Importing from your current stack

Nobody switches construction software by starting over. You have open jobs, years of cost codes, vendors with open balances and subcontracts half billed. This page describes the planned import paths into os.construction: what we intend to bring over from common systems and where it lands in the record model.

What has to come over

To run an open job in a new system, you need the things you cannot recreate from memory:

Jobs and their identity: number, name, owner, contract.
Cost structure: cost codes, cost types, phases.
Budgets: original and revised, by cost code.
Companies: vendors, subcontractors, owners, with contacts.
Commitments: subcontracts and POs, with change orders, billed to date and retainage held.
Prime contracts: contract sum, approved change orders, SOV, billed to date, retainage receivable.
Open balances: open AP and AR, and a trial balance at cutover.

Closed history (old daily logs, closed RFIs, prior years’ transactions) is useful but not required to run the job. The plan is to bring it over as read-only reference where the source system allows.

Where things map

The general mapping we are designing for. Names differ between systems and versions; the destination is the same.

Source data	Lands in os.construction as
Projects / jobs	Projects
Cost codes, phases, cost types, categories	Project cost structure
Budget line items	Budgets and budget revisions
Subcontracts, purchase orders	Commitments
Commitment change orders	Commitment change orders, linked
Prime contract and SOV	Prime contract and schedule of values
Owner change orders, change events	Change orders and potential changes
Vendors, directory, contacts	Companies and people
Open AP invoices and AR billings	Open financial records with balances
Chart of accounts, trial balance	General ledger setup and opening balances
RFIs, submittals, daily logs, documents	Project records (open ones active, closed ones as reference)

By source system

Project management side. Procore typically holds projects, the directory, RFIs, submittals, daily logs, drawings and documents, plus budget, commitments, prime contracts and change events if you use its financial tools.

Projects, directory and open RFIs and submittals become projects, companies and active project records.
Budget views, commitments and change events map to budgets, commitments and potential changes.
Documents and drawings come over as files linked to their project.
If accounting lives elsewhere, actual cost and payments come from the accounting system, not Procore.

Construction accounting side. Sage 100 Contractor and Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate (CRE) typically hold jobs, cost codes and cost types, budgets, subcontracts and POs, AP, AR and billing, and the general ledger.

Jobs, cost codes and cost types become projects and their cost structure.
Subcontracts and POs become commitments, with billed to date and retainage held.
Contract billing data becomes the prime contract and SOV, with billed to date.
Open AP and AR, and the trial balance at cutover, set opening balances.

General accounting, adapted for construction. QuickBooks setups vary widely. Jobs are often customers or sub-customers, and cost codes are often items or classes.

Customer:job records become projects.
Items or classes used as cost codes become the project cost structure. We expect to review the mapping with you, because every QuickBooks file does this differently.
Vendors, open bills and open invoices carry over with balances.
Chart of accounts and the trial balance at cutover set up the ledger.

ERP-scale construction accounting. Vista typically holds jobs, phases and cost types, job cost, subcontracts and POs, AP, AR, contract billing and the GL, often with heavy customization.

Jobs, phases and cost types become projects and their cost structure.
Subcontracts and POs become commitments with their change orders.
Contract items become the prime contract SOV, with billed to date.
Open AP and AR, retainage on both sides and the trial balance set opening balances.

How a cutover is meant to work

Choose a cutover date

Usually a month-end after the books for that month are closed in the old system.
Map the structure

Review cost codes, cost types and the chart of accounts. Decide what stays, what merges and what retires.
Trial import

Load a copy into a test environment. Compare job cost, commitments and open balances against reports from the old system, job by job.
Reconcile

Fix differences until budget, committed cost, cost to date, billed to date and retainage match the old system’s reports at cutover.
Go live

Final import at the cutover date. New transactions start in os.construction; the old system stays available read-only for history.

Running side by side

Some teams will want to run os.construction on new jobs while existing jobs finish in their current systems. That avoids migrating jobs mid-stream, at the cost of two systems for a while. We expect both approaches to be valid and will help founding contractors pick.