Electrical project work has a specific margin problem: the material is bought in runs, on one supply-house ticket for three jobs, and the labor is the largest line. A rewire can be bid at a healthy margin and finish at a thin one without a single obvious mistake, because the wire was split wrong between jobs and the inspector's panel never became a change order.
Obra keeps each job's money separate from the ticket up. A supply-house receipt is read into a draft and split across the jobs it served, each with its cost code. The panel the inspector required is a change order on the contract the day it's quoted. Labor is confirmed to the job at its burdened rate. The page shows the job's expected margin while the trim-out is still ahead.
Material runs, honestly split
The truck stops at the supply house once for three jobs. One receipt, $1,840, three projects. In most systems that receipt goes to whichever job the bookkeeper guesses, or to overhead, and two jobs look cheaper than they were. In Obra the draft is split when it's confirmed, from the photo, and every job carries its share with the ticket attached.
The service upgrade that pays for itself, or doesn't
An inspector requires a 200A service where the bid assumed 100A. The right afternoon looks like this: quote the upgrade, write the change order, get it signed, add the panel to the forecast's remaining to spend, install. The change order guide is the short form, and the pricing calculator makes sure it carries markup. The wrong afternoon is installing it to pass and hoping the client remembers the conversation.
Labor at its real cost
Electrical crews are expensive, and the wage is not the cost. Taxes, insurance, downtime and training push a $34 wage toward $50 an hour; the labor burden calculator finds your number. Obra records labor on the job at that rate, so the margin on the page is the margin you'd see at tax time, not the one that ignores the truck.
What Obra doesn't do for an electrician
Service dispatch, flat-rate price books, invoicing at the door. Those are field-service tools' jobs. Obra is for the contract work with a budget and a finish date, in English and Spanish, from the receipts the crew already sends.