A tender asks for a priced bill of quantities and you need one prepared. Here's what a BoQ actually is, what whoever prepares it needs from you, how long it takes, and what it costs — in plain English, from a builder's point of view.
A bill of quantities (BoQ) is an itemised list of everything a job needs — measured quantities for each element of work, laid out line by line so it can be priced consistently. Groundworks, brickwork, roofing, finishes: each gets its own measured items with quantities and units, then a rate against every line. Done well, it means every builder pricing the same tender is quoting on the same numbers, and it gives you a clear basis for valuing variations later. It's the take-off and the pricing structure written down in one document.
Plans, sections and elevations — the more complete the set, the tighter the bill. A full drawing set gives measurable quantities; planning-only drawings leave gaps that have to be assumed and flagged, which is why a partial set produces a looser BoQ.
Anything that fixes the standard of the work — a written spec, finishes schedule, structural engineer's details, window schedule. Without it, quantities can be measured but rates have to assume a spec, so the more you provide, the fewer assumptions the bill rests on.
The calls only you can make — foundation depth, ground conditions, access, what's included versus excluded. A good preparer flags these rather than guessing; you confirm or override them so the bill reflects the job you're actually pricing.
Prepared by hand, a BoQ for a domestic job is usually a matter of days once the drawings land, and longer for anything commercial — turnaround depends on the preparer's workload as much as the job. Cost tracks the same drivers as any tender pricing: size, complexity, how complete your information is, and how formal a bill you need — typically hundreds to low thousands for a domestic BoQ, more for commercial or contractual work. QuoteWise takes a different route: send the drawings and it produces a priced, line-by-line bill straight from them, with a 12-minute median turnaround and every quantity, rate and assumption visible. On complete drawing sets it scores around 80% accuracy against expert-checked baselines across 2,000+ benchmark runs on real UK projects — a working draft to price from and correct, not a fixed price — roughly 10× cheaper than commissioning a quantity surveyor for the same early-stage pricing. Your first 3 quotes are free.
We don't pretend to replace a quantity surveyor. A formal, contractual bill of quantities on a commercial or large refurbishment job — one that carries legal weight, forms part of a contract, or underpins cost management across a long build — is chartered-QS territory, and you should hire one. Use QuoteWise to get a fast, defensible first pass and to prep the brief; it replaces the manual take-off on a domestic tender, where a full surveyor is overkill, not the professional bill where the risk genuinely warrants one.
Send us the drawings and we'll prepare a priced, line-by-line bill of quantities from them — every line editable, under your own name.
A take-off is the measurement stage: reading the drawings and extracting every quantity the job needs — square metres of brickwork, linear metres of skirting, numbers of lintels — before any price is applied. It is the part that takes the longest and the part that decides whether the quote is right, because a good rate applied to a wrong quantity produces a confidently wrong number.
An itemised list, grouped into sections, with a measured quantity, a unit and a rate against every line, and section subtotals that add up to the tender sum. We publish two real ones measured from architect's drawings — a £141,727 extension and a £70,317 loft conversion — free to download, so you can see the structure rather than take a description of it.
The drawing set — plans, sections and elevations — plus anything that fixes the standard of the work: a specification, finishes schedule, structural engineer's details, window schedule. A complete set produces measurable quantities. A planning-only set leaves gaps that have to be assumed, which is why a partial set always produces a looser bill.
QuoteWise scores around 80% accuracy against expert-checked baselines on complete drawing sets, measured across 2,000+ benchmark runs on real UK projects. Planning-only drawings score lower. It is a working draft rather than a fixed price — every assumption is flagged so you can correct it before it goes anywhere near a client.
Upload the pack. Get a bill of quantities you can stand behind.