Best software for a small UK building company (2 to 15 people)

Between 2 and 15 people is where a building firm's software either grows with it or starts to pinch. At two people, almost anything works. At eight, with an office manager, a site manager, two gangs and a regular set of subbies, the questions change. Who needs a full login? Who just needs to log hours and photos? How do variations get approved, retention tracked and CIS taken off the subbies? And why does the bill go up every time you take on a labourer?

Short answer: for a building firm running projects with one person doing the office side, EstiMate Pro at £39.99 a month per business covers quoting through to the accounts, and the site team log time, photos and diary entries from a job link without a paid seat. If several people in the office need their own logins with roles, that's EstiMate Corp, from £249 a month, and at that point some per-user apps work out cheaper; we show where below. If your firm is more service and maintenance than projects, Tradify, Fergus or ServiceM8 may suit you better, a maintenance firm running a fleet of engineers should look at Commusoft, Joblogic or BigChange, and if you're a mid-size contractor with stock and progress claims, Simpro is built for that scale.

Three firm shapes

• Shape A, 3 people: the owner prices and runs the jobs, with two on the tools.
• Shape B, 8 people: the owner, an office manager, a site manager and five operatives.
• Shape C, 15 people: the owner, two in the office, two site managers and ten operatives, plus regular subbies.

What each shape pays

Prices checked October 2026: Tradify, Fergus, Powered Now, YourTradebase and EstiMate. We couldn't confirm the VAT basis of Tradify's or Fergus's prices; EstiMate's are what you pay, with a VAT receipt for every payment.

How the sums work, so you can redo them for your own firm:

• Tradify Pro: everyone who uses the app is a user at £37. So 3 × £37 = £111, 8 × £37 = £296 and 15 × £37 = £555.
• Fergus: office staff and managers as full users from £39, operatives as timesheet users from £12 (some Fergus pages say £11). Shape B is 3 × £39 + 5 × £12 = £117 + £60 = £177. Subbies on contractor users add £2 each on the days they're active. Some Fergus pages show Essentials at £35; at that price the three shapes come to £59, £165 and £295, so check the live page.
• Powered Now Professional: £32 per user, so 3, 8 and 15 users give £96, £256 and £480 ex VAT. Its pricing page and help centre conflict on how extra users are charged, so ask.
• YourTradebase: £29 plus £15 for each user after the first. Shape C is £29 + 14 × £15 = £239 ex VAT. Its pricing page doesn't say which users the £15 applies to.
• EstiMate: Pro is one office login for the business, with the site team on the Site Crew app at no per-worker charge. Corp, from £249, adds team seats with roles (Admin, Manager, Site).

Where EstiMate wins and where it doesn't

Shape A is the clearest case. One person prices and runs the jobs, the two lads log their hours and photos from a job link, and the whole firm is on Pro at £39.99.

Shape B depends on who does the office work. If one person handles the pricing and invoicing and the site manager mostly logs the diary, photos and time, Pro covers it. If the owner and the office manager both need their own logins, that's Corp from £249, and on these sums YourTradebase (£134 ex VAT) and Fergus (£177) are cheaper. EstiMate's case at that point isn't price. It's that the contract, variations, retention, valuations, subcontracts, CIS register and accounts sit in the same app as the quote.

Shape C is where per-user pricing really bites: Tradify Pro reaches £555 a month and Powered Now £480 ex VAT, against Corp from £249. Fergus, with cheaper timesheet users, comes to £315, and YourTradebase, at £239 ex VAT, still sits below Corp's starting price. Ask us what Corp costs for your number of office seats before you decide.

Who each one suits

EstiMate: building firms that run projects

Contracts come from the accepted quote and the client signs online. Variations become signed addenda, and the contract total and invoices update. Pro adds cost control, purchase orders, retention, valuations and subcontracts, weekly progress reports and snagging. See how the job costing side works. Our guide to job costing for builders explains the method.

Tradify: service-led firms that want a proven scheduler

Scheduling, timesheets, forms and a large review base, with 4.8 from about 612 reviews on Trustpilot UK. The cost scales with every user; see our Tradify pricing breakdown.

Fergus: trade firms with lots of operatives

Cheaper timesheet and contractor users make it gentler on a growing team than flat per-user pricing. It has AI quoting, variations and a live Xero sync. More in Fergus pricing.

YourTradebase and Powered Now: UK tax built in

Both put CIS and reverse charge on the invoice. Powered Now also sends MTD VAT returns to HMRC on Professional and up, which EstiMate doesn't do. Read Powered Now vs YourTradebase.

ServiceM8: cheapest on headcount, built for call-outs

ServiceM8 prices by jobs, not people, with unlimited users on paid plans: Starter is £25 a month ex VAT for 50 jobs (ServiceM8 pricing). A 15-person firm doing 40 jobs a month could sit on Starter. We couldn't find variations or CIS in it, so check how it handles a ten-week extension.

Simpro: mid-size contractors

Progress claims, retentions, variations, stock and Simpro Takeoffs. Pricing is quote only, with one-time setup and onboarding fees (Simpro), and existing contracts were offered a 15% uplift (25% after the promotion), with a price lock capping later annual rises at CPI plus 3%, when its Lightning AI platform launched in May 2026 (Simpro press release). See Simpro alternative for small builders.

Buildertrend: unlimited users, US-built

Buildertrend says every plan includes unlimited users, priced by custom quote based on builder type and annual revenue, billed annually or quarterly (Buildertrend pricing). It has daily logs and change orders with e-signatures, but we couldn't find CIS or reverse-charge VAT. Read Buildertrend alternative.

Xero: keep it for the accounts

Xero is per business with unlimited general users; Grow is £39 a month ex VAT from 1 September 2026 (Xero pricing). It files MTD VAT returns, and CIS returns with a £5 add-on. If your accountant already works in Xero, it can make sense to keep it for the books whichever job software you choose. See Xero for builders.

What changes as you grow

• From 3 to 8: decide who needs a full login and who only needs to log time and photos. That one decision moves your bill more than any feature.
• From 8 to 15: subbies, retention and valuations start to matter. Software that only does quotes and invoices will leave you on spreadsheets.
• Past 15: look at multi-branch reporting (EstiMate Corp) or a bigger platform. Our project management roundup compares them, and the per-user pricing post shows how costs climb.

What to do next

1. Write down everyone in your firm and mark who needs a full login.
2. Redo the sums above with your own headcount.
3. Run one live job in EstiMate alongside your current app, start to finish.

Whatever shape your firm is, start free and run your next project in EstiMate.