Skip to content
HMRC CIS return month ending 5 Aug · due Wed 19 Aug 12 days
CIS return due Wed 19 Aug 12 daysCDM 2015, RIDDOR and the compliance registers, built in rather than bolted onUnlimited users, every module, £0 per helmet30+ modules, one login, and the 15-app stack retiredQuickBooks, OneDrive, WhatsApp and email, wired into the jobGlove-friendly field app, QR-first, timed by the server not the phoneExpired subcontractor insurance drops a firm out of approved status overnightFree migration from whatever you run todayUK built, UK support desk, UK hours30-day free trial, no card, no obligation
Start the 30-day trial
Book a demo→
Why Unibuild

A proven core,
tailored to you.

You are not buying a blank sheet, and you are not being forced into somebody else's process. Unibuild is a platform that already runs two contracting businesses, one of them since 2016, and is then configured and extended around how yours actually works. This page sets out your alternatives and where each of them breaks.

Book a 45-minute demo → How implementation works
in production since 2016 two businesses, one platform each uses a different half the fit of bespoke, less of the risk
Where it came from

It was not designed in an office
by people guessing at what
contractors need.

It was built for real businesses, module by module, over ten years, in response to problems those businesses actually had. That is the most persuasive thing about it and it should not be buried.

In 2016
Work began on a system for a UK temporary site services provider: temporary power and site electrics, temporary water, welfare and hygiene services supplied to construction sites. It started small and grew module by module for a decade, as the business hit problem after problem and each one was solved properly rather than worked around. It runs that business today.
In 2023
A second system was built for a UK construction contractor, with a field app for site teams and a portal for their clients. It runs that business today, across roughly fifty staff.
Why that matters more than any feature
Any supplier can claim their software is flexible. Unibuild can demonstrate it, because two genuinely different businesses in two different parts of the industry are running on it right now, and each one uses modules the other has never switched on. That is evidence rather than assertion, and no competitor of this size can make the same statement.
Bringing it to market
The commercial insight is that the next contracting business has most of the same problems. Not all of them, and not in the same shape, which is why the platform is tailored rather than sold as it stands. But enough of them that starting from Unibuild is years ahead of starting from nothing.
Your four options

We are not going to make
factual claims about named
competitors, so here are the
categories instead.

Each of these is a legitimate choice for some businesses. Here is where each one actually fails, including ours.

Spreadsheets, paper
and WhatsApp

Option 1

By far the most common incumbent, and the easiest to displace on evidence. The argument is not that spreadsheets are bad.

  • They do not notify anybody
  • They do not hold a photograph or a signature
  • They do not produce a certificate
  • They stop working when the person who built them is on holiday
Where it failsFragility

Off the shelf job
management software

Option 2

Cheaper to start, faster to implement, and genuinely good at the narrow slice it covers. It loses on fit rather than on quality.

  • Excellent at jobs, dispatch and invoicing
  • Leaves you running spreadsheets alongside it
  • For valuations, plant, training, compliance, subbie accounts
  • You end up paying twice and reconciling both
Where it failsCoverage

A bespoke build
from scratch

Option 3

Perfect fit in theory. In practice a long, expensive project with a high failure rate, where you pay to have basic things invented again.

  • Months writing a specification nobody has time for
  • A long silence, then a system matching the document
  • Rather than matching the business
  • Most of the cost is spent on the parts that already exist
Where it failsRisk and cost

Doing
nothing

Option 4

The real competitor for most firms, and the one worth taking seriously, because the cost of the current situation is usually invisible.

  • The administrator's week
  • The disputed variation
  • The job that lost money quietly
  • The certificate that could not be produced
Where it failsInvisible cost
Where we sit The fit of bespoke, with most of the risk already retired Because most of it already exists and works
The proof, side by side

Two businesses. One platform.
Neither uses it the same way.

This is the single most persuasive thing on the website, because a sceptical reader can verify it at a glance. Each column is a real firm running on Unibuild today, and the gaps are as informative as the entries.

Site services uses

Estimating build upsPrice lists and rate librariesKits and markup classesRate valuationsOnsite quotesBin locationsDeliveries and collectionsRepairs and damage rechargePayment applicationsAged debt by managerCustom invoicingTest mode sandbox

Site services has never switched on

Client portalMaintained assets and PPMGas safety recordsFire assets and fire doorsPAT testingSite diariesCall-outsDay worksSubcontractor managementNear miss reporting

Construction uses

24 module field appClient portal and client appQR punch inMaintained assets and PPMGas safety recordsFire doorsPAT testingSite diariesProgress photographsSubcontractor managementAutomatic insurance suspensionTraining matrix and e-learning

Construction has never switched on

The pricing libraryRate valuationsDeliveries and collectionsBin locations and kitsRepairs and damageEmergency lightingWater testing and filter changes
Why we publish the gaps

Because the gaps are the argument. A platform where both firms used everything would prove nothing except that both firms are similar. Two businesses using opposite halves of the same system, each of them successfully, is the only honest evidence that a third business can be fitted without a rebuild. It also tells you something practical: when we demonstrate a capability, we will show it to you in the deployment where it carries real records, rather than showing you an empty screen and calling it a feature.

What the positioning means in practice

Both halves have to be
true at once.

