The essentials in 30 seconds
- Construction cost tracking is one table per trade package: signed contract, approved additional works, progress claims invoiced, amounts paid, balance due.
- The money never passes through you: the client pays each company; you check progress, approve the claims and keep the table.
- Invoiced and paid are two columns. Confusing them distorts the balance due.
- On a private works contract in France, the retention is capped at 5% and released one year after handover, barring a reasoned objection (law of 16 July 1971).
- An additional work enters the table once approved by the client before execution, line by line, attached to its package.
What is construction cost tracking on a renovation site?
Construction cost tracking is a table kept package by package that reconciles, for each company, the signed contract, the approved additional works, the deposits and progress claims invoiced, the amounts paid by the client and the balance due. The interior designer keeps it, the client reads it, the companies' invoices feed it.
It answers a single question: where do we stand against what has been committed? Three figures per package answer it: the committed amount (contract plus approved extras), the invoiced amount, the paid amount. The balance due follows from the first and the third.
It starts with the frozen DPGF (the itemised price schedule): each awarded package becomes a line, with its contract excl. VAT, its VAT and its total incl. VAT (see our annotated DPGF example). It ends with the final account of the last package, after handover, and lives in between to the rhythm of the progress claims.
Why does the interior designer keep this table when the money never passes through them?
Because the client pays each company directly, on invoices they do not know how to check. The interior designer collects nothing and passes nothing on: the companies contract with the client. But the designer is the only one who sees progress on site, so the only one able to say whether a progress claim matches what has actually been built.
Under the CFAI contract, this task has a name: the CET phase (works supervision and cost accounting, contrôle et comptabilité des travaux). You check progress before each claim, approve it or have it corrected, and keep the site's accounts on the client's behalf, while the client keeps control of every payment.
Without this table, the client adds up invoices: a claim paid without any check on progress, an additional work never attached to its package, and the overrun discovered at the final account, when nothing can be arbitrated any more. An interior designer we met this year showed us hers: a spreadsheet kept by hand, package by package, from contract to balance due.
Which columns go in the cost tracking table?
Twelve columns are enough, in two blocks. The contract: amount excl. VAT, VAT rate and amount, total incl. VAT, approved additional works, total committed. The payments: progress claims 1 to n, final account, invoiced, paid, balance due in euros and as a percentage. One line per package, one total line, and the same table from start to finish.
The example below is fictitious: an apartment over two years old, three packages awarded, works in progress, no retention (covered further down). The works are at the reduced 10% VAT rate, with the certificate handed to each company; a shop, or a company without the certificate, invoices at 20%. The rate is recorded package by package (see VAT at 10% or 20% on works).
| Package | Contract excl. VAT | VAT 10% | Contract incl. VAT | Approved extras incl. VAT | Committed incl. VAT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Package 02 – Plastering | €18,400.00 | €1,840.00 | €20,240.00 | €1,375.00 | €21,615.00 |
| Package 03 – Electrical | €12,600.00 | €1,260.00 | €13,860.00 | €0.00 | €13,860.00 |
| Package 07 – Painting | €9,800.00 | €980.00 | €10,780.00 | €704.00 | €11,484.00 |
| Total | €40,800.00 | €4,080.00 | €44,880.00 | €2,079.00 | €46,959.00 |
| Package | Claim 1 | Claim 2 | Final account | Invoiced | Paid | Balance due | Balance % |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Package 02 – Plastering | €8,096.00 | €8,096.00 | €5,423.00 | €21,615.00 | €16,192.00 | €5,423.00 | 25.1% |
| Package 03 – Electrical | €4,158.00 | €5,544.00 | pending | €9,702.00 | €9,702.00 | €4,158.00 | 30.0% |
| Package 07 – Painting | €3,234.00 | pending | pending | €3,234.00 | €0.00 | €11,484.00 | 100% |
| Total | €15,488.00 | €13,640.00 | €5,423.00 | €34,551.00 | €25,894.00 | €21,065.00 | 44.9% |
Reading the table. The plasterer has finished: the final account is issued, not yet paid, and the package's balance due equals it. The electrician is paid up to date; 30% remains to be invoiced. The painter has just issued a first claim, to be checked before payment. At the bottom: €8,657.00 invoiced and unpaid, €12,408.00 still to be invoiced; together they give the balance due, €21,065.00, or 44.9% of the committed amount.
Keep in mind: the percentage is calculated on the package's committed amount, extras included. A package at 30% balance due is waiting for its final account; a package at 100% is waiting for your first progress checks.
Deposit, progress claim, final account, retention: what are they, and when?
Four words, four moments. The deposit is paid before or at the start, against a deposit invoice. The progress claim is invoiced during the works, up to the progress observed. The final account settles the package after handover. The retention, if the contract provides for it, applies to each payment and is released one year after handover.
The deposit
Paid on order or before the start, often to cover supplies, the deposit (acompte) is a payment on the contract price, which sets its amount and timing; no text imposes a percentage on a private contract. The contractor issues a deposit invoice, which you enter in the table as soon as it arrives. In the table, it takes the first payment column and is deducted from the following claims.
