channel and follow up daily until there is an answer.
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Action · ERP
On approval, post the owner change order in the ERP: contract value, billing lines, budget revision.
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Action · Agent
Issue subcontract change orders and route them for signature.
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Decision · ERP
ERP contract equals the approved amount, every sub change order is in commitments, and the markup left over equals the approved markup.
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Action · Agent
Close the PCO and flag the lines for the next pay application.
✓ Done
Rules vs judgment
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Exact rules
- Notice deadlines, markup caps and rate sheets, package math, the ERP tie-out, the duplicate test.
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The model reads
- Sub quotes in any format, owner emails that approve or reject, scope language, signed change order PDFs. A rule still decides.
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A person decides
- Whether an event is a change at all, the price and time offered, whether to proceed without agreement, and every signature.
When it stops
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Sub quote never arrives
Chased on schedule; the PM decides whether to price without it.
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Owner approves a different amount
The approved amount posts; the PM sees the gap before any sub change order goes out.
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Signed PDF differs from the approval
Held for the PM, nothing posts.
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Markup above the cap
Recomputed at the cap for the PM, with the sub's number kept on record.
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Notice deadline close with no notice sent
It jumps to the top of the PM's and legal's lists.
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Budget revision missing after posting
Held for project controls so percent complete does not drift.
What you end up with
Every change carries its whole story in one record: the trigger, the notice date against its deadline, every quote as received and as read, each approval, the executed sub change orders, and the ERP screens after posting. A margin dispute a year later takes minutes, not a week of digging. Product →
Questions
Can the agent price a change order?
It assembles the price from quotes and your estimate and checks every number. The PM decides what the company offers.
What does it do with a construction change directive?
It logs it as authority to proceed, keeps the PCO open and tracks cost against it until a change order settles sum and time.
Can it work in an owner's Procore or Unifier project?
Yes. It works through the screen in your user's session, with exactly the permissions the owner granted. No API key needed.
Should sub change orders wait for the owner?
That is set once per job as a rule. The default waits; jobs that allow early issue flag each early one for the PM.
No prompts. No babysitting. No Integrations.