Construction
Milestone billing, retention, and subcontractors who need paying now.
Income arrives at milestones. Costs arrive every week. Each site needs its own budget and its own answer.
Start freeCastell Projects Ltd
Lekki site, contract LK-07 · Budget ₦86,000,000
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Certified and invoiced3 milestones | ₦52,400,000 |
| Retention held5% across certificates | ₦2,620,000 |
| Subcontractor payables9 bills due this week | ₦7,180,000 |
| Budget remaining39% | ₦33,600,000 |
The problem
Where the cash gets stuck here.
Construction income is lumpy by design. A milestone is certified, an invoice goes out, a retention is held back, and the balance arrives whenever the client's own process allows. Meanwhile the site consumes cement, diesel, plant hire and labour continuously.
Retention is the part that goes missing. A percentage held on every certificate, released long after the job is finished, easily forgotten by the only people entitled to chase it.
01
Retention nobody is tracking
Five per cent held on every certificate becomes a real sum across a year, and it is rarely on anyone's list.
02
Subcontractors on weekly terms
Labour and plant hire expect paying long before the client certifies the work they contributed to.
03
Site costs pooled together
Two sites running at once, one set of records, and no honest answer about which one is profitable.
04
Purchases made at the gate
A site manager buys what is needed to keep work moving. The approval, if any, happens after the fact.
On Billif
How the same work runs instead.
A project per site
Each site carries its own budget and timeline. Materials, plant and subcontractor costs post to the site that used them.
Invoice the milestone, track the balance
Invoice on certification with a pay-link. Retention stays visible as an outstanding balance instead of vanishing into a percentage.
Subcontractor bills in one queue
Bills forward in and become payables with due dates, so the weekly run is a list rather than a scramble.
Policies that match site reality
Define what a site manager can commit alone. The work keeps moving, and the spend is still attributable.
What you'll use
The parts of Billif this leans on.
Projects and budgets
Set a budget per project and watch it burn down
- A budget per project
- Spend against budget, with remaining balance
- Budget usage as a percentage
Invoicing
Branded invoices, recurring billing, credit notes and POs
- Branded invoices with online pay-links
- Recurring invoices
- Credit notes
Payables
Vendor bills tracked, approved and paid
- Forward a bill to your Billif mailbox and it is read automatically
- OCR and AI extraction turn the document into a payable
- Vendor bills tracked to a due date
Spend and reimbursement
Staff expenses and claims, with receipts and sign-off
- Expense capture with receipts
- AI reads and categorises the receipt for you
- Employee reimbursement claims
Guides for construction
- Accounts Payable for Large and Growing Companies: Approvals, Audit Trails and E-Invoicing
- Construction Finance: Site Budgets, Milestone Invoices and Retention
- Withholding Tax in Nigeria: How the Rules Affect Your Invoices and Payments
- Who Signs Off? Setting Spending Approval Limits as Your Business Grows
Your story could go here
We are collecting stories from construction businesses running on Billif. If that is you, we would like to hear how it changed the work.
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