The Projects Tab in Orcatec: A Complete Beginner's Guide

The Projects tab is the central workspace of your Orcatec account. This is where an estimate for a client is created, negotiated, turned into a signed contract, worked on, and finally invoiced. One project equals one deal with one client, and the entire lifecycle of that deal — from the first price you write down to the payment you receive — lives inside a single project card.

A project is not just a piece of paper with a price on it. Each card keeps a history: who created it, which statuses it has passed through, which files are attached, what work was completed, and how much money has ultimately come in.

This guide walks a brand-new user through everything the Projects tab can do: viewing your project list, understanding statuses, building Good/Better/Best pricing options, adding line items, applying discounts and taxes, and previewing the project exactly as your client will see it.

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Two ways to view your project list: Table and Board

You can view the full list of your company's projects in two modes. The toggle for switching between them sits in the top-right corner of the list.

Table is a classic spreadsheet-style view with all the columns you need — status, amount, client, date. It's the best mode for searching, sorting, and working with the list in bulk.

Board is a kanban-style view where each column is a status. Drag a card into another column to change its status. This view makes it easy to see your entire pipeline at a glance.

Tip: start with Table view when you need to find a specific project or compare numbers. Switch to Board view when you want to see how many deals are sitting in each stage of your pipeline.

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What's inside a project card

Open any project and you'll see four tabs at the top of the card. These aren't separate projects — they're different facets of the same deal.

Tab	What's in it
General	The main work area: the estimate, line items, Good/Better/Best tabs, discounts, taxes, and attachments. New users spend most of their time here.
Work Orders	Work orders for the job once the project has reached the contract stage — who is doing the work and when.
Invoices	Invoices issued for this project and their payment status.
Assets	Equipment installed or serviced under this project (serial number, warranty) — useful for service companies.

The Work Orders tab stays empty until at least one work order has been created.

The Invoices tab fills in once an invoice has been generated for the project.

The Assets tab shows equipment cards with a name, serial number, and warranty information.

Note: don't worry if three of the four tabs are empty on a brand-new project — that's expected. They fill in naturally as the deal moves forward.

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Statuses: how they work and how to change them

This is one of the first things worth understanding correctly: statuses in Orcatec are not a fixed list. There are 5 built-in status groups, each with its own behavior baked into the system, and inside each group your company can create as many of its own custom sub-statuses as you like, each with its own name and color.

Most deals travel the same basic path from left to right:

Estimate → Contract → Completed

Cancelled and Cold are the two exits along the way, for deals that don't make it all the way through. Here's what each group actually means:

Group	What it means
Estimate	The estimate is waiting on the client's decision; it can still be freely edited.
Contract	The client has agreed; parts of the project can no longer be changed without their re-approval.
Completed	The work is done and payment has been received.
Cancelled	The deal was cancelled.
Cold	The deal has gone cold — the client isn't responding.

Creating your own custom sub-statuses Advanced

Sub-statuses are configured under Settings → Project → Statuses. There you can also see which sub-statuses already exist in each group — for example, Contract comes by default with Accepted, In Progress, Work Completed, and Invoice.

Screen recording: open Settings → Project → Statuses, click "+ Create Status" inside the group you need, enter a name (up to 30 characters), and pick a color using the color picker (HSV, HEX, or RGB).

Tip: don't try to create a status on its own — first decide which of the 5 built-in groups it logically belongs to, and create it there. That choice determines how the system treats it — for example, whether the estimate can still be edited while a project sits in that status.

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Good / Better / Best: offering multiple pricing options

Instead of sending a client a single estimate, you can offer several packages to choose from at once — the classic "good / better / best" approach, which tends to raise your average sale.

1. Turn on the Multiple tabs for project toggle in the project's settings (the gear icon next to the project name), or turn it on globally under Settings → Project → Default Project Settings so every new project has it enabled automatically.
2. Good / Better / Best tab cards will appear on the project card. Use the Add new tab button to add more.
3. Each tab has its own name, image, description, and an independent estimate with its own total.
4. The radio button under each card selects which option is active and shown to the client by default.

Screen recording: switching between Good/Better/Best, choosing the active option with the radio button, and editing a tab's title/image/description through "Edit tab info."

Tip: fill out one tab completely first (Good, for example), then use the Duplicate button instead of building Better and Best from scratch — it's much faster to copy a tab and edit only what's different.

Where the pre-filled Good/Better/Best content comes from, and how to build your own template Advanced

The Good/Better/Best tabs can open already filled in — with equipment photos, descriptions, and prices in place — instead of empty. That content isn't built into the software; it comes from a Project Template that someone on your team set up and saved in advance. A brand-new company has no templates yet, so its very first project will open with empty tabs. That's expected, not an error — and it's easy to fix by creating your own template once, as shown below.

