Summary File Maintenance (SFM) Preferences Window

From Summary, select File > Preferences.
The Preferences window opens for you to select the options and settings desired for Summary reports.

In the General Options section, select:

 

In the Printing & Export Options, select:

The two text fields for Print 'Adj Mat Unit' column as and Print 'Adj Lbr Unit' column as allow you to enter different titles for these columns to appear on the Summary report (e.g., you may prefer that your customers see a column titled "Price" rather than "Adj Mat Unit" on the report).

Select Custom Print Header to open the Customize Printing dialog where you can select how the fields on your report display.

Select OK after choosing your report settings.

In the Level Display Options section:

In the Decimal Places section:

Use these fields to set the number of decimal places to be shown for both material and labor. You can either manually enter a number or use the up and down buttons to select a number. A representation of the number you choose is shown to the right of the input field.

In the Variance section:

Variance compares the current unit value (ignoring adjustments) to a value from Databook, and shows the difference in terms of unit and/or percentage.

You can select which unit from Databook they wish to compare using the ClosedCalculation Method option.

Original: the unit used when the report was run (can be primary or alt/discount, depending on the Summary settings).

Primary: Always compares to the primary unit in Databook.

Alt: Always compares to the alternate / discount unit of Databook.

EPF: Always compares to the saved units in the Estimate Pricing File. If the user has not saved a value into the EPF, it defaults to the saved primary unit.

When an item is added to the Estimate Pricing File, both its primary unit and alternate unit are added to the EPF.  These values are used by default when Summaries are run (unless the user saves a manually edited price, which then takes precedence).  Therefore, it is possible that, even without saving prices/labor to the EPF,  Variance: EPF and Variance: Primary will give different results (e.g., a Price Update was applied after the EPF was created).
If you change Variance preferences while a Summary is open, the Summary will update and display the new results.

Additional Variance Information: ClosedLimitations / Exclusions

 - Variance cannot function if the current (or compared) value is SQMF.  SQMF means that either there is no value, or there is an unknown value.  In either case, there's no real meaningful comparison that can be made.

 - Variance does not function for calculated values.  Since variance is meant to compare current values against the Databook (or EPF - and calculated units are not saved to the EPF), and calculated values cannot be edited, they are ignored.  Also: since calculated values do not display the units straight out of Databook, variance between the displayed unit and the Databook unit are meaningless.

If variance cannot be calculated, a "---" symbol will be displayed instead.
 

In the Miscellaneous Options section:

SUPPLIER CONNECT: Opens the Supplier Connect Options window where you select your preferred service for acquiring pricing information.  Select Viewpoint Pricer, EZ-Pricer, NetPricer, or Supplier Xchange. You can set up custom columns in Summary to be used with your selected service.

 EZ-Pricer columns are universal, meaning they can be set once and used for all other Estimates created.  However, EZ-Pricer columns will only appear if no Estimate-specific custom columns are setup in Summary.

Edit Colors:  Allows you to select the colors of the units in the Summary Items Grid View.  Click Set to Default to reset the colors to their original system settings. See Colors in SFM for more information. 

 

In the Accounting Integration section:    This section is visible if you have already selected an Accounting Integration program. This integration can be set from the main Estimating screen, File > Options > General Options.                          

The Summary screen has columns for all 9 of the codes (3 each for UPC Code, Vendor Code and Buyer Code). Verify which codes are being exported by creating the export and examining the files for which codes are included.

When you are finished selecting your preferences, select OK to accept any changes you have made and return to Summary. Select Cancel to return to Summary without saving any changes you have made.