Case Study

Loft Extension

Battersea, London

Project type

Dormer loft conversion

Contract value

£96,000

Programme

14 weeks

Valuations

5, monthly

Tom H. is a development manager at a small South London residential developer. When this Battersea loft started, he had three projects running at once and was tracking all of them in separate spreadsheets: one for the works, one for payments, one for retention. Nothing agreed with anything else by month two.

The contractor, Marek W., runs a nine-man loft conversion crew. His weeks were spent on the tools and his Sunday evenings were spent writing up applications for payment in Excel, photographing them, and hoping the numbers matched whatever version of the spreadsheet Tom had open.

Set up from the quote, not from scratch

Tom created the project by uploading Marek's quote PDF. BuildFlow's AI read the document and extracted the full bill of quantities: sections, line items, quantities, units and rates, all editable before confirming. What used to be an afternoon of retyping a contractor's quote into a spreadsheet took about three minutes, and the address was geocoded straight onto his portfolio map.

That extracted BoQ became the single contract document both sides worked from. Every application, certificate and payment for the next 14 weeks ran against the same line items, so there was never a 'which version are you looking at?' conversation.

Applications from the scaffold

Marek submitted his monthly application for payment from the BuildFlow mobile app, usually from site on a Friday afternoon. He marked up percentage complete against each BoQ line, attached progress photos to the lines they evidenced, and hit submit. The application landed in Tom's dashboard instantly with a full audit trail.

Tom certified line by line from his desk, adjusting the odd claim with a recorded reason rather than a phone argument. Marek got a push notification the moment each valuation was certified, and the payment certificate PDF followed automatically.

“I used to lose every Sunday night to paperwork. Now the application goes in from the scaffold before I've left site, with the photos attached to the exact lines they prove. I can see when Tom's certified it and when the money's coming. First project I've done where I never once chased a payment.”

Marek W.

Director, loft conversion specialist

Nine-man crew, four lofts a year

Compliant by default

BuildFlow tracked the Construction Act payment notice and pay-less notice deadlines on every valuation, so Tom always knew the last safe date to act. Five applications went through the full cycle: submitted, reviewed, certified, paid. None were late, and nothing was disputed.

3 min

To set the project up from the quote PDF

5 / 5

Applications certified and paid on time

Missed payment notice deadlines

“Reading the BoQ straight out of Marek's quote sold me on its own; that used to be an afternoon of retyping. But the real win is running three sites without three spreadsheets. Every valuation, every deadline, every retention figure is in one place, and I certify from my phone between site visits.”

Tom H.

Development Manager

Residential developer, three concurrent projects