The proven half
The platform is already built, already working and already carrying two real businesses. You are not funding an experiment. You can be shown a system that has processed thousands of timesheets and punch records, hundreds of purchase orders, hundreds of quotations and a decade of measured valuations in live use, on real data, rather than a slide deck.
The tailored half
Every contracting business works differently: your approval limits, your document templates, your trades, your client reporting, your compliance regime. Unibuild is configured and extended to match, and that development work is part of the engagement rather than a change request you pay for afterwards.
What we will never say
That it is off the shelf, generic or one size fits all, because it is not. And equally never that it is built from scratch for you, because that implies the cost, the risk and the two year timescale that Unibuild specifically exists to avoid.
Why this wins
It sits precisely in the gap contractors complain about. Off the shelf software is cheap to start and never quite fits, so the business ends up with spreadsheets alongside it. A bespoke build fits perfectly, costs a fortune, takes two years and often fails. Unibuild offers the fit of bespoke at a fraction of the risk, and we can prove it by showing you two finished ones.
UK construction operatives on site in hi-vis
2016Running a UK business since
67Tables carrying the project reference
275Of 295 tables fully audited

Measured across the two live deployments, July 2026.

The reasons not to buy it

Four situations where we
are the wrong answer.

A supplier who cannot name a case where they are wrong has not thought about it, or is not telling you.

01
You need CIS or a payroll file on day one
Neither exists today. The hours, the rates and the subcontract records are all held in exactly the right shape for both, which is why they are well understood pieces of work rather than research projects, but if either is a hard requirement for your first month then you are buying a promise rather than a product, and you should price that accordingly.
02
Your engineers work where there is no signal
There is no offline queue. Most forms let the date and time be entered manually so work can be written up later, but if your people genuinely spend their days in basements and risers with no coverage, a platform that needs a connection is the wrong shape for you and we would rather say so at the first meeting.
03
You produce scheme certificates in volume
Unibuild does not produce an EIC, an EICR or a Minor Works Certificate, and building a compliant set is significant work rather than a switch. If certification is the majority of your output, keep your scheme software and use Unibuild for everything around it, which is what most firms do anyway.
04
You want software you never talk to anyone about
This is a tailored engagement. It involves a scoping conversation, decisions about your own process, and somebody in your business making them. If what you want is a card payment and a login by Friday, there are products that do that well and we are not one of them.

Being straight about all four is not a weakness in the argument. It is what makes the rest of the claims believable.

The hard questions

Asked by every serious
prospect, answered here
rather than avoided.

How do we know it will fit our business?+
Because two businesses that work almost nothing alike are running on it already. One supplies temporary power, water and welfare to construction sites: it tenders on measured rates, values work on site every week, and moves a large amount of plant between a central store and dozens of live jobs. The other is a construction contractor whose priorities are field evidence, compliance registers and keeping clients informed. They use different halves of the same platform. The first has never switched on the client portal. The second has never switched on the stores and delivery system. That is not a compromise, it is the design.
How many customers do you have?+
Unibuild Technologies is bringing this platform to market now, so the honest answer is that an early client gets more attention and more influence over the roadmap than they would from an established supplier. That is a genuine advantage and worth stating as one rather than dressing up. The counter to the obvious concern is that the software is not new even though the company is: it has been running a business every working day since 2016, and has been continuously extended across two deployments since.
What if you go under? We would be stranded.+
A fair question for a supplier of our size and it deserves a real answer rather than reassurance, so ask us directly and we will give you our position in writing before you commit. What we can say here without qualification is that the platform has been maintained and extended continuously for ten years across two businesses. Whatever the size of the supplier, the software itself is not an experiment. The specific commercial arrangements, and what happens to your data and your system if the relationship ends, belong in the contract discussion rather than on a marketing page, and we would treat any supplier who answered that question glibly on a website with suspicion.
We have been through a failed software project before.+
Most contracting firms of any size have, and the pattern is usually the same: months spent writing a specification, a long silence, then a system that matches the document rather than the business. Unibuild starts from the opposite end. There is a working platform to look at on day one, so the conversation is about what is different about your business rather than what you require in the abstract. Reacting to something real is a task busy people can do well. Writing a specification from a blank page is not.
This looks like a lot. We only want two or three parts of it.+
That is a good outcome rather than an objection, and phased adoption is the normal route. Most businesses start with the two or three areas that hurt most and add the rest later. For what it is worth, the purchase order module was introduced into a live deployment in February 2026 and carried 879 orders within five months, so adding a module to a running business is routine rather than a project in itself.
Will it replace our accounts package?+
No, and you should be wary of anyone who says their system will. Unibuild handles the operation through to the application for payment and then feeds your accounts system. It is not a bookkeeping product and it is not Making Tax Digital software. Selling it as one would be a fast way to lose a finance director in the second meeting.
Why does the honesty on this website feel unusual?+
Because this audience has been sold to before and is waiting to catch somebody out. Every page on this site names what the platform does not do, and several of them lead with it. That is a deliberate commercial decision rather than modesty: a limitation stated plainly makes every other claim more believable, and a prospect who finds the gap themselves in a demonstration discounts everything they were told before it.
Next step

Tell us the part of your week
that costs you the most.

The demonstration We will show you that part, on a live system Rather than a general tour
Book the demonstration → How implementation works
Phone · UK hours
+44 7587 557546
Email
[email protected]
What it costs
Pricing
Demo calendar
unibuild.co.uk/demo