Craft Quantities
Plan & Takeoffs

Quote check

Check a central heating replacement quote

Paste the quote you were given and enter your measurements. Every line is read against the job: what the quote leaves out, what it adds, which quantities sit outside the computed range, and what to ask. Quantities only — never prices.
  • 3Lines the job needs
  • 10Measurements
  • QuestionsNever a verdict

How the quote is read

Each line of a central heating replacement quote is matched to the line of the job it names, or marked as something the Central heating replacement takeoff does not measure — labour, removal, hire, fees, or anything else. Work the takeoff lists as part of the job but gives no quantity for is read as that work, not as something the quote adds.

The job’s own figures come from 10 measurements — floor area of the rooms worked in, scaffold along the wall below the flue, height to the flue's working platform, pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted, room the old boiler comes off: length, room the old boiler comes off: width, room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling, doors in that room, windows in that room, loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in — run through the same calculators as the takeoff, so the two give the same figure for the same job.

Reading a central heating replacement quote

A heating quote names a boiler, and its make, model and output are worth seeing in writing, along with how the output was arrived at: a heat-loss survey of the house, or a like-for-like swap for the old one. Worth asking whether the radiators are replaced, reused or resized, whether new valves and a system filter are included, and whether the controls quoted are a programmer and room thermostat or a smart system with a valve head on each radiator.

Cleaning the system is where two quotes for the same boiler part company. Worth confirming whether a power flush is priced or only a chemical cleanse, that it happens before the new boiler is connected, and whether the inhibitor dose, the carbon monoxide alarm, the condensate run to a drain, any gas pipe upsizing and taking out an old cylinder and tanks are in the figure. Who registers the boiler for its guarantee, and when the commissioning record and the notification arrive, are worth settling before the old boiler comes off.

Three steps

  1. Give your measurements. The page opens on a typical job so it has something to show.
  2. Paste the quote's lines as they came, or add them one at a time. Leave the prices in — they are taken out, never read.
  3. Read the report: what is left out, what is added, what sits outside the range, and one list of questions to send.

Your quote

The central heating replacement quote you were given

Paste from an email, or open or drop a PDF, Excel, CSV or text file, or a photo of the quote. Amounts of money are taken out before anything is read — this page compares quantities, never prices.

Nothing you paste or open leaves this device.

or one the job needs:

The reading

What the quote says, against the job

Central heating replacement · Floor area of the rooms worked in 970 sq ft · Scaffold along the wall below the flue 0 ft · Height to the flue's working platform 16.5 ft · Pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted 39 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: length 13 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: width 10 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling 8 ft · Doors in that room 1 · Windows in that room 1 · Loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in 0.59 inFloor area of the rooms worked in 90 m² · Scaffold along the wall below the flue 0 m · Height to the flue's working platform 5 m · Pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted 12 m · Room the old boiler comes off: length 4 m · Room the old boiler comes off: width 3 m · Room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Doors in that room 1 · Windows in that room 1 · Loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in 0.02 m

  • What it leaves out

    Every line the job needs that nothing on the quote reads as, with the quantity your measurements produce.

  • What it adds

    Lines this job's takeoff does not measure — labour, removal, hire, fees, anything else — each named for what it is.

  • What sits outside the range

    Quantities above or below the computed range, by how much, in the quote's unit or converted and shown.

  • What to ask

    One list of questions, in the quote's order, ready to copy and send. Questions, never a verdict.

Paste the quote above, or add its lines one at a time. The reading appears here as each line is read.

Outside what this takeoff measures

8

Nothing in the reading measures these. Whether the quote covers each is worth asking in its own right: a scope missing from a quote tends to become a cost after work has started. Why each is left out is on the takeoff.

  • The heat-loss calculation and the system design
  • A hot-water cylinder changed or added, with its controls and its discharge pipe
  • The gas meter and the supply to it
  • The commissioning record, the gas tightness test's paperwork and the building control notification themselves, and any fee for them
  • Other fuel-burning appliances in the house
  • Radiators, valves, pipe, fittings and the flue as quantities
  • Floor coverings lifted for pipe runs, and redecorating beyond the room the old boiler comes off
  • A change to a heat pump, which alters the emitters, the cylinder and the electrical supply and is a job of its own

The reference

Every line the reading looks for

For Floor area of the rooms worked in 970 sq ft · Scaffold along the wall below the flue 0 ft · Height to the flue's working platform 16.5 ft · Pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted 39 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: length 13 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: width 10 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling 8 ft · Doors in that room 1 · Windows in that room 1 · Loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in 0.59 inFloor area of the rooms worked in 90 m² · Scaffold along the wall below the flue 0 m · Height to the flue's working platform 5 m · Pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted 12 m · Room the old boiler comes off: length 4 m · Room the old boiler comes off: width 3 m · Room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Doors in that room 1 · Windows in that room 1 · Loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in 0.02 m. Each is the calculator linked under it, run with those measurements; a range is that calculator at both ends of one choice, not a margin for error.

