Write the scope as a list of tasks, each with an action, a quantity, a material and who supplies it. Then mark the boundaries: where your work starts, where it stops, and the state you leave the site in. After that, list the exclusions, meaning the nearby things a reasonable customer might assume are included but are not, and the assumptions your price depends on. Test the result by asking whether another tradie could price the job from your words alone. If they could, your customer cannot easily misread it, and almost every argument that would have started on site ends before it begins.
The four parts
A scope that holds has four parts, and most quotes have only the first.
- Tasks. What you will do, one task per line, with numbers. "Remove and dispose of 75 square metres of lawn" rather than "clear yard".
- Boundaries. Where the job begins and ends, physically and in time. Which rooms, which walls, which side of the fence, up to which point in the pipe, what happens to the mess.
- Exclusions. The things next to the job that you are not doing. These are the items customers assume, because they are close to what you are doing and it seems natural that you would.
- Assumptions. The conditions your price relies on: access, ground conditions, existing services, the customer's choices being made by a certain point. When an assumption turns out false, you have a fair basis for a variation.
Writing tasks a customer can check
Each task should name the action, the thing, the amount and the supply. "Supply and lay 42 square metres of instant turf" tells the customer what arrives, how much and who buys it. "Turf to front" tells them nothing they can check, and gives you nothing to point to if they expected the side yard done as well.
A few words do more harm than any others in a scope. "Etc." invites the customer to fill in the rest. "As required" makes the quantity open-ended. "Standard" means nothing unless you say whose standard. "Make good" needs a description of what good looks like: patched and ready for paint is not the same as painted to match. Replace each of them with a noun and a number.
Finding your exclusions
You already know your exclusions; you have argued about most of them. Make a list from memory of every item a customer has ever thought was included when it was not, and keep it per kind of job. Then add the standard suspects for your trade:
- Work by adjoining trades: painting after patching, plastering after electrical, tiling after plumbing.
- Approvals and certificates you do not arrange: council, strata, engineer.
- Disposal of anything that is not yours: the customer's old furniture, the previous tradie's rubbish.
- Anything hidden that you have not inspected: behind walls, under floors, below the ground.
- Ongoing care after handover: watering, sealing, servicing.
Write exclusions as short nouns. A list of six plain items is read; a paragraph of legal language is skipped. The glossary entry on exclusions has more on the difference between an exclusion and an assumption.
A worked example
Fernhook Landscapes is a fictional landscaping crew of two. A homeowner asks for a front garden makeover. The first draft of the quote reads "Front garden makeover, $9,100". The version that goes out reads:
- Remove and dispose of existing lawn, 75 square metres at $12: $900
- Supply and lay instant turf, 42 square metres at $34: $1,428
- Build garden beds with steel edging, 26 metres at $48: $1,248
- Supply and spread garden soil, 6 cubic metres at $115: $690
- Supply and spread mulch, 4 cubic metres at $95: $380
- Supply and plant 40 plants in 200 millimetre pots at $28: $1,120
- Crushed granite path, 18 square metres at $95: $1,710
- Drip irrigation to beds, one zone with a timer, connected to the existing front tap: $1,150
- Tip fees, 3 loads at $160: $480
The total is $9,106. The note then sets out the boundaries: the work area runs from the house to the front fence and excludes the driveway and the nature strip; the letterbox and fence stay as they are. It lists the exclusions: the street tree, fence repairs, retaining walls, garden lighting, any council permits, and watering after handover. And it states the assumptions: the soil can be dug by hand or a small machine, the front tap has enough pressure for drip irrigation, no underground services run through the beds beyond those located before digging, and the plant list is agreed before ordering.
Two weeks in, the owner asks why the nature strip still has patchy grass. The answer is on the quote. Turfing it is 12 square metres at the same $34 rate, $408, and goes out as a separate quote. The owner accepts it the same afternoon, and nobody felt cheated.
The lines carry the tasks and the note carries the boundaries, exclusions and assumptions. In Quote Desk that is up to twenty lines and one note per quote, which suits a job of this size; the quote builder shows the layout.
Testing it before you send
Run two tests on every quote over a few thousand dollars.
The stranger test: could another tradie in your trade price this job from your quote alone, without ringing the customer? If they would need to ask how many, which room, who supplies the fittings or whether the old one goes, your customer will be asking the same questions later, usually halfway through the job.
The doorstep test: read the scope and imagine the customer walking around the finished job with it in their hand. Is there anything they would look for that is neither in the tasks nor in the exclusions? That gap is the argument you have not had yet.
Mistakes to avoid
- A single lump-sum line for a job with several parts, so nobody can tell what is in it.
- Exclusions buried after the payment terms, where nobody reads.
- Boundaries left out, so the job grows to fill whatever the customer imagines.
- Assumptions kept in your head, so a changed condition looks like an excuse.
- Writing for a lawyer instead of the customer. Plain nouns and numbers protect you better than long sentences.
What to do this week
- List every item a customer has wrongly assumed was included on your last twenty jobs.
- Turn that list into a standard exclusions block for each kind of job you quote.
- Rewrite the scope on your most common quote using the four parts.
- Run the stranger test on the next three quotes before you send them.
- Read the guide on what to put in a quote so it holds up for the other parts of the quote.