PWS Appendix A (Attachment 2).pdf

Setting up the MCACES MII Project

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PROJECT ITEM ASSEMBLIES

IN MCACES MII

Generic methods applicable to cost data for the ERDC BUILDER Sustainment Management System

Goodpaster, Steven R CIV USARMY CENWW (USA) Steven.R.Goodpaster@usace.army.mil

Abstract This paper describes how to build Cost Assemblies in MCACES MII using Project Item folders in lieu of the Assemblies tab, how to manage those assemblies into a master file with markups, and how to work with the costs data in other systems outside of MCACES MII.

It is a generic method that may be utilized in part or in whole for management of cost assembly data. This effort was funded by the U.S. Army Engineer Research and

Development Center (ERDC) regarding development/maintenance of cost data for use in their BUILDER Sustainment Management System.

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Contents Part I – Building Assembly Folders with Project Item Links in MCACES MII

Setting up the MCACES MII Project

Using the MII Costbook

Training for MCACES MII

Example 1 – Remove and Replace Security Windows

Example 2 – Remove and Replace Chiller

Remarks on Creation of Assembly Folders

Quality Control

Part II – Maintaining a Master Compilation of Assembly Folders in MCACES MII

Merging Assemblies Folders from other Sources into a Master File

Repricing Data

Repricing Material and Sub-Bid with the Cost Book

Repricing Equipment with the Equipment Book

Repricing Labor with a Labor Library

Contractor Assignments

Markups

Direct Cost

Contractor

Owner

Part III – Work with Cost Data Outside MCACES MII

Exporting MII data to MS Excel

Reapplying Markups

Cost to Prime

Contract Cost

Project Cost

Work Breakdown Structure

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Part I – Building Assembly Folders with Project Item Links in MCACES MII

Setting up the MCACES MII Project Assuming MCACES MII is already installed, type MII in the search bar and click on the icon to launch MCACES MII.

Select New Library on the startup window, or, if not present, access the window by selecting File from the ribbon and New… from the resultant dropdown menu. Hit OK.

Hit Continue on the New Library Wizard popup.

Ensure Local or Networked Library is selected, then hit Next >>.

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In the Type & New Library Path window, select Project from the Library Type:

dropdown. Then select the correct category for the project from the Select Work Breakdown Structure. Finally, ensure the file path for saving your project is correct in the Library to Save: section, hitting Browse… to select file name and path. When everything is correct, hit Finish.

Fill out the Project Properties as appropriate.

This is what a new project with the Military Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) looks like. It utilizes an older Uniformat WBS, so you will want to delete it.

To delete, right click the [1] Primary Facility folder and select Delete. Do this for the [G] Sitework folder as well.

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Using the MII Costbook

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You will need to click Yes when prompted to confirm deletion of the WBS folders.

Once all the WBS folders have been deleted, it will look like this:

The MCACES MII Cost Book can be used to add Construction Specification Institute (CSI) Tasks organized by the MasterFormat WBS. It can be accessed for use within the estimate by opening it as a Source Library. Select Source

Library from the ribbon. Then select the folder icon beside Open a Library…

Select Open Library and hit OK.

Select the desired Cost Library to open and click Open.

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You can search for cost book items using the Text search box in Select Filters… Keep in mind that you or the Costbook may have spelling mistakes, so you may have better luck searching with partial key words.

If you double-click on the gray box where the black arrow is located to the left of a search result item (the column to the left of the Source column), you’ll navigate in the Costbook folder tree to where the cost item is located. This is helpful to find similar Costbook items that may have not shown up in a keyword search.

You may copy Costbook CSI Tasks into the cost estimate: Right-click on an item from the Costbook, select Copy, and then right-click and Paste the CSI Task into a folder within your cost estimate Project Items tab.

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If you navigate back to Item Detail, you can now inspect the Project Item that was created with its child CSI Task from the Costbook.

The figure below shows the top-level Project Item that was created, and under that is it’s child CSI Task from the Costbook. The white boxes on the Project Item near Crew Output, Labor Cost, Equip Cost, Material Cost, and Sub Bid Cost allow you to make user overrides.

This is where changes must be made (i.e., not on the child CSI Task itself) to preserve its original Source so it does not modify into a User-Created Item. Cost Items modified on the Project Item level can be re-priced with an updated Costbook; an exception will occur if the underlying child CSI Task is modified into a USR Source CSI Task.

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Training for MCACES MII

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Inspecting the Figure below for the underlying CSI Task to the Project Item, you can see the Source is listed as RSM (RSMeans). Changing any value here will change the Source to USR (a user created item), that will not automatically reprice with a cost book update. It will also create issues when merging multiple estimates together if there are different USR Source CSI Tasks that share the same Source Tag. Please refrain from modifying CSI Tasks and instead use the over-rides from the Project Items level as seen in the Figure above. Make sure to clearly document the basis of any override in the Note field shown in the figure above.

Training for MCACES MII For additional instructions on how to use MCACES MII software, please refer to available training sources. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Learning Center does provide two courses: Micro-Computer Aided Cost Estimating System II Basic, and Micro-Computer Aided Cost Estimating System II Advanced. Other training material is available. The intent of this document is not to provide training on how to use the MCACES MII software, but rather to provide the workflow on how to create assemblies using Project Item level folders in a way that is manageable as input cost data for other systems.

