Quotes in the installation trade: build them faster, follow up better
Quoting costs installation businesses time mostly through retyping: survey data, prices and customer details move by hand from one system to another. A good quoting process builds the quote from the customer record, lets the customer accept digitally, follows up automatically when a response is slow and keeps cost price and margin visible per line, internally.
By the makers of stiptUpdated August 6, 2026
Where does the time on a quote really go?
Ask an installer what quoting costs and you rarely hear the arithmetic. The time sits in everything around it. Retyping survey data from a form, a group chat or a notebook. Looking up prices in supplier lists and old quotes, because nobody is sure what the current purchase price is. Entering customer details once more in Word or Excel, then emailing PDF versions back and forth until a file exists called final-v3.
The result is familiar: quotes become evening work. Whoever is on the road all day pushes the writing to after dinner, and a Monday enquiry gets its quote on Friday. Meanwhile the customer has requested two more elsewhere.
The second time sink is less visible: the follow-up. A sent quote disappears into a folder of sent mail, and the follow-up call stays stuck at still-need-to-do. Not because nobody finds it important, but because no system says it has to happen now.
From site survey to approval, without entering anything twice.
- 1Site survey
The survey form with measurements, photos and the chosen solution attaches to the customer record, not to a group chat.
- 2Building
The quote grows out of the record: customer details are already there, lines come from the product catalogue, quantities from the survey.
- 3Sending
The customer gets a tidy email with a link to an online quote page and the PDF attached.
- 4Viewed
You see when the customer opens the quote. The status moves along by itself: sent, viewed, accepted.
- 5Follow-up
If a response stays out, a reminder goes out automatically after a fixed number of days.
- 6Approval
The customer accepts digitally, with name and signature. The record moves on to scheduling.
Manual next to working from the record
| Step | Manual (Word or Excel) | From the record |
|---|---|---|
| Customer details | Retyped from an email or phone note | Already on the quote |
| Measurements and quantities | Copied from the survey form or a group chat | Come from the survey on the record |
| Prices | Looked up in supplier lists and old quotes | From the catalogue, with current prices |
| Sending | PDF attachment, versions side by side | One link to the current version plus PDF |
| Status | Unknown until the customer calls | Sent, viewed and accepted visible |
| Follow-up | A note on a scrap of paper | Reminder after a fixed number of days, automatically |
How do you follow up a quote without being pushy?
Most quotes do not die of a no, but of silence. The customer is busy, wants to compare or has simply forgotten. Do nothing and the decision is left to chance; call and you quickly feel like a salesperson. That is why follow-up so often stays undone.
Two things make it easier. First, information. A quote viewed three times but not accepted calls for a different conversation than a quote never opened. In the first case the customer is hesitating and a call is welcome; in the second the email probably never arrived or was forgotten.
Second, automation. A friendly reminder that goes out by itself after a fixed number of days feels like service to the customer and costs you nothing. Good quoting software handles both: statuses that update automatically and a reminder you set once and never have to remember again.
A quote builder as in stipt: lines from the catalogue, quantities and prices in view, and a status that keeps itself up to date after sending.
What do cost price and margin per line get you?
An accepted quote feels like a win, but it is not always one. Between quote and handover sit purchase prices that rise, hours that overrun and discounts given away at the kitchen table. If your quotes only contain selling prices, you find out at the annual figures whether anything stuck.
That is why you want to record the cost price per quote line at the moment you build the quote. Then you see the margin per line and per quote, and you see immediately what a ten percent discount really costs. That cost price should stay internal: the customer never sees it, not on the quote page and not in the PDF. That is how it works in stipt, for example, where every quote line has an internal cost price field that copies the purchase price from the catalogue when the line is added.
This is also the difference with heavy estimating software. That is built for large construction projects with standard hours, tiered pricing and subcontractors. For the average installation business it is too much tooling: a current catalogue, bundles for recurring combinations and margin insight per line cover the daily work.
What to check in quoting software
- Quotes grow out of the customer record, so customer details and survey data are never retyped
- A product catalogue with current prices, VAT rates and bundles for recurring combinations
- Digital acceptance through a link, with a signature, instead of printing and scanning
- Statuses that update automatically: sent, viewed, accepted, rejected, expired
- Automatic follow-up: a reminder that goes out by itself when a response is slow
- Cost price and margin per line, visible internally and never to the customer
- A next step after approval: the quote moves on to scheduling and invoicing instead of dead-ending in a folder
Frequently asked questions
What is the best quoting software for an installation business?
It depends on where your quotes come from. If you write standalone quotes on request, a simple quoting tool is enough. If quotes grow out of enquiries, site surveys and open projects, choose software where the quote is part of the customer record: the retyping disappears and the follow-up moves along with the rest of the journey.
What does quoting software cost?
Standalone quoting tools cost roughly 10 to 50 euros per user per month. All-in-one packages where quotes are part of a customer record with scheduling and invoicing sit roughly between 30 and 250 euros per user per month. Look closely at what the price includes: digital acceptance, follow-up and integrations are often priced separately.
How quickly should you send and follow up a quote?
Send the quote while the visit is still fresh, ideally within a few days of the site survey. For the follow-up, a reminder after about a week is common. More important than the exact moment is that it happens by itself: an automatic reminder never forgets a quote, a to-do list does.
Is a digitally accepted quote legally valid?
In the Netherlands a contract is form-free: an agreement by email or through an online quote page generally counts as acceptance. A digital acceptance with name, date and signature provides stronger evidence than a loose okay in an email. For large or unusual jobs it remains sensible to put the agreements in writing.
Do I need estimating software next to quoting software?
Separate estimating software exists for large projects with standard hours, tiered pricing and subcontractors, and that is where it belongs. The average installation business does fine with a good product catalogue, bundles for recurring combinations and a cost price per line; the estimating then lives in the quote itself instead of in a separate package.