We batched up a number of improvements and released them this past weekend: 

:: All dates and times in your BuildIT account can be customized on the Preferences>Personal>General page.  Over 300 locations were updated to make this improvement.

:: New Calendar popups are more compatible with newer browsers, look better and work better. They support custom all your date formats.

:: Improved Gantt "Power Bar" allows setting a new start date with the calendar popup, setting task duration by number of working days.

:: Sharper graphics on the Gantt bars.

:: Updated Rich Text Editor for emails.

:: Improved speed when closing the send-email window.

:: Improved validation and error messages on a number of dialogs.

:: Fixed an issue where failed faxes were not being set as "read".

:: New features on the Custom Job Info pages.

Too much info to track on your jobs, or want to fill in documents with job info -- talk to BuildIT support today.

If it's important for your business to "get it in writing," then using pre-formatted construction document templates will help you prior to starting the job, during construction, and after the work is done.

With BuildIT's easy-to-use document generator, you'll be able to create and edit a wide range of construction documents from any internet connected computer. These documents will be branded with your letterhead and company logo to build your reputation and professionalism. You'll be in good company as this system has been used on 1000's of project to create 1000's of documents similar to these samples.

click the images above to see editable samples

Here's how it works:

It helps if your jobs are entered into BuildIT, and that your contact database is uploaded. We can help you with this as you're getting started. Job and contact information is entered into BuildIT only once. From there, the system re-uses it again and again where it's needed.

Next, start the BuildIT document generator.

Select a current project, and a contact to whom you want this document addressed to.

The system then auto-completes the construction document; these "forms" are designed such that the right information that already exists in BuildIT goes into the right field.

Finally, save the document to BuildIT, then either print it, fax it, or email it.

There are many advantages to this document system:

• Saves a ton of data entry time.
• Documents can be auto-filled with virtually any information from your company or project.
• Send documents via email and fax with just a few clicks. Track versions of the same document.
• Proprietary construction document templates (and custom letterhead) for your exclusive use can be created by our specialists.
• Make multiple documents in one operation: avoid redundancy and mistakes.
• Ideal for field staff submitting daily job reports.

You can access your construction documents now by starting your free test drive of the BuildIT system. No credit card. No risk. And you get full access to all parts of the system.

By doing so, you'll get 60+ professional construction documents included free of charge. You can use them in BuildIT, or download them to your hard drive. They are yours free whether you subscribe or not.

So start creating professional construction documents today... the easy way.

By popular request, you can now set the sorting of jobs on the Gantt chart.  Go to "Personal Preferences » Schedules/Tasks" and set the dropdown next to: "Gantt View: When showing all jobs, order jobs by:"

There are also a number of performance improvements and minor tweaks to the code.

A new feature for New Years!

• On the Files tab, there is a new option: "Create Zip Archive of Checked".  This creates a ZIP of the checked files.  Useful for downloading or emailing a group of files in one convenient package.
• We've developed and launched some new custom features for specific users - contact us today to find out some of the 'hidden' capabilities of BuildIT or how our development team can streamline your business.

A light maintenance build:

• On the "Job List" you can now add one or more contacts to one or more jobs (previously, you could only add contacts to one job at a time). 
• Improved the operation of the Gantt "Power Bar" to adjust tasks -- more features coming!
• A bunch of "under the hood" changes to improve browser compatibility, resolve issues in older browsers.
• Improved refreshes of screens when some dialogs closed.

We've added a few new features today from user feedback:

• On Setup > Personal Preferences > Job List, you can now display the Job Address on the Job List.
• You can now choose to ignore holidays when scheduling tasks.  This change can be made on Setup > Company Preferences > Job Scheduling. If you change this preference, the working days on all your tasks will be automatically recalculated.
• If you change the working days on a job, on the Dashboard > Job Info page, the working days on all tasks for the selected job will be automatically recalculated.
• Tax rates on the Job Costs page are now set on the Setup > Company Preferences > General page.
• The Setup > Company Preferences pages has been reorganized to match the tab order.
• Under Contacts > Company Specific, we've made available some new categories: employees, sub-contractors, and vendors.

