Guide · Checking

The flooring quote checklist: what to check before you send

Most quote errors are not arithmetic. They are a missing room, an old plan revision, a forgotten stair or a trim nobody counted. A few minutes with a checklist catches them while they are still cheap to fix.

Work through the sections in order. Each one builds on the last, and the final sanity checks only make sense once the details are right. Print it, or copy it into your own quoting notes and add the things your builders always ask about.

1. Documents

1. The lot number and site address on the quote match the plan and the selections.
2. The plan revision and date are the latest the builder has sent. Check the email thread for a newer set.
3. The selections sheet is for the same lot and revision as the plan.
4. You have the floor plan pages with internal dimensions, not just the site plan and elevations.
5. Any builder variation or specific request in the email is reflected in the quote.

2. Scope: which spaces are yours

1. Every space on the plan has been classified: hard floor, carpet, tiles by others, or not ours.
2. Every room named in the selections appears on the quote with the right finish.
3. Passages, nooks and halls joining floored rooms are included even if the selections do not name them.
4. Garage, alfresco, porch, balcony and outdoor areas are excluded unless the selections say otherwise.
5. Where the selections and the plan marking disagree, you have followed the plan and noted it for the builder.
6. The stair finish is confirmed, not assumed.

3. Measurements

1. Rooms are measured from the printed dimension strings, not from a scaled PDF.
2. L-shaped and open plan spaces are split into rectangles that add up to the whole area, with no overlap.
3. Robes are floored to the sliding door line from the robe depth, not to the shaded shelf. See robes, recesses and kickboards.
4. Walk-in robes, linen cupboards and under-stair storage are included where they open off floored rooms.
5. Fridge, dishwasher and bar fridge recesses are floored.
6. Cabinets are deducted 10 cm less deep than the plan shows, or whatever your kickboard recess rule is.
7. Every step is counted, with landing steps and box steps identified. See measuring stairs.

4. Materials

1. The doorway allowance has been added across every doorway and full-length window or sliding door.
2. The stair allowance is added to stair product before the normal waste.
3. Waste is applied once, to the total, then rounded up to whole packs. See waste percentage.
4. The pack size is right for the selected range. Pack sizes differ between ranges from the same supplier.
5. Carpet is cut along the roll in a sensible direction for each room, at the roll width the range comes in. See carpet lineal metres.
6. The product, range and colour on the quote match the selections exactly.

5. Trims and edges

1. A trim is priced at every doorway where the floor changes.
2. Sliding doors, stacking doors and full-length windows have trims where the floor meets the frame.
3. Robe doors have trims either side, unless this builder lays the floor before the robe tracks.
4. If pricing per metre, each opening is rounded up before the metres are added. See trims and transitions.

6. Extras

1. Floor preparation, levelling or moisture work is either priced or clearly excluded.
2. Removal of existing floors is priced where it applies.
3. Travel, high rise or access allowances are included where the site needs them.
4. Your standing extras are on, or deliberately switched off for this job.
5. Blinds, if the builder asked for them, are on the same quote with install and check measure. See quoting blinds.

7. Price and wording

1. Your rates are current. A quote sent next month on last year's supplier price is a margin you will not get back.
2. Tax is shown the way this builder expects: inclusive or exclusive, and labelled.
3. Each line describes what is included in plain words: the product, the rooms, the trims and the stairs.
4. Exclusions are stated: areas by others, preparation not included, furniture moving and anything you would otherwise be asked about.
5. The quote says how long the price is valid and what happens if the plan changes.

8. Sanity checks

Finally, step back from the detail and look at the whole quote. These checks catch the big errors the line by line checks can miss.

1. Area against the house. Add up hard floor, carpet and tiled areas and compare them with the internal floor area of the house. A big gap usually means a missing room.
2. Price per square metre. Divide the total by the floored area. Compare it with similar houses you have quoted for the same builder.
3. The odd one out. Look for any room whose area looks wrong for its name: a 30 m² bedroom or a 3 m² living room is a misread dimension.
4. Pack and roll counts. Make sure the order on the quote is the order you would actually place with the supplier.

A quick sanity check example

A single storey house has an internal floor area of about 190 m² once the garage and alfresco are excluded. The quote has 71 m² of hybrid and 57 m² of carpet, so 128 m² floored by you. The wet areas and entry are tiled by others, and they add up to about 25 m² on the plan. That leaves roughly 37 m² unaccounted for. Walls take some of the internal area, but not that much. Going back to the plan finds a 14 m² second living area marked as carpet on the plan that the quote left out. The check took two minutes. Finding it after the builder accepted the quote would have cost the whole margin on that room.

Where Squaro helps

Squaro is built around this kind of checking. Every line on a Squaro quote shows the room, the sheet it was read from and the dimension it used, and figures the reader was unsure about are flagged. The estimator ticks each line, and if a line's amount changes after it was ticked, the tick goes stale so it is checked again. Sent quotes keep the rates they were written with. See flooring quoting software for how the checking works.

Related reading

• How to quote flooring from builder plansThe full method, from the builder's pack to a priced quote, with a worked hybrid example.
• Flooring waste percentage, and when to round up to packsChoosing a waste figure, applying it in the right order, and rounding to whole packs.
• Flooring trims and transitions at doorwaysFinding every opening that needs a trim, and pricing trims per item or per metre.
• Flooring quoting software that prices the way you doPricing builder plans with your own rules and rates, and checking every line before it is sent.
• Flooring quote template: what to put on a builder quoteThe details, scope lines, exclusions and terms a quote needs, with an example.

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