Service
Quantity Take-Off
Quantity take-off turns the work shown in the project into numbers. The employer's cost estimate, the bid, the interim payment and the final account all derive from the same measurement. When it is built wrongly, it is not only the quantity that breaks but all four documents: a faulty take-off closes cheap at the tender stage and turns expensive at the final account.
The service on this page is a one-off deliverable: we take off the quantities, hand over the file, and you run the rest. If you want us to manage the whole tender calendar, see Tender and bid preparation; the quantities there are the same quantities.
Which quantities do we take off?
- Architectural quantities: walls, finishes, paint, joinery, roof and similar works.
- Structural quantities: concrete, reinforcement and formwork of the load-bearing system.
- Electrical and mechanical quantities: services installation works.
- Room schedules: for building and services.
- Custom items: a custom item and analysis for works with no public item.
All four disciplines run in the same working order, so overlaps and gaps in scope between architectural and structural, or between mechanical and electrical, show up early.
How quantities are taken off: five steps
- Project and room schedule are read. Floor plans, sections, details and the room schedule are opened together; take-off does not begin while one is missing.
- Work is matched to items. Each work item is tied to a unit-price description. The description states the unit of measure and what is included.
- Measurement is taken. By the description's rule: net or gross, whether openings are deducted, whether overlaps are included.
- Quantities are split by room. A take-off kept by block, floor, axis or room can be reused in the interim-payment period; one kept as a single total cannot.
- The summary is produced. Totals per item, with source-sheet references.
Why does the measurement rule matter?
The same wall can be measured net in one description and without deducting openings in another. A take-off done without reading the description falls, even if arithmetically correct, because it does not follow the contract's measurement rule. Which rule is a take-off done under? The measurement rule of the unit-price description the work is bound to. Most differences between employer and contractor at the interim-payment stage come from here: usually the measurement rule or the room split differs, and the argument is about method, not quantity. The difference is closed by comparing against a record. We cover this separately in quantity discrepancy defence (Turkish).
Five signs of a defensible take-off
- Every line has a source: it can be traced from the drawing to the room.
- Item and unit of measure agree.
- Room split is preserved; it can be divided into interim-payment periods.
- Opening and exception decisions are noted with a quotation from the description.
- The summary and the detail agree line for line.
A take-off that meets these five enters the bid, the interim payment and the dispute with the same file.
What does the same take-off do at each stage?
- Tender preparation: the take-off is the base of the employer's cost estimate schedule.
- Bid: the percentage-weight table and the unit-price bid schedule are built from the same take-off (Tender and bid preparation).
- Interim payments: period quantities, attachments, the green book and the list of completed works derive from the room-level take-off (Interim payments).
- Final account: final quantities, comparative bill and the increase/decrease file (Final accounts).
- Abnormally low tender defence: the explanation stands when take-off, unit-price analysis, transport calculation and labour cost agree with each other (Abnormally low tender explanation).
The most common take-off errors
- Measuring without reading the description. The measurement rule is written in the description; whether openings are deducted and whether overlaps are included is not decided by assumption.
- Keeping a single total. A take-off without a room split cannot be reused in an interim-payment period.
- Item and unit of measure do not match. An item measured in m² is linked to an m³ item; the quantity is right and the price is wrong.
- Leaving opening and exception decisions undocumented. If the decision is not noted with a quotation from the description, it cannot be defended when the other side objects.
- Not tying the summary to the detail. Small differences in cents and quantities weaken the credibility of the file.
Delivery format
We deliver an item-based Excel summary and PDF. On request a per-room breakdown and a percentage-weight table are added. Every line is recorded with its item number and rate period; when the same work moves to an interim payment, a final account or an abnormally-low-tender defence, the same line is traced. Unit prices are the current items published by the Ministry of Environment, Urbanisation and Climate Change and the related bodies, and every rate is recorded with a period label showing which month's price it holds.
If the drawings are incomplete
The take-off can be done partially. We make no assumptions on a missing sheet; the report states which item rests on which document and what is left as an assumption. So when the authority or the other party questions the take-off, it is clear from the start which figure rests on a document and which on an assumption.
Scale: where has this been used?
Kartal Training and Research Hospital 323,000 m², MaviBahçe shopping mall 250,000 m², Çorum 650-bed State Hospital 139,000 m². In transport: Sincan–Ankara–Kayaş / Başkentray (TRY 442 million) and the Bingöl–Genç 9th Regional Border Road (TRY 115.35 million).
Why is it different with us?
The take-off output is not a dead Excel file. Each line is recorded with its item number and rate period; when the same work moves to an interim payment, a final account or an abnormally-low-tender defence, the same line is traced. The team taking off the quantities knows where the same line will be used at the next stage, so it builds the file from the start for those uses. This lets the file be used in the tender, the interim payment and the dispute without recalculation, with the same lines.
When is a take-off service used?
- A contractor entering a tender wants a reliable quantity list from the project at the bid stage.
- An authority or employer wants the measurement taken off by an independent team before building the cost-estimate schedule.
- During interim payments, when employer and contractor quantities do not agree; the difference is compared by measurement rule and room split.
- After works are complete, when the real measurement of what was done has to be produced (attachments and as-built).
You can send your project and room schedule through the contact page or ask for a free preliminary review; the scope is settled by looking at the documents available.
If you will do it yourself
If you want to run the calculation yourself, the measurement rules and item logic used in public works are in the guide. If you are looking for an empty quantity and cost-estimate schedule, you can download the Excel template; for the steps see How is a take-off done? (Turkish).