How the ranges are taken

Where the choice is cutting waste, the ends are the site’s own allowances: 5%, the tight buffer of a crew with a planned set-out, and 15%, the wider one a first-timer orders. Where the calculator decides between patterns or materials, the ends are the options it offers. Where it adds nothing for loss, the range runs from the net quantity to 15% over it.

A minimum — the fewest hangers a spacing allows, the least airflow a room needs — has no upper end. A single figure carries an allowance the material itself needs, such as a lap, and names it.

What a reading like this cannot see

  • It does not know your prices, your market, or what the work ought to cost.
  • It does not know the building — the access, the condition of what is there, or what has to happen first.
  • It cannot check a lump sum, because there is no quantity in one.
  • A line it reads as missing may be priced under another name. A quantity outside the range is not evidence of anything. Each is a reason to ask a question.
  • Two quotes are not comparable until their scopes are.
  • It is not advice, and it is no substitute for a second quote.

The full takeoff

Every quantity for this job, with its working

The Central heating replacement takeoff runs the same calculators on the same measurements and shows what sits under each line here.

Open the takeoffEvery quote check

  • Base, allowance, order

    Each line's quantity before and after its allowance, and what to buy.

  • Every allowance editable

    Change a waste figure and the order follows, with its source named.

  • Into a project

    Add the whole job to a workspace with your own prices.

Frequently asked questions

What quantities does a central heating replacement job need?
It depends on the measurements, so this page asks for yours. At the size it opens on — Floor area of the rooms worked in 90 m² · Scaffold along the wall below the flue 0 m · Height to the flue's working platform 5 m · Pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted 12 m · Room the old boiler comes off: length 4 m · Room the old boiler comes off: width 3 m · Room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Doors in that room 1 · Windows in that room 1 · Loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in 0.02 m — the lines come to: Lagging on pipes in cold spaces, 13–14 x 1 m sections; Wall paint, two coats, in one room, 6.05–6.96 L; Skip (dumpster) for what comes out, 1.35 m³. In imperial units — Floor area of the rooms worked in 970 sq ft · Scaffold along the wall below the flue 0 ft · Height to the flue's working platform 16.5 ft · Pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted 39 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: length 13 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: width 10 ft · Room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling 8 ft · Doors in that room 1 · Windows in that room 1 · Loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in 0.59 in — they come to: Lagging on pipes in cold spaces, 7–8 x 6 ft sections; Wall paint, two coats, in one room, 1.66–1.91 gal; Skip (dumpster) for what comes out, 1.77 yd³.
Which line on a central heating replacement quote varies the most?
The Wall paint, two coats, in one room: 6.05–6.96 L for a job measured Floor area of the rooms worked in 90 m² · Scaffold along the wall below the flue 0 m · Height to the flue's working platform 5 m · Pipe in cold spaces, each pipe counted 12 m · Room the old boiler comes off: length 4 m · Room the old boiler comes off: width 3 m · Room the old boiler comes off: floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Doors in that room 1 · Windows in that room 1 · Loose waste, as a depth over the floor worked in 0.02 m, depending on how much is allowed for loss over the net figure, up to 15%.
What does a central heating replacement quote often leave out?
The reading names every line of the job that nothing on the quote reads as — any of the 3 lines the takeoff measures. The takeoff also lists 8 things it does not measure, shown under the reading, and each is worth asking about: a scope missing from a quote tends to become a cost after work has started.
Can I paste the quote exactly as it came?
Yes — from an email, a PDF or a spreadsheet, one item to a line. Amounts of money are taken out before anything is read, headings and totals are skipped, and each line is shown with what it was read as, so a misreading is one correction. Quantities in the other unit system are converted and the conversion is shown; a count of boxes is never compared with a count of tiles.
Does this check the price as well?
No. It reads quantities, never prices, and this site publishes none: an installed price moves with the market, the season, the access and the specification, so a figure for what the work ought to cost would give you confidence in a number nobody can defend. A quantity against your own measurements is checkable, and every figure here links to the calculator that produced it.