The progress claim
During the works, the company submits a progress claim (situation de travaux): the cumulative statement of work done, minus what has already been invoiced. You check it on site before approving it; the client then pays it within the contract's payment term. If the contract refers to standard NF P 03-001 (Marchés privés, cahier des clauses administratives générales applicable aux travaux de bâtiment faisant l'objet de marchés privés, octobre 2017), a voluntary standard that applies only when the contract cites it, it frames the rhythm of the claims and the final account. The progress claim invoice is the company's; your own fee invoice follows its own path (see electronic invoicing).
The final account (DGD)
After handover, the company draws up its final account (DGD, décompte général définitif): the contract, plus the approved additional works, minus the omissions, minus what has already been invoiced. The balance is the package's last invoice. You check it line by line against your table: each additional work at the approved amount, and nothing else. Any dispute is raised in writing, point by point, before payment. Handover itself, with or without reservations, is the act by which the client declares acceptance of the works (Article 1792-6 of the French Civil Code); our guide to the handover report covers reservations and how they are cleared.
The retention
On a private works contract in France, instalment payments may be reduced by a retention of at most 5%, which guarantees performance of the works to meet the reservations raised at handover. It is deposited with a stakeholder accepted by both parties, or replaced by a personal and joint guarantee from a financial institution. One year after handover, with or without reservations, it is released, unless the client lodges a reasoned objection by registered letter (law no. 71-584 of 16 July 1971, articles 1 to 3; any clause to the contrary is void). On the plastering package of the example, 5% of €21,615.00 is €1,080.75, to be kept in the balance due until it is released.
Late penalties
They exist only if the contract provides for them: amount per day, starting point, cap. A judge may reduce a manifestly excessive penalty, and it is incurred only after formal notice, except in the case of definitive non-performance (Article 1231-5 of the French Civil Code). In the table, a penalty is a line deducted from the final account, decided by the client, never applied by you alone.
These are professional reference points; the conditions that apply to a given site are those of each contract signed between the client and the company.
How should additional works be handled in the tracking?
An additional work enters the table on three conditions: approved by the client before execution, priced line by line (excl. VAT, VAT, incl. VAT), attached to the package carrying it out. Until approved, it stays outside the committed amount, on a visible waiting list. An extra buried in a progress claim reaches neither the final account nor the budget.
The path is always the same. The company prices the extra on the package's template, with the DPGF item number when it changes an existing item. You check it (quantities, unit prices) and present it to the client with its effect on the balance due. The client approves, in writing and dated; the extra takes its line, and the company carries it out then invoices it in its next claim.
Keep in mind: an omission follows the same path, as a negative. An item removed without an approved omission line stays in the contract, and nothing stops the company claiming it in the final account.
Percentage-based fees: on what amount are they calculated?
At the outset, the fee quote is calculated on the estimate, since no contract exists yet. At the end, the real basis is the sum of signed contracts and approved additional works, excluding VAT. In between, the rule must be written into the contract: basis, moment of recalculation, treatment of omissions. Without that clause, the last fee instalment is disputed.
Back to the example, with a fictitious rate of 12%. The fee quote approved by the client was based on an estimate of €40,000.00 excl. VAT of works: €4,800.00 excl. VAT. Signed contracts of €40,800.00 excl. VAT plus approved extras of €1,890.00 excl. VAT make €42,690.00 excl. VAT: 12% is €5,122.80 excl. VAT. The difference, €322.80 excl. VAT, is due only if the contract provides for recalculation on the actual contracts, and it is presented to the client each time an extra is approved. Our guides to interior designer fees and the CFAI contract set out the clause to write.
What are the most common mistakes in construction cost tracking?
- Confusing invoiced and paid. An invoice received is not a payment, nor is an approved one. Two columns, two dates: the invoice date, the transfer date. Otherwise the balance due falls to zero too soon.
- Forgetting additional works. An extra approved by phone, carried out, never recorded: it reappears in the final account, and the client discovers an overrun they had in fact accepted. Each extra takes its line the day it is approved.
- Mixing 10% and 20% VAT in the same total. Works on a home over two years old at 10% subject to conditions, fees and shops at 20%: a total incl. VAT added up without separating the rates is wrong.
- Waiting for the end to take stock. Postponing an extra or simplifying an item is only possible while the works are under way. Update the table at each claim received and show it to the client at each site meeting.
- Letting a company invoice more than the progress observed. A claim at 80% on a package 50% complete is corrected before approval, in writing. Once paid, it takes away the client's only lever: the balance. Your site supervision (dated reports, photos) is the evidence the approval rests on.
So, what about Nodal?
In Nodal, cost tracking is a derived ledger: it is built from the frozen packages of the DPGF and the additional works approved by the client, with no re-entry of the contract. For each package: contract excl. VAT, VAT and incl. VAT, deposits and progress claims 1 to n, final account, invoiced, paid, balance due in euros and as a percentage. Contracts placed outside the DPGF are added as separate lines. You enter the deposits, progress claims, final account and payments; the rest is calculated.
Percentage-based fees are recalculated on the actual contracts, on the designer's side only: the client keeps the amount of the fee quote they approved. The table opens as a full-screen spreadsheet and exports to Excel and PDF. The client reads "Où en est le budget" in their space, read-only, in your branding. Tendering to contractors, freezing packages and a space in your branding: available depending on the plan.
Article published on October 18, 2026. Legal references checked on October 18, 2026 on Legifrance. The amounts in the example are fictitious. A professional synthesis that constitutes neither legal nor financial advice. The payment, retention and penalty conditions that apply to a site are those of each contract.