Job costing software for security systems contractors
Security integrators price by the door and the camera. Install jobs bill by milestone or pay app, and service contracts bill every month. CFOS keeps install cost apart from service so you can see what each project made.
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How security systems bill and where the money leaks
Install work is priced per door for access control, per camera for video and per zone for intrusion, then billed one of two ways. Commercial new construction goes on a schedule of values with a monthly pay app and retainage. Direct work for an owner usually bills a deposit, a payment at rough-in and the balance at turnover, and monitoring and service agreements bill every month for years after.
Doors are where the money goes. Electrified hardware, power transfers and door position switches depend on the door and hardware supplier, and when a frame comes without the prep for your hardware, your tech drills it in the field or comes back later. Camera counts change after the owner walks the site, and the new positions need cable, mounts and licenses that weren't priced.
Programming and turnover cost more than they look. Entering doors, schedules and credentials, setting camera views and training the owner's staff all take technician hours, often after hours in an occupied building. Warranty callbacks in the first year are labor too, and without a code they disappear into overhead.
How security systems costs split and what CFOS tracks
Security cost splits into cabling and rough-in, devices and panels, door hardware work, programming, and software licenses. Device material is bought in lots and often staged in the shop before install, so what's bought and what's installed are two numbers. Labor is spread across several trips: cable before the ceilings close, devices after paint, and programming at the end.
CFOS imports your estimate as the job budget by cost code and compares it to actual cost from QuickBooks Online, updated every hour. With access control, video and intrusion as separate systems, and labor and material under each, you can see which system made money on a mixed job. Bills emailed to your bills inbox are read, coded to the job and checked against the PO, so a camera order for one site isn't charged to another.
The service side belongs on its own. Monitoring and service contracts can be their own jobs or cost codes, so recurring revenue and callback labor don't blend into install margins. Job cost by job then tells you whether the installs or the service contracts earned your gross margin.
Workflow from the field to the office
The lead tech files a daily with the crew, the equipment and photos of what was pulled, mounted and terminated. Photos of every door before the ceiling closes and every camera after it's aimed are the record the GC and the owner both accept. If a door wasn't ready, the daily shows which one and on what day.
When the owner adds a camera or the GC asks for a reader on a door that wasn't in your scope, the tech writes a T&M ticket on the daily and the GC signs it on site. It becomes a change order draft for the next pay app or the next milestone invoice. Added devices get billed while everyone still remembers asking for them.
Field time is approved and goes to QuickBooks Payroll with the job and cost code, so after-hours programming and daytime install are both on the job. The PM builds the pay app from the schedule of values with retainage and stored material where the contract allows, or invoices the milestone from QuickBooks. Punch items are tracked to closeout, so final payment isn't waiting on two doors somebody forgot.
What the owner sees every month
Each month the PM enters cost to complete on every open install, and it gets approved. The WIP schedule shows over and under billing by job, so a big deposit shows as overbilling until the work catches up to it. The master WIP puts every install on one page.
Your CEO Report grades gross margin, overhead and net profit before taxes against the published average and the CFOS target for security systems at your size. The 13 week cash forecast reads your QuickBooks and your pay apps and marks the lowest week. Device orders for several jobs due in the same month are easy to spot there before payroll week.
AR and AP aging with a collections list keep retainage and unpaid milestones in view. You can ask Claude or ChatGPT about your own jobs, like which installs are over on programming hours. The answer is read only and limited to what your sign in allows.
Security systems cost codes, matched to QuickBooks
Each group below is one set of cost codes in CFOS. Bills, time and equipment post to them. QuickBooks keeps the books underneath, so your bookkeeper sees the same numbers.