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Example 1 – Remove and Replace Security Windows

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Example 1 – Remove and Replace Security Windows Now that the project is set up in MCACES MII, an assembly can be created. For this example, an assembly will be created as shown in Figure 21.

The assembly from Figure 21 has Uniformat Level 4 WBS of B202001 as shown in Figure 22.

To understand the WBS hierarchy for Uniformat Level 4 and recreate the folder tree for the Uniformat level 4 WBS B202001, referencing the Uniformat WBS will most likely be required. The Navy has a convenient reference for an updated Uniformat WBS at the Whole Building Design Guide (WBDG) website. It can be searched for via a search engine, and the website address is shown in Figure 23.

Using the WBDG website as a reference, create the Uniformat WBS for the example assembly in MCACES MII (see Figure 24 and Figure 25).

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Before you get started, it’ll be helpful to turn on Source Tag within MCACES MII.

Click the Toggle Folder Tags dropdown menu on the ribbon and select Source Tag. This will show the source tag to the left of the folders in the tree view.

Right-click on the Project within the Project Items tab and select New Folder.

Referencing the Uniformat WBS for the levels up to B202001, create the folder tree structure. Make sure to fill out the Source Tag, Description, Note, and UOM (unit of measure) fields.

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Now that the four levels of the Uniformat WBS for the assembly example above have been created, create a folder under the Uniformat Level 4 WBS to contain the assembly.

Add Project Items for CSI Tasks under the assembly folder. Verify that the items chosen to comprise the assembly are the most appropriate and remove/add items as necessary. You may drag items back into the folder to reorder them by sequence when the work is performed or create a sub-level folder to organize specific tasks to perform (e.g., prep, form, re-steel, place, finish). The cost items for this example which are close to the assembly are shown in the Figure below:

Next, click on each item in the assembly, then link them to the top-level folder by selecting the chain icon in the Item Values section to the upper-right of the screen.

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Click the Link to a… dropdown menu and select Project Items & Folders.

Use formula to convert mismatching quantities between the assembly UOM and the CSI task UOM as appropriate. Make sure to document your work in the Note text box so it is intuitive to others.

Let’s study the item highlighted in Figure 39. Highlight it, click the quantity linking button (Figure 37), select to link it to the assembly folder (Figure 38), and then enter the quantity linking equation (Figure 40). Note that the UOM of the Project Item is in Tons, whereas the assembly UOM is in square feet (SF). To convert mismatched quantities, Q is first multiplied by 1/3 ft (assuming 4-inch thick window), giving a cubic foot (CF) measurement.

Next, Q*1/3 is divided by 27 to convert CF to cubic yards (CY). Finally, a value of

1.6 Tons/CY is added. This gives the formula of ((Q*1/3)/27)*1.6 (Figure 40).

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Figure 39

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When done inputting the formula, click OK. The Quantity tab will be zero value.

To update the value, click the ReCalc Library calculator icon, which should be highlighted in red in the ribbon (Figure 42).

The linked quantity is now displayed.

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The first Project Item of Example 1 is shown in Figure 44.

Note in Figure 44 that the Quantity link is green to signify that it is a linked quantity. Only link CSI tasks to the folder above it, and nowhere else. That will prevent the issue of broken links and prevent a spaghetti mess of tracing where Project Items link. Also note that the Crew Output was adjusted, but none of the other values.

The Project Item Figure 44 only has a Labor Cost, and that field should NOT be overwritten.

The Labor Cost will update when repricing with the Labor Library as described in the Section for Repricing Labor on page 36. The only acceptable convention to increase labor cost in this case is by adjusting the Crew Output. Keep in mind that a universal productivity adjustment may be applied later (e.g., 80% productivity rate) by whomever is managing the Master MII file as described in Part II – Maintaining a Master Compilation of Assembly Folders in MCACES MII on page 28.

The remaining four items in the assembly example are shown in Figure 45, Figure 46, Figure 47, and Figure 48.

Figure 44

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In Figure 45, and Figure 46, pay particular attention to the Note field. It is important to document anything that another Cost Engineer would not readily understand through mere inspection. In the case of Figure 45, it is assumed the windows consume 4-inch thickness of space. In the case of Figure 46, in addition to the thickness assumption, a density of

1.6 TN/CY is assumed.

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Figure 46

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Figure 47

Figure 48

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After creating the assembly, inspect the overall assembly. The Source Tag can be changed so that the folder Project Items in the folder tree view for the assemblies show the quantities with respect to one unit of the assembly. This can be done by clicking on the dropdown near the folder on the top bar, and clicking on Quantity/UOM as shown in Figure 49.

The finished assembly showing quantities of the Project Items per 1 SF of assembly, and the unit costs is shown in Figure 50 and Figure 51.

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Example 2 – Remove and Replace Chiller

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Building on Example 1 above, another example is shown below.

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Now that the Uniformat folders have been created with the appropriate Source Tags, Notes, and UOM, the Assembly folder with Source Tag and Description from Figure 52 can be created. The Assembly folder, and Project Items with their child CSI Tasks, are shown in Figure 61.

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The first Project Item in the assembly is shown in Figure 62. Notice that Modifiers were added for congested area and working in an occupied office building (Figure 63). Modifiers are available for certain Project items in the Costbook and can be found by clicking on the Members button.

