BuildMonkey
Part of Shop Toolbox

Shop management software for custom builds and restorations.

Repair software assumes every job ends this week. A frame-off runs eighteen months, gets invoiced a dozen times, and outlives two service writers. BuildMonkey is built for the long build — quoted in packages, tracked to the hour, billed as it goes, and documented the whole way.

Start your free trialSee how it works

14 days free · No credit card · Works with your Shop Toolbox account

A brake job and a frame-off are not the same business.

The two-day jobThe two-year build
Written, done, paid — same weekQuoted in packages, authorized in pieces, billed a dozen times
One tech, one bayBody, fab, wiring, interior, engine — five departments, one car
Parts on the shelf by TuesdayParts from four states and a swap meet, one of them backordered till spring
Customer waits in the lobbyCustomer checks their phone from another state
Book time says 2.4 hoursNobody wrote book time for hand-forming a rocker panel
Profit is obviousProfit is eighteen months of hours and parts you'd better have tracked

One thread from the quote to the books.

Most shops run a build across four disconnected systems and reconcile them at the end. Here the quote becomes the board, the board accumulates the hours and the parts, the invoices draw the build down, and the whole thing lands in your accounting under a job for that car.

  1. 01

    Quote

    Packages priced at hours × your labor rate, parts at cost plus markup. Send a link. The customer approves or declines each package and each part on their phone, types their name, and it locks.

  2. 02

    Build

    Approved packages become the board. Tasks four levels deep, owned by a person or a whole department, with the hours already estimated.

  3. 03

    Bill

    Invoice whatever is finished, as many times as the build needs. Installed parts at your markup, tracked hours at your rate.

  4. 04

    Book

    Invoices, payments and clocked time sync to QuickBooks Online under a job for that build — so your bookkeeper sees the '67 Charger, not forty loose invoices.

Look under the hood.

Real screens, real shop, real numbers — a ’67 fastback eighteen months into a frame-off.

Tasks & packages

Three hundred tasks, and you can still see the car.

Packages break the build into real work. Tasks nest four levels under them, each with an owner, a status you named, a due date and hours estimated against hours actually spent. A parent rolls up its children, so the top of the board stays readable while the bottom stays honest.

  • Assign to a person or a whole department
  • Estimated against tracked hours on every row
  • Drag work between packages
The build board for a 1967 Mustang Fastback: two packages, Media blast & bodywork at 55% and LS swap & driveline at 43%, with nested sub-tasks showing owners, statuses, due dates and target against tracked hours.
Parts

Know exactly which part the build is waiting on.

Every part carries its own state and its own receive-by date, so a stalled build tells you it is two backordered quarter panels rather than making you phone the counter. Photograph the supplier PO and the rows fill themselves in — vendor, cost, quantity — for you to check before anything is saved.

  • Needed → Ordered → Shipped → Backordered → Installed → Invoiced
  • Cost and markup internal; the customer sees price
  • One screen for every part across every build
The parts table for a build: Dynacorn quarter panels backordered to September, an LS3 marked installed, a Tremec shipped, each row showing vendor, quantity, cost, PO number and a receive-by date, above a drop zone for auto-filling parts from a PO.
Timeclocks

A hundred hours, and every one of them accounted for.

The crew clocks in on a task from their phone and clocks out with a note — the note is required, so you end up with a record rather than a number. Hours roll into the invoice, and into QuickBooks Online as real time activities under a job for that build.

  • Per-technician totals for any date range
  • Billed against unbilled, so nothing walks out unbilled
  • Every session says which build and which task
The timeclock report for a week: 100 hours clocked across 30 sessions, 100 hours unbilled, three technicians with per-person bars, and a session list showing the build, the task, the times and whether each is billed.

Standard equipment.

One price, no tiers. Everything below is in the box.

Progressive invoicing
Invoice whatever is finished, as many times as the build needs. Partial payments, a customer e-signature and a release of liability on every one.
Customer build journey
Publish a progress update with photos and hours, and send the owner a private link they can follow from anywhere.
Package templates
Save the work you quote over and over, with the hours already estimated, filed in a category tree you control.
Built for the phone
A real bottom nav, a one-thumb task list, clock in and out, and a photo shot straight onto the work from the floor.
Departments
Paint & Body, Fabrication, Interior and Engine & Trans come set up. Assign a task to a whole department and whoever clocks in claims it.
Statuses you name
Task and part statuses are yours to rename, recolour and reorder. The billing logic follows behaviour, not labels, so nothing breaks.

You find out a build lost money after it leaves.

Cost lives in one spreadsheet, price in another, and the hours were on a paper timecard somebody keyed in on Friday. This answers the question while the car is still in the shop.

  • Budget against actual, live on every build

    Budget is the sum of your approved quotes. Actual is tracked hours at your rate plus parts at customer price. It updates as the work happens, not at the end.

  • Parts margin, line by line

    Cost, customer price and profit on every installed part, across one build or the whole shop.

  • Payroll hours by person

    Any date range, with per-member rollups. Techs see their own; admins see the shop.

