Allocate utility cost by machine, area or site
Every machine reports what it draws. One site bill becomes a cost you can push down to a department, a cell or a single asset, and forward onto the work it made.
By job role
Cost the work from what actually ran.
Standards set two years ago are still pricing work today. Output IQ measures the machine hours, the energy and the time each job really consumed, and it does it before the month closes.
- No implementation fee
- Rolling monthly
- Thirty days to change your mind
- UK hosted
Energy and costLive
Energy this week
Whole site
2412
Prev week£2,566↓ 6.0% Week average£2,380↑ 1.3%
Cost per hour
PRESS-04
18.40
Prev week£19.10↓ 3.7% Factory average£17.90↑ 2.8%
Out of hours cost
This week
312
Prev week£268↑ 16.4% Month average£295↑ 5.8%
The problem
Costing runs on standards, and standards go stale quietly.
A machine hour rate set when energy was half the price is still recovering overheads today. Nothing in the process shouts about it, so the error compounds one quote at a time.
01
Energy arrives as one bill for everything
A single invoice for the site cannot be allocated to a machine, a department or a job. The largest variable cost in most operations is also the least attributable.
02
Job costs are built from estimates
Hours booked rather than hours run, standards rather than actuals, and labour reconstructed from a timesheet. Each approximation is small and they all point the same way.
03
Waste never reaches a cost code
Downtime, scrap and rework are operational problems until somebody prices them. Unpriced, they compete for attention with things that have a number attached, and lose.
What you get
Real costs now, not at month end.
Price jobs and products on what they cost
Machine time, energy and labour land against the job that consumed them. The next quote is built from what the last one actually took rather than from a rate somebody set.
See true costs now, not after month end
The figures build as the work happens. Forecasting, pricing and cash decisions stop waiting five weeks for a picture of something you can no longer influence.
Recover overheads on real machine hours
Absorption on hours the machines actually ran, rather than on hours they were booked for. Two very different numbers in most operations, and only one of them is true.
Put a cost on downtime, scrap and rework
Lost hours priced at the real machine rate, with energy included. The money leaking out of the operation becomes a figure the board can act on.
Where the numbers come from
Four sources, one figure.
None of this is typed in by anybody. The number you look at is assembled from the parts of the business that already produce it.
The ERP
Orders, stock, purchasing and finance. What was sold, what it was quoted at and what was bought to make it.
Mobile job tracking
Jobs booked on and off from a phone or a tablet on the floor. Labour lands against the job as it happens, not on a timesheet at the end of the week.
Connected sensors
Power, vibration, heat, pressure and run hours, straight off the machine. Nothing to key in and nothing to remember.
Costs that reconcile, and arrive early
Built from the machine, the job and the meter rather than from estimates. The same numbers the month end will produce, five weeks sooner.
Energy this week 2412 Whole site, down 6.0% on last week
In practice
Measured, anonymised results will be published here as our first deployments report them. Nothing invented goes on this page in the meantime.
The rest of the business
The same feed, read a different way.
- Owners and directorsKnow what it costs to run.
- ProductionFull control of your shop floor in real time.
- OperatorsAll the upside, none of the extra work.
- EngineeringEfficiency from hard data, not guesswork.
- MaintenanceCatch it before it becomes a breakdown.
- QualityEvidence for every batch, not assumptions.
Questions
The ones finance managers ask.
Does this replace our accounting package?
No. Output IQ feeds the package you already run rather than replacing it. What it adds is the operational cost detail that an accounting system never sees.
How accurate is the energy allocation?
It is measured at the machine rather than apportioned. The site bill still reconciles, but the split across assets comes from readings instead of from a formula.
Can I get cost per unit as well as per hour?
Yes, where output is counted. Machine time, energy and labour resolve to a job and to the units that job produced.
What does it cost?
No implementation fee, rolling monthly, and thirty days to change your mind. Sensor hardware can be bought outright or rented per machine per month, so it can sit in capex or opex.
How long before the numbers are usable?
The first machines produce usable cost per hour figures as soon as they are fitted. Trend and variance become useful once you have a few weeks behind you.
Get started
Your business, one platform. Complete control. Real time intelligence.
Explore how Output IQ can empower your business, from automated ERP and MRP to live data analysis and sensors. Service before Software.