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In the case of assembly Project Item number 4 for the water chiller (Figure 66), modifiers are added for: congested area, upgrade to SEER 14, and working in an occupied office building (Figure 67).

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Figure 67

Remarks on Creation of Assembly Folders

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Remarks on Creation of Assembly Folders Before you get started creating Assembly Folders in earnest, make sure to read Quality Control on page 25. Quality Control, and Quality Assurance, are important to ensure that assemblies are created in such a way that they are manageable, with consideration to the workflow for which they are used. The assemblies will be used for many years into the future, so a focus on ease of updatability (See Repricing Data on page 29) is paramount.

There is another way to create assemblies within MCACES MII. That is through the Assemblies tab. This guide recommends the approach outlined above using Project Items with Folders. The method within the Assemblies tab utilizes a grouping of CSI Tasks, but they are not a child of the parent Project Item. As a result, it is not possible to override Crew Output, Material Cost, or Sub Bid Cost. For example, Figure 68 shows the Project Item parent to a CSI Task with checkmark fields for overrides. You can see in the left pane tree view the child CSI Task nested under the Project Item.

As you dive down one level deeper to the child CSI Task (Figure 69), you can see that there is no way to apply an override. Any changes made here will modify the CSI Task, and its source will change from RSM to USR. Doing this is strongly discouraged when compiling estimates from multiple sources, because there will arise cases when some estimates have an RSM sourced CSI Task and others have a custom USR sourced CSI Task with the same Source Tag. If you must create a USR CSI Task, you must change the Source Tag to something unique. For example, append the three letter initials for your name, followed by an index or version number.

Figure 68

Quality Control

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When working with Assembly folders, special care must be taken with linking. As a convention to keep the Cost Engineer sane, only link to the folder one level above the Project Item. If you copy and paste a Project Item from one folder to another, always re-link it back to the upper-level folder—otherwise, the Project Item will link to another Assembly Folder. If everything is linked properly by convention, the Assembly Folders themselves can be moved within the cost estimate or transferred to another cost estimate without any of the links breaking.

Keep in mind that you can drag Equipment, Labor, and Crews into an Assembly Folder in lieu of a CSI Task. Study the crews attached to the CSI Tasks that comprise an Assembly, and add additional Project Items as required. For example, the CSI Task from the MII Cost Book may only have a crew with one (1) electrician to install light fixtures – you may need to add a scissor lift and a laborer to have a completed crew to accomplish the work required.

In those cases, the quantity linking would multiply the labor/crew/equipment hours by a production rate. It can be helpful to reference the productivity rate of other items in the assembly that additional labor/crew/equipment is supporting. As always, make sure to document numbers used in quantity linking that aren’t obvious by inspection from others.

Quality Control Make sure that assembly folders have:

• source tags prefixed with Uniformat level 4 WBS

• unique source tags

• the correct description

• the unit of measure set

• at most only one (1) level of folders

• project items that link only one level up to the parent folder

• no broken quantity Project Item or sub-folder links

Figure 69

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The intent is to create Assembly Folders with MCACES MII Project Items with Bare costs.

Bare costs do not include any Markups. Markups will be applied in the Master Compilation of Assembly folders in another MCACES MII file, as described in Part II – Maintaining a Master Compilation of Assembly Folders in MCACES MII on page 28. Therefore, do not:

• assign any contractors

• apply any direct cost markups (e.g., productivity, overtime, sales tax)

• apply any contractor markups by assigning contractors (e.g., Job Office Overhead

(JOOH), Home Office Overhead (HOOH), Profit, Bond, etc.)

• apply any owner markups (e.g., escalation, contingency, Supervision, Inspection and Overhead (SIOH), etc.)

Instead of using productivity markups, use a Project Item override as necessary to adjust crew output. If this is done, document why in the Note field (e.g., Figure 70).

The effective pricing level for material costs needs to be within a year of the latest MCACES MII Cost Book, if using a material cost override. The 2024 MII English Costbook, for example, has an effective pricing date of 01/01/2024. This adjustment shall not be made through a markup—the material cost override shall include any inflation adjustment in the number to the Costbook effective pricing date as necessary.

ONLY override the Material Cost if necessary. If possible, utilize Costbook material prices for similar items with similar cost and create a note stating that the material cost is representative. That will facilitate automatic future updates of material prices with future cost book releases (See Repricing Data on page 29). If an override of material cost is used, Figure 70

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DO NOT override Labor Cost or Equip Cost of Project Items in the Unit Costs section, because those values come from the labor/equipment library respectively. If additional labor/equipment costs are required, add the labor/equipment to the assembly as a separate Project Item.

Do not dive down from the Project Item level into the CSI task attached to the Project item and change things. Doing so will change the Source from RSM or HNC (Huntsville Engineering and Support Center) to USR, which will not be updated when repricing with the cost book. If a USR item is used, create a new item with a unique Source Tag that is unlikely to be used by another independent cost estimator. If a USR item is used, document it sufficiently so that it can be manually updated in the future by someone else (i.e., document productivity rate, material price source/date/contact, etc.).

Pay particular attention to the Source of the item in the MII Cost Book. Do not use CSI Tasks with a source of NLU, which stands for No Longer Updated. That pricing source is old and is not updated when the cost estimate is repriced with the current or future Cost Books.

