How to handle change orders

Change orders are not the problem. Undocumented change orders are. The work you do without writing it down is the work you argue about at the end.

Where change orders actually come from

Three sources: the customer changes their mind, something hidden turns up once you open the wall, or the original scope was vague enough that you and the customer pictured different jobs. The third is the one you control, and it is fixed at estimate time with clear inclusions and exclusions rather than at change-order time.

Price it before you do it

The single rule that prevents most disputes: nothing extra gets done before the customer has agreed to what it costs. Once the work is finished, the leverage is gone and the conversation becomes a negotiation about money already spent. A two-line note approved by text is enough — it just has to exist and predate the work.

What a change order has to contain

What is changing, what it costs, and what it does to the schedule. That third one is the most commonly omitted and the most damaging: a customer who agrees to an extra $900 without being told it adds four days will still feel misled when it does.

Get it in writing, even informally

A signed form is ideal, but a text message saying "confirming the extra outlet and the wall patch, $340, adds about half a day — ok to proceed?" and a reply saying yes is real documentation. The medium matters far less than the fact that both people saw the number before the work happened.

Don't absorb small ones to stay likeable

Small unbilled extras are how a profitable job becomes a break-even one. Five thirty-minute favours is a lost half day. If you genuinely want to absorb something, say so and show it as a no-charge line — you get the goodwill *and* the customer learns the work had value.

Let the original estimate do the work

Most change-order friction traces back to a vague scope. Explicit exclusions — what you are not doing, what you assumed, what happens if the substrate is bad — turn a potential argument into a clause you already agreed on.

Generate this estimate now

Describe the job in plain words. No email needed to see your first estimate — about fifteen seconds for a small job, a little longer for a big one.

What you get — see the format first

A complete estimate you can send to the customer, built from the rate you enter:

Description	Qty	Unit	Unit price	Total
Labor — itemized by task	hrs	hour	your rate	—
Materials — with your markup applied	qty	ea / sq ft	cost + markup	—
Permits, disposal, access	—	—	—	—

Plus a plain-English scope summary, assumptions (what had to be guessed), exclusions (what you are not doing — the section that prevents most change-order arguments), and a validity period. Printable, or send the link.

Every figure comes from the rate and markup you supply. We never fill in a market price for you.

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