  • Invoices issued in a range

    With paid and sent-to-accounting status, each row linking straight back to the invoice.

Stop typing things that are already written down.

Photograph a supplier PO and it reads into parts rows — vendor, part names, cost, quantities — with a receive-by date proposed. Drop the customer’s punch list PDF and it becomes packages and tasks. Hand it a page of notes and it becomes a structured, editable note.

  • A supplier PO, photographed on the counterParts rows with vendor, cost, quantity and a receive-by date
  • The customer’s punch list, as a PDFPackages and tasks on the build board
  • A page of handwritten notesA titled, structured note you can edit

Nothing is written until you review it. You get a proposal to correct, not a mess to undo.

Every photo knows where it came from.

A gallery per build, organized in folders. Photos shot on a task, photos attached to a comment, documents dropped on the parts page — all of it lands in one place, each image carrying who uploaded it and what it came from.

That same library is what the owner sees. Publish an update and it becomes the build’s public page. When the car sells, it is the provenance file.

Scheduling that knows a 100-hour task isn’t a one-day task.

Give each person their real working week. A task with a due date and an hours target spreads backwards from that date across the days it will actually take — 100 hours at 5 hours a day is twenty working days on the calendar, not a dot on Friday. Days that are over-booked get flagged.

Assign to a person or to a department. Paint & Body, Fabrication, Interior and Engine & Trans come set up — rename them, recolor them, or build your own. A department task shows for everyone in it until one of them clocks in and claims it.

Who runs on it.

Five trades, one problem: the work outlasts the paperwork.

  • Hot rod shops

    Several builds moving at once, parts sourced from everywhere, and customers who are enthusiasts and want the detail.

  • Restoration shops

    Multi-year timelines where the photo record is worth as much as the receipt, and the billing has to keep pace with the work.

  • Custom car builders

    Scope that changes mid-build, so re-quoting and getting the customer to sign off again has to be routine, not a fight.

  • Restomod builders

    Original bodywork and a modern driveline in the same car — two disciplines, two crews, one due date.

  • Fabrication shops

    No book time exists for what you do, so the hours have to be real and the job costing has to be honest.

And the rest of it.

  • Rich-text notes per build, with a shop-wide template library
  • Roles that decide who can price a job and who can move a task
  • Task and part statuses you name and color yourself
  • Vendors, with contact details parsed off the PO
  • Deadline reminders and a daily summary by email
  • A full activity history on every build
  • Drag-and-drop ordering on builds, tasks and parts
  • One Shop Toolbox account across every tool you use

Your software is making assumptions about your shop.

Repair software assumesA build actually is
One job, one invoice, done FridayTwelve invoices over eighteen months, as work gets authorized and finished
A ticket with eight linesSeven disciplines, forty packages, three hundred tasks
Parts arrive tomorrowQuarter panels backordered fourteen weeks, whole build waiting
The estimate is the invoiceThe estimate is a scope approved line by line, then billed against for a year
Labor is flat-rate book timeLabor is what your fabricator actually spent, to the second
Customer picks up and leavesCustomer wants a photo and a paragraph every month, for two years

Questions shops actually ask.

Is BuildMonkey a repair-shop management system?

No, and that is the point. Repair systems are built around one job, one invoice, closed the same week. This is built around a build that runs for months, gets billed a dozen times, and has to stay legible the whole way. If you write tickets for brake jobs, you want different software.

Can I invoice one build more than once?

Yes — as many times as the build needs. Invoice whatever is finished: installed parts at your markup and tracked hours at your rate. Partial payments are supported, and each invoice carries a customer e-signature and a release of liability.

Does BuildMonkey work with QuickBooks Online?

Yes. Invoices, payments and clocked time sync to QuickBooks Online under a job for that build, so a year of progressive billing arrives grouped by car instead of as dozens of unrelated invoices. Sales tax is left to QuickBooks, which is the authority on it.

Can my customer see progress on their car?

Yes. Publish a progress update with photos, parts installed and hours, and send them a private link. They can follow the build from their phone without calling the shop.

How do I quote a restoration?

In packages — a block of work priced at hours × your labor rate — plus parts at cost with your markup, which the customer never sees. Send the quote as a link; they approve or decline each package and each part individually, type their name, and it locks. You get a signed scope instead of a phone call.

Can I track what a build actually cost me?

Yes. Every build shows budget against actual as the work happens, and the reports cover payroll hours by person, invoices issued in a date range, and parts profit — cost, price and margin, line by line.

Does it work on a phone in the shop?

Yes, properly — a bottom nav rather than a shrunken desktop layout. Your crew can clock in and out of a task, add a note, and shoot a photo straight onto the work from the floor.

Is there a free trial?

Yes. Every tool in Shop Toolbox comes with a 14-day free trial and no credit card is required to start.

What happened to Project Apex?

Same product, new name. Project Apex was the codename while it was being built; it is called BuildMonkey now. Nothing about your shop’s data or sign-in changed.

Get the build out of your head.

Start your free trial

14 days free · No credit card · Already have a Shop Toolbox account? Sign in.