Do not add more than one (1) sub-folder within the assembly folder, as it will have performance implications in MCACES MII. Sub-folders are helpful to organize multiple steps in more complicated assemblies. For example, for concrete you might have folders for prep, re-steel, form, place, finish, and cure.

Merging Assemblies Folders from other Sources into a Master File

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Part II – Maintaining a Master Compilation of Assembly Folders in MCACES MII

Merging Assemblies Folders from other Sources into a Master File Assemblies can be created by others in their own MCACES MII files. If the rules are followed with respect to Source Tag coding, and overrides are utilized in lieu of directly modifying RSM/HNC CSI Tasks without giving them unique Source Tags unlikely to be used by others, the Assemblies Folders can be merged from multiple MCACES MII files into one Master MCACES MII file. This is done by opening each of the MCACES MII files containing Assembly Folders as a Source Library and selecting the assembly folder to import from the source (Figure 71).

Once the Source Library containing the assemblies to import is opened on the right pane of MCACES MII, the assemblies can be copied over into the Master Compilation of Assemblies MII file. This is done by left-clicking to highlight the source (assembly folder to import), destination (level 4 Uniformat folder in the master MII file), and then clicking the button for Copy Row(s) to Selected Folder (Figure 72).

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Figure 72

Repricing Data

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Alternatively, the assembly folders can be copied over by either dragging and dropping, or right-clicking on the assembly to import, selecting copy, right-clicking on the destination folder (level 4 Uniformat WBS), and then selecting paste.

Repricing Data

Repricing Material and Sub-Bid with the Cost Book Once a Master MCACES MII file has been created and populated with assembly folders, the cost data can be repriced with the latest Cost Book release to keep it current. The Cost Book is repriced first, before repricing Labor or Equipment, because it will also reprice the labor/equipment to Seattle, WA. The Labor/Equipment can be repriced separately after the Cost Book is repriced.

To reprice the Costbook, navigate to Library Properties (Figure 73), and then to the Cost Book tab (Figure 74). On the Cost Book tab, click the Translate and Reprice… button.

After clicking on the Translate and Reprice… button, a warning window will appear (Figure 75). Read the disclaimer and click on the Yes button to begin repricing the MCACES MII Master Compilation Assembly file with the Costbook.

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After agreeing to the Reprice Warning disclaimer, click on the three dots (…) under the Costbook Library text field (Figure 76) to open another window that will allow you to select the Costbook to use for repricing (Figure 77).

After the Cost Book has been repriced, pay attention to any exceptions (Figure 78). USR items will not be repriced and need to be updated manually.

Any CSI Tasks that have been moved from an RSM/HNC to NLU (No Longer Updated) source must have their Project Items reworked in the Assembly Folder so that current pricing data is used. As shown in Figure 78, there are no exceptions in this example.

For a more user-friendly view of the exceptions, click the icon of the page with the magnifying glass in front of it. It will then open a Costbook Exceptions Report in your web browser (Figure 79). It is recommended when resolving multiple exceptions to highlight the data, copy it, and paste it into MS Excel. A column can be created to flag exceptions that have been resolved as they are worked through in the MCACES MII file. You can rerun the Cost Book reprice to show which exceptions remain when working through resolving them.

User created CSI Tasks and Project Items (USR Source) will always show up on the exceptions report. These items will need to be manually updated, as the reprice does not know how to update those items. Clearly document in the CSI Task notes of USR items the pricing source, pricing date, and any other information pertinent for ease of future updates.

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Repricing Equipment with the Equipment Book As you can see, this estimate is currently using the 2022 MII Equipment Library (Figure 80).

The current library is year 2024, so it will need to be repriced. To do so, click on the Reprice… button.

Before you can select the correct Equipment library, the region must first be determined.

The Equipment Library comes with a PDF titled Map of Regions, which shows the regions covered. To reprice the equipment to Seattle, WA, it is determined through inspection of Figure 81 that Region VIII (8) must be selected.

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After clicking the Reprice… button, a Reprice Warning will appear. Click on Yes to continue (Figure 82).

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After clicking the Yes button on the Reprice Warning window, you will have the option to select the Equipment Library. As discussed earlier, the Equipment Library for Region 8 is selected (Figure 83).

After repricing the equipment, it will generate an exceptions report (Figure 84).

Resolve all exceptions as required to update equipment costs to the current pricing level. There may be cases where assembly folders utilize Project Items that have CSI Tasks, Crews, or Equipment that has Equipment Items that are outdated (i.e., no longer in the new equipment library). Those Assemblies Folders will need to be reworked, and have their equipment replaced with what is available in the current Equipment Library. Evaluate whether any USR equipment can be replaced with an equivalent in the Equipment Book, and if not, it will need to be updated manually as appropriate.

Now that the equipment has been repriced, there are some fields that need to be updated under the Equipment tab.

You must update the:

• Sales Tax

• Cost of Money

• Land Fuel rates

Sales tax can be updated by using an Internet search engine to locate a website where the tax rates are documented. In the case of Seattle, the sales tax rate can be found on the Department of Revenue Washington State website (URL shown in Figure 85).

Upon navigating to the website, select the most up-to-date year (Figure 86), and click the link for the most recent Quarter.