Here's how the mechanism works, and what to do about it from a clean slate.

How a saved template ends up in a new project

On the General tab of any project you'll find two buttons: Manage Templates and Save as Template.

Both buttons sit next to each other, right under the "Project forms" block on the General tab.

Manage Templates opens your company's full template library along with a Default Template field — whichever template is selected there will be automatically applied to every new project you create. The info tooltip (ⓘ) next to the field explains it directly: "This template will be set as a default one and will be applied automatically to all new projects."

The Project Templates window: the Default Template selector at the top, and below it a table of every template your company has saved — creator, creation date, and who it's shared with.

If the Default Template field is empty (as it will be for any new company with no templates saved yet), a new project's creation window won't mention a template at all, and the Good/Better/Best tabs will open empty — a single tab with no image, description, or price, ready for you to fill in by hand. Once a default template is set, the project creation window will show a line like "You are using default Project template — [name]," and all three tabs — plus the company header, logos, and so on — will fill in automatically.

This is what that notice looks like when creating a new project: "You are using default Project template - test." Until your company has saved and set its own default template, this line simply won't be there.

How to create your very first template from scratch

There's no separate "create a blank template" button inside the Manage Templates window — that library only shows templates that already exist (open to edit, share, or delete). The only way to get your first template is to build it from a real project, and the good news is that saving it and making it the default happen in one and the same step:

1. Create a regular project and turn on Multiple tabs for project if it isn't on already.
2. Build out the Good tab by hand: click Edit tab info to set a title, description, and image, then add your line items below it (see the Line Items section further down). Use Add new tab and Duplicate to create and fill in Better and Best.
3. Once every tab looks the way you want a typical package from your company to look, click Save as Template on the General tab.
4. In the "Save template" window, give it a clear name (for example, "AC Tune-Up — 3 tabs") and check the Use as default template box before clicking Save. This one checkbox does what would otherwise take a second trip to Manage Templates — it saves the template and makes it the default in a single click.
5. From that point on, every new project will open pre-filled with this content, and you can still adjust it for the specific client without starting from zero.

Screen recording: opening "Edit tab info" to rename a tab and rewrite its description, then clicking "Save as Template," naming it, and checking "Use as default template" to save and set it as the default in one step.

Tip: you can save as many templates as you like — for different types of jobs, such as AC installs or furnace repairs — but only one can be the default at any given time. The rest don't disappear; you can still apply any of them to a specific project manually from the Manage Templates window, even if they aren't set as the default. (If you skip the checkbox when saving, you can still go to Manage Templates afterward and set any saved template as the default from the dropdown there — both paths lead to the same result.)

Note: don't confuse a template with the Good/Better/Best tabs themselves. A template is a separate saved snapshot of an entire project (created with the "Save as Template" button), while the tabs are what you edit inside a specific, live project. Changes you make to a project do not update its template automatically — to refresh the template itself, click "Save as Template" again.

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Line items: pricing, materials, and attachments

An estimate is built from sections, and each section contains line items. Every line item has two checkboxes and flexible pricing logic.

Field	What it does
MATL	Marks the item as a material (affects material reporting).
TAX	Marks the item as taxable — without this checkbox, tax won't be calculated on it even if tax is enabled at the project level.
Cost	The item's cost to your company.
Margin	When this checkbox is on, the price is calculated automatically as Cost × (1 + Margin%), and can no longer be edited manually.
Price	The price the client sees. Can only be edited manually when Margin is turned off.

You can attach a photo or file to a line item using the paperclip icon — either drag and drop a file or paste an external image link.

Screen recording: click "+Add Item" → enter a name, check MATL and TAX → enter Cost → turn on Margin and watch Price calculate itself → add a description → click the paperclip → "Upload files" or paste an external photo link → save.

Note: if you turn on Margin and then can't edit the price manually, that's expected behavior, not a bug. Turn off the Margin checkbox first if you want to set a price directly.

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Discounts, rebates, taxes, and fees

This is the most underrated part of building an estimate — the order these are calculated in determines the final number your client sees. The logic always flows in this order:

Subtotal → minus Discount/Rebate → plus Tax → plus Fee → Total

Discount and Rebate

Technically these are the same form: a name (you can search among previously saved templates), a validity period, and an amount in either $ or %. The difference is purely semantic — Discount is usually a price cut your own company offers, while Rebate typically represents a manufacturer's compensation. Both are applied at the section level and reduce that section's "Section total after Discounts and Rebates."