“BuildIT Vets” know that our size and structure allows us to be agile, responsive, and economical for our customers.  And that feedback from our users is highly valued at BuildIT – often directly driving improvements and core development.  Our overall objectives – organizing, scheduling, and communicating – guides our team, and our priorities.

We are pleased to introduce that our latest version is available now and extends our toolset – making BuildIT more powerful, more rewarding, and more profitable for our users.

Scheduling – new Gantt “power bar”

Most BuildIT users create and update their schedule using the Gantt view (sometimes called a bar chart or construction timeline view).

With the new Gantt “power bar”, launched by clicking the button below the task name (and to the right of the # of working days), you can quickly make changes to that particular task:

• Increase or decrease the duration of the task
• Move the task forward or back by a day or a full week
• Toggle the highlight of the task
• Delete the task
• Add contacts to the task

You’ll see the changes immediately upon clicking the buttons - no need to wait for the entire screen to refresh, nor do you need to open the entire task up. This will shave minutes off your scheduling daily, which adds up to hours saved at the end of the month.

PDF “super docs”

PDF (or Adobe) documents have become an industry standard.  Contractors recognize that documentation is a big deal – it shows your professionalism and covers your butt, but proper documentation can be a pain in the butt to create.  It’s also one of the top reasons BuildIT customers subscribe to our service: we help our users create, store, share and send documents.

We are introducing a full range of cleanly formatted industry standard PDF document templates – or “super docs" – and more are on the way!

Super docs simply look better – much easier on the eyes – they work better too. They have your letterhead (automatically generated or fully customized). They can be saved in BuildIT or on your computer, and emailed to your contacts (either locked or editable).

Need a custom super doc? No problem: we help our customers create custom documents for their exclusive use – just email us your favorites (if you don’t already see what you need in the list of available templates) and we’ll get back to you.

In BuildIT simply click [Create New] > [Document].  Then look for the templates that have «PDF» to the right of their name, or simply uncheck the “text templates” and you’ll see just the super docs (more are being added all the time).

Some other new features since our last update:

1. Creating a new contact from an email – notice the new icon next to an email address in an inbound email? Click on it, and launch a new contact edit window, with that email address already filled in. Just enter additional contact details and save.

2. To do’s – they can now be moved to, or copied to, a different job. Use the yellow “do this” drop down menu for this feature.

3.  Favorites – you can now add a favorite in your “files” tab – just click on the button and type in or copy your link in the appropriate field. Create a link to a website and share that to your users, contacts, and by email.

4.  Calendar view on "schedule" tab - you can now view your tasks in a more familiar format.

5.  Email "read/unread" toggle - are your unread emails piling up, but you still wish to keep them on the system? Or have you viewed an email but wish to keep that hot potato hot by having it display as "unread"? Then use the new "do this" control to set checked emails to read/unread.

6.  We've added some more user account types - employee access accounts that are "email only", customer access accounts that can only view detail on ONE job. These user accounts are offered at discounted rates and may address some situations in your company where you want to restrict access to information but still keep key people "in the loop".

7. Have you checked your preferences?  We’ve added a bunch of new options in the last few months.  Have a look around to see if BuildIT is optimally configured to the way you work.

8. Infrastructure – you’ve come to expect that when you log into BuildIT, it works… every time.  To make that possible, we are constantly upgrading hardware and software components at our hosting facility. We’ve been known to do some heroic things at wee hours of the morning, so that when you log in the following morning, you are greeted by the login screen… and you get in. That’s a major benefit to a hosted service – we take care of the hardware requirements, you just use the system, knowing that you’re always working off the most up-to-date version.

BuildIT... imagine what's next !!
1 866 585 5050
http://www.builditsystems.com