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In the PDF that opens for Local Sales and Use Tax Rates by City/County, search for the Combined Sales Tax for Seattle, WA (Figure 87).

The sales tax rate of 10.35% is to be input on the Equipment tab under Factors and Sales Tax (Figure 88).

The Cost of Money rate can be found through an Internet search engine by searching for “prompt payment interest rate.” It should take you to the website shown in Figure 89. The current rate is 4.625% as shown in Figure 90. Input the interest rate in the Equipment tab Cost of Money field (Figure 91).

The land fuel rates can be updated from various sources. One such source is the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). You can find the website through an Internet search engine by searching for “EIA fuel rates.” You should find the website URL shown in Figure 92 as one of the top search results.

On the EIA website you can find regular unleaded fuel rates for Seattle, WA (Figure 93), and On-Highway Diesel for West Coast Less California (Figure 94). For Off- Road Diesel, the EIA website shows the percent of taxes applied to Diesel (Figure 95). The Off-Road Diesel rate can be calculated as $3.201/gal [$3.857*(1- 0.17)] by removing the taxes from the On- Road Diesel Rate.

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The fuel rates for Gas, Diesel (Off-Road), and Diesel (On-Road) on the Equipment tab must be updated. Figure 96 shows the updated values from the latest EIA fuel rates shown by inspecting Figure 93, Figure 94, and Figure 95.

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Repricing Labor with a Labor Library As you can see, the estimate is currently using the 2023 National Labor Library – Seattle 2023.

There is a National Labor Library – Seattle 2024 available, which is the most current “official” labor library for that city. That labor library, however, is arguably out of date. While the date of the Davis Bacon Wage Determination is current, the survey date of the individual labor trades may be out of date. Sometimes, the last survey date for the wage of a particular trade may be multiple years old. In some cases, the last survey date may have been during the COVID-19 epidemic or even before.

Inflating the Davis Bacon Wage Determination rates for trades people from the last survey date to current pricing levels is the best practice. To do so requires a system and workflow that may be unique to a particular Cost Engineer.

One such method is as described below.

First, create a new labor library within MCACES MII. To do so, click on File and New… (Figure 98). Click Next >> on the New Library Wizard window that pops up (Figure 99). Select a Library Type of Labor, Browse for where you want to save it, and click Finish (Figure 100).

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Figure 100

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Once the Labor Library has been created, it will open in MCACES MII with the Labor Properties window showing (Figure 101).

Fill out the Title and Notes as desired, and then click on Close.

Now that a Labor Library has been created, open the MCACES MII Master Assemblies file as a Source Library. Click on Source Library, and then the Open a Source Library Folder (Figure 102).

On the pop-up window, select Open Library and then click on OK (Figure 103).

Navigate to find the Master Compilation of Assembly Folders MCACES MII file, select it, and click on Open (Figure 104).

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In Figure 105, you can see that the Master Compilation of Assembly Folders MCACES MII file is now opened as a Source Library. Change the Views from Project Items to Labor to view the Labor Items in the Source Library.

Figure 106 shows the first Labor Item in the MCACES MII Master Assemblies file.

To copy the Labor Item into the Labor Library, you first need to create an empty folder in the Labor Library.

MCACES MII will not allow you to copy a Labor Item from a Source File into the Labor Library without first creating an empty folder (e.g., New Folder) as shown in Figure 107.

Now that the empty seed folder New Folder has been created, drag and drop the Labor Item into the Labor Library (Figure 108). Notice that the folder structure from the Source Document is automatically generated (Figure 109).

The empty seed folder is no longer needed and can be deleted (Figure 110).

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Continue copying Labor Items over from the Source File into the Labor Library.

Notice as you copy over the Labor Items that the folder structure from the Source Library is automatically generated for you.

Now that all the Labor Items have been copied over into the Labor Library, inspect the first Labor Item (Figure 112). You will see that it has a Source, SourceTag, Description, and Note field. The JBaseWage is the base wage rate.

TaxableFringe and NonTaxFringe are the fringe benefits rates for taxable and non-taxable respectively. Travel and Subsistence are to cover costs for inadequate local workforce.

For Labor Items that have a MIL Source, they can be repriced with the Labor Library. Other Sources will need to be repriced in the MCACES MII project without the use of a Labor Library.

The MIL Source Labor Items in the Labor Library need to be updated with the latest Davis Bacon Wage Determination, have its labor rate escalated to the most current date, and have other adjustments applied as necessary. To aid in calculation of escalation and generation of a Note that is auditable, it is recommended to use an MS Excel Spreadsheet.

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Figure 112

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An example MS Excel Spreadsheet to generate a verbose Note field for the MCACES MII Labor Library is shown in Figure 113. The SourceTag (Column A), and Description (Column B), are Input into the Orange cells to match what is in the Labor Library (Figure 112). The Note (Column C) includes concatenation of all pertinent information that allows a Cost Engineer to trace the cost source, labor rates, escalation source, math on how the sources were escalated, and a parametric adjustment, if applicable (e.g., adjusting labor rates to another city that doesn’t have good Davis Bacon Wage Determination data). The Note column is generated here to fill out the Note field in the MCACES MII Labor Library.

Inspecting the Base Wage calculation (Figure 114), it references the ECICONWAG tab cell G12, and columns R, J, and O.