| Cost code group | What goes on it |
|---|---|
| Cabling and rough-in | Cable, back boxes and pathways for doors, cameras and panels, pulled before the ceilings close. |
| Access control devices and panels | Controllers, readers, power supplies and request to exit devices. |
| Door hardware and door prep | Electrified hardware work, power transfers, door position switches and field drilling of frames. |
| Video surveillance | Cameras, mounts, recorders, servers and storage. |
| Intrusion detection | Panels, keypads, motion detectors and door and window contacts. |
| Software licenses | Door, camera and user licenses for the system software. |
| Programming and turnover | Database setup, schedules, credentials, camera views and owner training. |
| Lifts and equipment | Lifts, trucks and tools charged to the job by day. |
| Warranty callbacks | First year callback labor and replacement devices, kept apart from new jobs. |
| Change orders and T&M | Added doors and cameras, tied to the signed ticket. |
How security systems contractors do, by revenue
Each row shows the all-trade average, this trade's average and the CFOS target where one is published. These are the numbers your own job costing gets graded against. Net profit is before taxes in every row.
| Revenue | Overhead | Gross margin | Net profit, before taxes |
|---|---|---|---|
| $1M to $5M | 15.1% all-trade average 16% Security systems 14.1% CFOS target | 22.1% all-trade average 22% Security systems 25% CFOS target | 7% all-trade average 6% Security systems 11% CFOS target |
| $5M to $10M | 14.1% all-trade average 15% Security systems 13.1% CFOS target | 23.4% all-trade average 24% Security systems 26% CFOS target | 9.4% all-trade average 9% Security systems 12.9% CFOS target |
| $10M to $25M | 13.1% all-trade average 14% Security systems 12.1% CFOS target | 24.6% all-trade average 25% Security systems 27.1% CFOS target | 11.5% all-trade average 11% Security systems 15% CFOS target |
| $25M to $50M | 12.1% all-trade average 13% Security systems | 25.7% all-trade average 26% Security systems | 13.7% all-trade average 13% Security systems |
Gross margin and overhead come from figures CFMA, Jones Maresca and other sources publish by trade and size. Net profit is computed, not surveyed: net profit = gross margin minus overhead. Nothing comes out for taxes, interest or other income and expense, so it is a before tax figure, on the same basis as CFMA's net income before taxes.
CFMA's 2025 medians are 7.1 percent before interest and taxes and 6.7 percent net income before taxes. Gross margin minus overhead leaves out interest and other income and expense, so a figure here can come in a little above or below a reported net income on the same business.
Above the $10M to $25M band the gross margin and overhead rows are a modeled extension of the same curves. They have not been reconciled against the licensed CFMA Benchmarker, so read those bands as a model and not as a survey result.
Problems security systems contractors write to us about
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We email you when CFOS for QuickBooks opens, plus a few updates before then. Your address stays with Run On CFOS. One click unsubscribes.
30 days free, a 90-day money-back guarantee, and cancel anytime. It opens January 2027. We email you the day it opens.
What security systems contractors ask
Can I track cost per door and per camera?
Yes. Budget access control and video as separate systems with labor and material under each, and bring the door and camera counts in from your estimate. Actual cost updates every hour from QuickBooks Online and approved time, so at closeout you can divide by the count and compare it to your price.
How do I keep monitoring and service apart from installs?
Set them up as their own jobs or cost codes. Monthly service billing stays in QuickBooks Online, where it's billed today. Your install jobs then show their own margin without recurring revenue mixed into them.
What about devices the owner adds after the walk-through?
The tech writes them on the daily as a T&M ticket and the GC signs it on site. It becomes a change order draft for the next pay app. The ticket, the photos and every revision stay with the job.
Where do deposits and milestone billing go on the WIP?
Milestones can be lines on the schedule of values, and the WIP schedule compares billing to cost to complete each month. A big deposit shows as overbilling until the work catches up. That keeps a deposit from being spent on the next job's payroll by mistake.
Does CFOS replace QuickBooks Online for a security integrator?
No. CFOS works on top of QuickBooks Online and reads from and writes to it. QuickBooks keeps your books, and you still pay Intuit for it separately.
- Job costing software that runs on QuickBooks
- One price. Every module. Priced by your revenue.
- Use all of it, or just the part you need
- Job costing software that runs on QuickBooks
- One price. Every module. Priced by your revenue.
- Use all of it, or just the part you need
- Security systems benchmarks
QuickBooks is a trademark of Intuit Inc. Run On CFOS isn't affiliated with Intuit.