Tax

The "Add Tax" window has two key choices to make:

• Calculation base — either "On Taxable Items" (tax is calculated on the amount before any discount) or "On Total after Discounts" (calculated after the discount is applied). This changes the final dollar amount, so choose the base deliberately.
• Rate source — "Based on ZIP" (calculated automatically from the ZIP code), "Custom for this Industry" (a rate set for your industry), or "Custom" (entered manually for this project).

Screen recording: open "Edit Tax," switch the calculation base, and watch the tax amount update; below that, the Project Fees block.

Fee

A flat dollar amount added after tax, so it isn't itself taxed. This is a good fit for one-time charges like a permit fee.

Where default tax rates come from, and setting your own Advanced

Configured under Settings → Project → Taxes.

Default — a ready-made table of US rates by state and ZIP code; nothing to enter yourself.

Custom — your own rates for specific ZIP codes, for when the standard table doesn't fit your needs.

Adding your own rate takes just two fields: ZIP and Rate.

Note: a line item without the TAX checkbox checked will not be included in the taxable base, even if tax is enabled for the entire project. Always double-check this box on each item.

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What the client sees (Preview)

The Preview button at the top of a project card opens an exact copy of what your client will see: the Good/Better/Best cards, the full estimate, an "Accept Project" button, and a field for comments.

On the right side of the Preview screen there's a Settings panel that lets you override what's shown to the client for this project only — without touching your company-wide settings.

Setting	What it hides or shows
Show tech contacts	Contact info for the technician who will do the work.
Show QTY / Show QTY when 1	Quantity on each line, including when it's just 1 unit.
Show description only	Hides prices and shows the client only the description of the work.
Show price per item	The price for each individual line item (can be hidden, leaving only the grand total).
Show $0 prices	Whether to show items priced at $0 (for example, something included for free).
Require Project signature	Whether the client must sign to accept the project.

Screen recording: turning off "Show price per item" and watching the client-facing estimate update immediately.

Tip: always open Preview before sending a project to a client — it's the easiest way to catch stray zeros, wrong labels, or accidentally-enabled internal fields before your client ever sees them.

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Where the Project ID number comes from Optional

A project's ID isn't random — its format is defined once under Settings → Project → Project ID Pattern and is then applied automatically to every new project.

A pattern like {UPI}{yy}{mm}{dd}{00} produces an ID such as ADM26090701.

Variable	Meaning
{UPI}	A user identifier — 2-3 letters, assigned automatically the first time a given employee creates a project.
{yy} / {mm} / {dd}	The year, month, and day the project was created.
{00}	A sequential number (2 to 10 digits) — a required part of the pattern, since without it IDs would repeat.

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Frequently asked questions

What's the difference between Discount and Rebate?

None, in terms of the form or the math — it's the same input (an amount in $ or %). The only difference is how your company labels the source of the reduction: Discount is usually used for the company's own price cuts, Rebate for manufacturer compensation. They're tracked separately in reports.

Why can't I edit a line item's price manually?

The Margin checkbox is most likely turned on for that item. While it's on, the price is always calculated automatically from Cost and the margin percentage. Turn off Margin and the Price field becomes editable again.

What do MATL and TAX mean?

MATL marks an item as a material (used in material reports). TAX marks an item as taxable. If tax is enabled at the project level but a specific item's TAX box isn't checked, tax won't be calculated on that item.

Why does the same tax rate produce a different total?

Because the tax settings let you choose what base the tax is calculated on: the full amount before any discount ("On Taxable Items") or the amount after the discount is applied ("On Total after Discounts"). Check this setting in the Edit Tax window if a total looks off.

Where do I find status settings?

Settings → Project → Statuses. There are 5 built-in groups (Estimate, Contract, Completed, Cancelled, Cold), and inside each one a "+ Create Status" button lets you add your own sub-status with a name and color.

Can I change what a client sees for just one project, without touching company-wide settings?

Yes. Open the project, click Preview, and use the Settings panel on the right. Every toggle there applies only to that specific project.

Why bother with multiple Good/Better/Best tabs instead of just editing one estimate?

It's a way to give clients a choice without extra back-and-forth: they compare three ready-made packages at different price points and decide for themselves. This approach often raises the average sale, since a more valuable option sits right next to the baseline one.

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Checklist for your first project

• Create a project and select the right Industry
• Check or set up the status in the right group (Settings → Project → Statuses)
• Fill out at least one estimate option (the Good tab); turn on Multiple tabs and fill in Better/Best if needed
• For each line item, check MATL and TAX, and set Cost plus either Margin or a manual Price
• Attach a photo or file using the paperclip icon if needed
• Add a discount or rebate if one applies
• Check your tax settings — the calculation base and the rate source
• Add a one-time Fee if applicable
• Open Preview and look at the project through your client's eyes
• Fine-tune what the client sees using the Settings panel inside Preview, if needed
• Send the project to your client