Inspecting Figure 115:

• Column R is the Index Number closest to the Labor Date (column M)

• Column J is for any parametric adjustment, if applicable—no adjustment is made, because you are using Seattle, WA, Davis Bacon Wage Determination

• Column O is the hourly dollar rate from the Davis Bacon Wage Determination

Figure 113

Figure 114

Final April 4, 2025 Page 41 of 62

Cell G12 from the ECICONWAG tab (Figure 116) is the latest index number available in the escalation source.

Putting this all together, the calculation for the base wage is shown in Figure 117.

A similar process is applied to derive the escalated Taxable Fringe. Non-Taxable Fringe is merely the total fringe benefits minus $1, because Davis Bacon Wage Determination does not provide enough detail to determine Taxable vs. Non- Taxable Fringe benefits.

Once the MS Spreadsheet generates a proper Note field for each of the Labor Items in the Labor Library, the Note fields can be copied into the Labor Library. To do so, it is recommended to first copy/paste the MS Excel Note cell into Notepad and then paste it into MCACES MII. Doing it this way will preserve line breaks. If you copy/paste from MS Excel

Figure 115

Figure 116

Figure 117

Final April 4, 2025 Page 42 of 62 directly into the MCACES MII Notes field, the text will be one continuous line of text that is more difficult to read.

Figure 118 shows the Note cell from the MS Excel spreadsheet copy/pasted into Notepad. The copy/paste from Notepad into the MCACES MII Labor Library is shown in Figure 119. Notice that the Base wage and fringe benefits are updated to reflect what is in the Note field.

You will need to copy/paste the Note field from MS Excel to Notepad, and then from Notepad to MCACES MII, for all the remaining Labor Items. Don’t forget to update the Labor Rates based on the Notes for each Labor Item. Once this has been completed, you may save and close the Labor Library.

Figure 118

Figure 119

Contractor Assignments

Final April 4, 2025 Page 43 of 62

Contractor Assignments Contractors must be assigned to Assembly Project Item folders so that Payroll Tax, Workman’s Compensation Insurance (WCI), and Contractor Markups (see Markups on page 47) are applied. To do so, Contractors must first be created, and Payroll Tax & Insurance configured, for the State and Contractor Class.

Navigate to the Contractors tab and create a new Contractor by right-clicking on the MCACES MII project name in the left pane, selecting New, and then Contractor (Figure 120).

In this example, assume a General Contractor (GC) will oversee trades for all in-place work. Rename the New Contractor to GC (Figure 121 and Figure 122).

As the Prime Contractor is assumed to be a General Contractor, Subcontractors for each of the trades will need to be created.

For this example, several possible trades are created for Electrician, Glazier, and HVAC (Figure 123). Notice that Subcontractors are in the tree nested as a sub-item to the Prime Contractor (GC).

Figure 120

Figure 121

Figure 122

Figure 123

Final April 4, 2025 Page 44 of 62

As Seattle, WA, is the location chosen for the MCACES MII Master Compilation of Assemblies project, the State of WA will need to be selected (Figure 124) to determine the Payroll Tax rates for each of the Contractors (i.e., the Prime Contractor, and all Subcontractors).

For the GC, set the appropriate Contractor Class (Figure 125). In some cases, the General Contractor may self-perform work, and a Contractor Class of Excavation, Concrete Work, or Carpenter may be applicable. In this case, the Prime Contractor is a GC that will primarily be in the office. Therefore, select Clerical Help as the Contractor class. Notice in Figure 126 that Contractor Class will display once it is selected, and that the WCI Rate will update.

Similar to setting the Contractor Class for the GC, the Contractor Class will also need to be updated for the Subcontractors of Electrician (Figure 127), Glazier (Figure 128), and HVAC (Figure 129). Notice again that the WCI Rates adjust based on what Contractor Class is selected.

Figure 124

Figure 125

Figure 126

Final April 4, 2025 Page 45 of 62

Now that the Payroll Tax & Insurance State and Contractor Classes are defined for all the Contractors on the Contractor’s tab, navigate over to the Project Items tab.

Contractors can be assigned here by selecting Project Item folders and then utilizing the dropdown on the right to select one of the defined Contractors.

This will be done on the Uniformat Level 4 folders, and four examples are shown below.

For Uniformat Level 4 [B202001] Windows, select Glazier as the Default Assigned Contractor (Figure 130).

For Uniformat Level 4 [D303001] Chilled Water Systems, select HVAC as the Default Assigned Contractor (Figure 131).

Figure 127

Figure 128

Figure 129

Figure 130

Final April 4, 2025 Page 46 of 62

For Uniformat Level 4 [D401002] Fire Alarm Devices, select Electrician as the Default Assigned Contractor (Figure 132).

For Uniformat Level 4 [G401003] Switches, Controls & Devices, select Electrician as the Default Assigned Contractor (Figure 133).

It is Cost Engineer judgement to determine the appropriate hierarchy of Contractors, and which Contractor Class is appropriate. Contractor Classes determine how risky the type of work is to set the WCI rate. The hierarchy determines how many layers of Contractor Markups will be applied. In some cases, there can be three tiers of Contractors (e.g., Prime Contractor -> Electrician Subcontractor -> Controls Subcontractor).

