Overview:
A cost centre represents a part of the business or project that incurs costs.
Think of it as the bucket of responsibility.
It is where the money is spent.
A cost code categorises the type of cost.
Think of it as the nature of the expense.
It is what the money is spent on.
Common examples:
Labour
Materials
Equipment hire
Subcontractors
Travel
Fuel
Overheads
In construction or field services, these often go deeper:
Labour → Electrician, Plumber, Apprentice
Materials → Concrete, Cable, Parts
Plant → Excavator, Crane, Truck
Common examples:
Projects / Jobs
Departments (Operations, Maintenance, Sales)
Business units
Locations or branches
Clients or contracts
How They Work Together (This is the important bit)
Costs are usually recorded as:
Cost Centre + Cost Code = Meaningful insight
Example:
Cost Centre: Project A – Warehouse Fit-out
Cost Code: Labour – Electrician
This lets you answer:
How much did Project A cost in total?
How much of Project A was labour?
Across all projects, how much did we spend on electricians?
Which projects are blowing out on materials?
How a Business Should Decide to Map Them Out
Start with reporting goals (not software)
Ask:
What questions do we want to answer monthly?
What do managers argue about today?
Where do cost overruns usually happen?
If you can’t explain the report you want, your structure will be messy.
Keep cost centres simple and flexible
Good practice:
One cost centre per job / project / contract
Optional secondary split (e.g. location or department) only if truly needed
Avoid:
Creating cost centres for every activity
Duplicating what cost codes already do
Rule of thumb:
If it comes and goes → cost centre
If it repeats across jobs → cost code
Design cost codes to be consistent across all projects
Cost codes should:
Mean the same thing everywhere
Be limited in number
Reflect how you estimate and quote work
Bad sign 🚩
“This project has different cost codes because it’s special”
That kills cross-project reporting.
Match your cost codes to how you quote jobs
If your quotes break down into:
Labour
Materials
Plant
Subcontractors
Your cost codes should match that structure exactly.
This allows:
Quote vs actual comparisons
Margin tracking per cost type
Faster variance analysis
Don’t over-engineer early
Especially for growing businesses:
10–30 cost codes is usually plenty
You can always add more later
Removing or merging later is painful
Golden rule:
If no one will ever act on this data, don’t create a code for it.
Real-World Example (Field Services / Construction)
Cost Centres
Job 10234 – AC Installation – Client A
Job 10235 – AC Repair – Client B
Cost Codes
Labour – Technician
Labour – Apprentice
Materials – Parts
Equipment – Vehicle
Subcontractor
Travel
This setup lets you:
Track profitability per job
Compare labour efficiency across jobs
See which jobs are material-heavy vs labour-heavy
Common Mistakes to Avoid
❌ Using cost codes as cost centres
❌ Creating hundreds of cost codes “just in case”
❌ Different teams using the same code differently
❌ Designing purely to satisfy accounting, not operations
❌ Changing cost code meaning mid-project
Summary
Cost centres tell you where money is spent, cost codes tell you what it’s spent on—and good mapping starts with the questions the business actually wants answered.
Step 1: Go to Inventory → Cost Centres.
How Cost Centres Work:
Cost centres are automatically calculated from cost codes (e.g., code 213 → centre 200)
The centre code is always n00, where n is the first digit(s) of the cost code
Click on Name or Description to customize them for your project
Custom names are saved and persist across sessions
Budget totals are automatically calculated from associated cost codes
Step 2: Go to Inventory → Cost Codes
Click on + Add Cost Code
Populate the following:
Code - this must be the number between
Labour Type - choose Other, Productive Labour, Unproductive Labour
Description - short description for the cost code
NOTE: You can also make use of the Import function to bulk add cost codes to your FieldInsight Account. Just click on the "Import" button in the above screenshot.
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