UK-built · CDM · CIS · MTD
Choose on three things: what the bill scales with, whether the system fits how your firm already works, and whose name is on the staff app. Unibuild is bespoke construction management software for UK contractors: a platform in daily production since 2016, shaped to the way each firm already works. It is one flat monthly figure per firm that covers everything, with unlimited users.
Published · Vendor facts read from each vendor's own website on
Most shortlists mix categories without saying so. Name the category first and half the comparison is done, because each one fails in a predictable place.
Free to start and exact to the person who built it. Nothing reminds anybody, nothing holds a photograph, and the file stops when its author is on holiday.
Quick to set up and good at jobs, dispatch and invoicing. The firm adapts to its screens, and valuations, plant and compliance often stay in spreadsheets beside it.
Built around drawings, documents and large project teams. Strong where many parties share one project, and lighter on the contractor's own labour, plant and payroll.
Built outward from the ledger, so the finance team is at home from day one. Site capture is the half that has to be won over.
An exact fit, if the specification was right. It means months of specification, a long build, and paying to reinvent timesheets and document storage from nothing.
A working platform, adapted to the firm and extended wherever something is missing. The fit of bespoke, on a core that has run contracting businesses every working day for ten years.
A demo shows what a system does. These questions show what it costs to live with. Put them to every vendor in writing, before the first meeting.
Most construction software asks a firm to adopt the vendor's process. Unibuild is shaped to yours: your approval limits, your document templates, your rate cards and your words for things. The firm does not change how it works to suit the screens.
When a firm needs something new, Unibuild builds it. Changes asked for after go-live are included in the monthly fee rather than charged at a day rate.
The build starts from a working platform rather than an empty screen. A firm gets the fit of a bespoke system without the cost, the timescale or the risk of commissioning one from scratch. That platform has run Electrical & Mechanical Services (UK) Ltd, a temporary site services firm, every working day since 2016. SME Building Services, a Croydon contractor, has run on it since 2023, with 48 active users across 120 projects.
The detail, from first scoping call to the change you ask for in year two, is in how Unibuild's bespoke construction software is built around your firm.
Your staff app is published on the App Store and Google Play under your company's own name and icon, on iPhone and Android, and its publishing is included in the monthly fee at no extra cost. Your operatives download your app, not ours.
That is decided at the gate, on a Monday morning. An operative asked to install their employer's app is being asked to do something ordinary. Asked to install a product from a company they have never heard of, they have a reason to leave it until later.
The branding carries through the rest of the platform. The office portal shows your name, logo and colours. Fifty-eight document types generate on your own letterhead, and the QR clock-in posters print in your branding. A client app under your brand is available for firms that want one.
From the store listing to the poster at the gate, the detail is in the branded staff app, published under your company's name.
Software built for another market can be configured towards these. The question is whether they are part of the record or a workaround beside it. Duties stay with the firm either way.
| Regime | Ask any vendor | Unibuild |
|---|---|---|
| CIS | Does it work to HMRC tax months, and assemble the monthly return from payments already made? | Periods run from the 6th to the 5th and close into a CIS300 return pack, nil returns included. Deductions sit against the subcontract orders and payments |
| Domestic reverse charge VAT | Is the reverse charge a VAT treatment on the invoice, or a note typed by hand? | A configurable charge type, alongside standard, reduced and zero-rated |
| CDM 2015 | Are RAMS, toolbox talks and training records held against the job and the person? | RAMS, permits to work, toolbox talks with signed attendance and the training matrix run on the same records as the job |
| Construction Act payment notices | Do the orders it issues carry a payment mechanism, with the notice dates on them? | Subcontract orders carry printed payment terms: due date, final date for payment, payment notice and pay less notice. The payment timetable calculator works out the dates |
The accounts package stays. Unibuild runs the job up to the application for payment, syncs with QuickBooks, Xero and Sage 50, and exports payroll and any other data as CSV, XML or JSON.
Every vendor with a comparison page on this site, from what each publishes about itself. Each name opens the full comparison, including where that system fits.
| System | What the bill scales with | Publishes a price | Who it suits | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unibuild | The firm. Never per person or per seat. Unlimited users on every plan | No. Quoted per firm, in writing, usually the same working day | UK contractors running site and office on one system | Facts at a glance |
| Joblogic | Named users, field engineers included | Publishes a per-user rate on its Standard plan | Field service and maintenance firms billing by job | Vendor's website, read 20 September 2026 |
| Procore | Annual construction volume | Publishes no price | Large main contractors running many projects at scale | Vendor's website, read 20 September 2026 |
| BigChange | Licences | Publishes no price | Mobile workforces where vehicle tracking is the point | Vendor's website, read 20 September 2026 |
| Eque2 | Not published | Publishes no price | Firms whose centre of gravity is Sage and the ledger | Vendor's website, read 20 September 2026 |
| Causeway | Not published | Publishes no price | Large contractors, highways, infrastructure and local authorities | Vendor's website, read 23 September 2026 |
| COINS | Per user licence | Publishes no price | Contractors and homebuilders wanting one ERP with the ledger inside | Vendor's website, read 23 September 2026 |
| Autodesk Construction Cloud | User, project or account, by product | Publishes no price | Model-led projects needing a common data environment | Vendor's website, read 23 September 2026 |
| Commusoft | A licence per office user, manager and engineer | Publishes no price | Heating, plumbing and electrical service firms | Vendor's website, read 23 September 2026 |
| PlanRadar | Named users, with subcontractors and watchers free | Publishes per-user rates. Enterprise is quoted | Firms whose work is defects, inspections and handover records | Vendor's website, read 23 September 2026 |
| Fieldwire | Named users, with unlimited-user options on custom contracts | Publishes per-user rates, with a free Basic plan | Teams coordinating field tasks against drawings | Vendor's website, read 23 September 2026 |
All of these side by side, with the reasoning, are on the comparison hub. Any vendor missing from the table can be put through the same test by email. Ask what the bill scales with, and what happens to it when headcount rises by a third.