Figure 131

Figure 132

Figure 133

Markups

Final April 4, 2025 Page 47 of 62

Markups Without any markups applied, the only costs reported will be Bare Costs. Bare Costs do not include any markups. It is imperative to apply markups to capture the total Project Cost of the MII Project Item Assemblies. Fully marked-up Project Costs can be more than double that of the Bare Costs.

Markups are broken into three components: Direct Cost, Contractor, and Owner.

Direct Cost Direct cost markups include

• Productivity

• Overtime

• Sales Tax

• Payroll Tax

• Workman’s Compensation

Insurance (WCI)

• Misc. Direct Costs

Productivity Productivity Markup can be applied to the entire project by navigating to Project Items, selecting the project (top root level of the folder tree on the left pane), clicking on the Markups button, clicking on <Add Markups>, highlighting Direct Cost, and then selecting Productivity (Figure 134).

An appropriate universal Productivity markup may be subjective to a particular Cost Engineer. A 100% productivity markup is baselined to what RSMeans considers is normal for unrestricted commercial construction. For Government work with added requirements on the in-place work labor workforce, an 80% productivity markup may be reasonable (Figure 135) as a generic recommendation without consideration for a specific project.

Overtime Overtime markup is applied by the same procedure as the Productivity Markup (Figure 136).

Figure 134

Figure 135

Figure 136

Final April 4, 2025 Page 48 of 62

The overtime markup amount cannot be applied under Folder Detail -> Markups, and is instead found under the Project Properties -> Markups tab. Figure 137 shows how to define a 5x10 hour work schedule. Notice that the Overtime Percentage markup is 10%, and there is a -20% FCCM Adjustment Percentage.

FCCM is for Facility Capital Cost of Money, which adjusts downward the depreciation rate of the equipment that is based on an 8-hour per day depreciation schedule.

Once the Overtime has been configured in the Markups tab of the Project Properties, hit the Close button. You will need to click on the Calculator button (Figure 138) for the Overtime Markup field under Markups on the Project Items tab to populate (Figure 139).

Sales Tax Sales Tax is applied to the project the same way as Productivity and Overtime (Figure 140).

The Sales Tax rate is determined as described in the Section Repricing Equipment with the Equipment Book on page 31. The Sales Tax field populated for the rate in Seattle, WA, is shown in Figure 141.

Payroll Tax & Insurance Payroll Tax and WCI is applied under the Contractors tab -> Payroll Tax & Insurance, as described in Section Contractor Assignments on page 43.

Figure 137

Figure 138

Figure 139

Figure 140

Figure 141

Final April 4, 2025 Page 49 of 62

Miscellaneous Direct Costs Other miscellaneous Direct Costs can be applied as necessary. The primary one of interest is Inflation of the Cost Book to the current pricing date. This can be done by defining custom Direct Cost Markups and referencing the latest RSMeans data Cost Book Updates.

First the Material Cost (MatlCost) and Sub Bid Cost (SubbidCost) Markups need to be created in the Project Properties (see Figure 142 and Figure 143 respectively).

These markups are applied to Material Cost, and Sub Bid Costs, respectively as a Running % on Selected Costs.

The current Cost Book is 2024, and the year as of this writing is 2025. To determine the Material and Sub Bid markup percentages, the RSMeans Construction Cost Index Updates will need to be referenced for the latest Quarter in 2024 and 2025.

For RSMeans City Cost Index 2024, the website URL can be found through a web search engine. The URL is shown in Figure 144.

Click on the weblink for the Q4 City Cost Index (Figure 145), and then look up the rates for Seattle, WA (Figure 146).

Figure 142

Figure 143

Figure 144

Figure 145

Figure 146

Final April 4, 2025 Page 50 of 62

Follow the same procedure to look up the RSMeans City Cost Index for 2025. The URL is shown in Figure 147.

Click on the weblink for Q1 City Cost Index (Figure 148), and then look up the rates for Seattle, WA (Figure 149).

Now that the rates to apply inflation adjustment to the 2024 Cost Book have been determined, the Material Inflation is calculated as shown in Figure 150.

The Material Inflation Markup is added on the root folder of the Project in the Project Items tab under Markups by selecting

Direct Cost and then MatlInflation (Figure 151).

Once the Material Inflation Markup has been added, input the rate (Figure 152).

Similarly to the process for applying Material Inflation, Sub Bid Inflation is applied using the Average % from the RSMeans City Cost Index (Figure 153).

Figure 147

Figure 148

Figure 149

Figure 150

Figure 151

Figure 152

Figure 153

Final April 4, 2025 Page 51 of 62

Add Sub Bid Inflation Markup on the roof folder of the Project Items tab under Markups by selecting Direct Cost and then SubInflation (Figure 154).

Once the Sub Bid Inflation Markup has been added, input the rate (Figure 155).

One other Markup Consideration in the current environment as of this writing is Tariffs. There are many Tariffs going into effect by executive order, and those price adjustments to material prices are not yet reflected in the RSMeans City Cost Index Inflation adjustments applied earlier.

Therefore, it would be reasonable to add another Miscellaneous Markup on Material Costs for Tariffs.

A markup for Tariffs can be created in Project Properties under Direct Costs by creating a Miscellaneous Markup with Method Running % on Selected Costs on MatlCost (Figure 156).

The effect of the Tariffs is currently unknown. Considering 25% tariffs are applied to many raw material costs from outside of the country, adding half of that (12.5%) as a Tariff markup may be reasonable (Figure 157). Further analysis, and discussion within the Cost Engineering Community of Practice, is necessary to determine the most appropriate markup rate.

Figure 154

Figure 155

Figure 156

Figure 157

Final April 4, 2025 Page 52 of 62

Contractor JOOH, HOOH, Profit, Bond Contractor Markups are applied under the Contractors tab. To apply Markups to the GC, select GC in the left pane, click on the Markups button, click on <Add Markup>, select Contractor, and then add the applicable markups (Figure 158).

For the GC, the following Contractor Markups are applied: JOOH, HOOH, Profit, and Bond (Figure 159). It is assumed in this case that JOOH activities of the Prime Contractor will cover the Sub-Contractors. The Bond covers both the bid bond and performance & payment bond. Any Insurance costs are assumed to be included in HOOH.

For budgetary cost estimates adding a Contractor Markup for Mobilization and Demobilization costs may be reasonable.

This markup is not included in a default project and can be created in Project Properties as a Misc. Running % (Figure 160). A 5% default may be reasonable.

Figure 158

Figure 159

Figure 160

Final April 4, 2025 Page 53 of 62

The Mob/Demob Markup can be added to the Prime Contractor similar to the other Markups (Figure 161).

Notice that when the Mob/Demob markup is added, it automatically populates with the default markup of 5% (Figure 162).

Markups for the Sub-Contractors are applied by selecting each of them in the left pane, and then adding Markups as applicable (Figure 163, Figure 164, and Figure 165). Notice that the JOOH markup is not included, because it is assumed the GC will cover JOOH activities for the Sub-Contractors. Also notice that no Bond is included, as the GC for Government work is required to Bond all the work for the entire Contract, including work performed by the Subcontractors.

Contingency (Design/Estimating) Design/Estimating Contingency is missing from the default setup of a MCACES MII project under Contractor Markups. You will notice that there is a Contingency under Owner Markups in Project Properties, but that is for Construction Contingency to cover mods/claims during construction. A new markup will need to be created for the Design/Estimating Contingency in the Project Properties (Figure 166).

Figure 161

Figure 162

Figure 163

Figure 164

Figure 165

Final April 4, 2025 Page 54 of 62

Now that a Running % Misc.

Design/Estimating Contingency Markup has been created under Contractor in the Project Properties, it can be added to the GC to have it applied to all the costs with the Prime or any of its Sub-Contractors assigned. The markup can be added in the Contractors tab by selecting the GC, clicking on Markups, selecting Contractor, and then clicking on Contingency (Figure 167).

This whitepaper is written to inform the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC) regarding management of cost assembly data for use in the Sustainment Management System (SMS). The SMS produces an Estimate classification of 5, or at best 4, per the Association for the Advancement of Cost Engineering (AACE) International Estimate Classification system. A typical Design/Estimating Contingency at those classification levels according to AACE could range from 20% to 100%. Therefore, an assumed Contingency of 50% is within the expected range.

A 50% contingency applied to the GC is shown in Figure 168.

Owner Owner Markups include:

• Construction Contingency

• Engineering & Design

• SIOH

• Escalation

For USACE Civil Works projects, these markups are applied in the Total Project Cost Summary (TPCS) Excel Spreadsheet.

The MCACES MII Cost Estimate does not include these owner markups.

For USACE MILCON projects, these markups are included in the DD1391.

This whitepaper intends to describe the process to develop fully funded costs for

Figure 166

Figure 167

Figure 168

Final April 4, 2025 Page 55 of 62 use in other systems that don’t utilize a TPCS or DD1391. Therefore, these markups can be included in the MCACES MII Master Project Item Assemblies file.

Contingency (Construction) As discussed earlier in Section Contingency (Design/Estimating) on page 53, the Owner markup for Contingency is specifically Construction Contingency for anticipated mods/claims during construction. For clarification, it is helpful to rename this markup in Project Properties. Also, Contingency should be reordered to be the first Owner markup applied (Figure 169).

Construction Contingency can be added by selecting the top-level folder or the project under the Project Items tab, clicking on Markups, selecting Owner, and then clicking on Contingency (Figure 170).

A Construction Contingency of 10% should be adequate to cover mods/claims on most projects (Figure 171).

SIOH

The SIOH is the Government’s cost to provide Construction Field Management.

While there are mandated SIOH rates for MILCON projects mandated to be used in DD1391 programming estimates, there are other sources to determine this rate when there is no mandate. One such source is the USACE’s TPCS Spreadsheet, which contains the average USACE cost of doing business Construction Phase account rates (Figure 172) that, when added up, total 14.5%.

Figure 169

Figure 170

Figure 171

Final April 4, 2025 Page 56 of 62

SIOH should be added after Construction Contingency and calculated based on the Contract Cost. By default, this is not how a new MCACES MII project is configured.

The adjusted SIOH markup is shown in Figure 173.

The SIOH markup is added in the Project Items tab by selecting the parent project folder in the left pane, clicking on Markups, selecting Owner, and then clicking on SIOH (Figure 174).

The SIOH markup with the applied 14.5% is shown in Figure 175.

Engineering & Design By default, in a new MCACES MII project, there is no markup for Engineering…