For HVAC & mechanical subcontractors
Mechanical contractor software for commercial projects, not service tickets.
A chiller that costs more than your truck fleet. A shop fabricating duct for three jobs at once. A controls vendor, an insulation sub and a balancing agency you have to chase before your own draw gets paid. Almost every tool sold as “HVAC software” was built for residential service dispatch. This one was built for the project side of a mechanical contractor.
14-day free trial, no card needed. Sign up from here and HVAC / mechanical is already selected when you pick your trade. See pricing →
- Stored equipment billed on its own SOV line
- Shop fab hours kept apart from field labor
- Controls, insulation and TAB tracked as your subs
What actually goes wrong on a commercial mechanical job.
You buy the equipment a year before you bill it.
Rooftop units, air handlers, chillers, boilers and VAV boxes get released the day the submittal is approved, and then you wait. The deposit is gone, the progress payment to the manufacturer is gone, and the unit is in a yard somewhere. A schedule of values that lumps equipment in with installation gives you no way to bill for it. Break it out as a stored-material line and the money can come in when the truck arrives instead of when the crane leaves.
Shop fabrication is real money and invisible progress.
Your shop cuts duct and builds pipe spools and rack assemblies weeks before any of it hangs. Those are real labor dollars, already spent, against a job where the GC walks the building and sees nothing installed. Switch phase tracking on in Settings, add a Shop Fabrication work type, and your shop hours stop blending into field hours. Carry a fab line on the SOV as well and you can show exactly where the labor went — and defend the line when the GC’s PM pushes back.
You are a general contractor to your own subs.
Controls and BAS, insulation, rigging, test and balance, sometimes sheet metal overflow. You hire them, you chase their COIs and W-9s, you need their lien waivers in hand before your own draw clears. SubMark tracks the subs you hire — their COI and W-9, their contracts, their jobs — and tracks the lien waivers you send your GC against each draw. Chasing the waivers your own subs owe you is still a phone call.
The last 10% takes six months.
Start-up, functional testing, the air balance report, O&M manuals and owner training are the final line items on your SOV, and every one of them depends on somebody else finishing first. Meanwhile retainage has been held since the first draw. Knowing exactly which closeout items are open, and what each one is worth, is the difference between calling the GC with a number and calling to ask.
Before you mobilize
The 4 things HVAC / mechanical subs settle with the GC before mobilizing.
What is approved, where your scope stops, what has to be true before you start, and how you get at the work. Every one of them turns into a change order three weeks in if nobody writes the answer down — and the answer is worth nothing if it only lives in one PM’s inbox.
In the pack
Switch on Pre-Construction Review and these 4 questions are already the list, worded the way HVAC / mechanical subs ask them.
- Confirm the approved equipment submittals and lead times against the schedule
- Confirm who provides roof curbs, structural openings and the rigging
- Confirm where the controls scope stops with electrical and low voltage
- Confirm who owns test-and-balance, start-up and commissioning
Tick them off job by job, with your own note on each. The note is your answer — the pack ships the question and leaves the answer to you.
Pre-Construction Review is an opt-in module — it is not one of the eight switched on at setup. Turn it on in Settings and the list is already there in HVAC / mechanical terms, with no upgrade and no setup call. Edit it once and it applies to every job; the tick and the note stay with the job it was asked on. See every module →
The mechanical job, phase by phase.
Shop labor, field labor, equipment and three subcontracts all land on the same job and none of them behave the same way. Here is how the work maps to what ships in SubMark.
- 01 Bid & estimate
Equipment schedule takeoff off the M-sheets, duct by the pound, pipe by the foot and size, VE alternates.
Bid Board, Plans & Drawings, Takeoff, Estimating & Proposals
- 02 Submittals & equipment release
Equipment submittals approved, then release for manufacture and the lead-time clock starts.
Submittals with a material library and merged PDF export
- 03 Coordination
Fighting for ceiling space with sprinkler, electrical and structure; sleeves, inserts and hanger layout.
Plans & Drawings with deep zoom, markups and pins that stay on the sheet
- 04 Shop fabrication
Duct fab, pipe spools and rack assemblies built in your shop ahead of the field.
Time Clock & Labor Logs, Job Costing for the job’s labor, material and subs
- 05 Underground & sleeves
Underslab condensate and drains, hydronic mains, sleeves and penetrations — in before the pour.
Daily Labor Logs with photos, Change Events for anything in the trench
- 06 Overhead rough-in
Duct hung, branch piping run, VAV boxes set, hangers and supports, level by level.
Crew Scheduling across jobs, Daily Labor Logs level by level
- 07 Equipment set
Curbs, crane picks, rooftop units and air handlers landed, piping tie-ins and refrigerant.
Purchase Orders, Invoices Inbox, Daily Labor Logs as the dated record of the pick
- 08 Controls & insulation
Your controls vendor and insulation sub on site, working to your schedule and your contract.
Sub Contracts, Subcontractor Management, Subcontractor Collaboration
- 09 Start-up, TAB & commissioning
Start-up, functional testing with the Cx agent, air and water balance, and the rework that comes out of it.
Daily Labor Logs as the dated record, Schedule of Values & Draw Log for the final draws
- 10 Closeout
O&M manuals, warranty start date, owner training and the retainage release.
Submittals, Lien Waiver Tracking, Schedule of Values & Draw Log
Every module named above ships today; the eight below are on from day one, and the rest are a switch in Settings, not an upgrade. The full list is on the product page.
In the pack
These 9 phases load with the HVAC / Mechanical pack the moment you pick it at setup.
They are the phase list your foremen pick from on every daily log, so the hours come back tagged to the part of the job they were spent on.
- 01 Permit / Layout
- 02 Rough-In Ductwork
- 03 Set Equipment
- 04 Rough Inspection
- 05 Refrigerant Lines
- 06 Controls
- 07 Trim-Out
- 08 Start-Up / Commission
- 09 Final Inspection
Plus “Other”, for the work that fits nowhere. Rename, reorder or delete any of them in Settings — the pack is a starting point, not a cage.
A mechanical schedule of values with somewhere to put the money.
The two lines most mechanical SOVs are missing are stored equipment and shop fabrication — which, between them, are most of what you have spent by the time the GC sees any work in the building. These are the kinds of lines a commercial mechanical SOV usually needs:
In the pack
Open the SOV builder on a new job and these 5 lines are already in it.
- Equipment 40%
- Ductwork 30%
- Refrigerant / Piping 15%
- Controls 8%
- Start-Up / Final 7%
What most commercial HVAC / mechanical subs add
- 01 Submittals, engineering & coordination
- 02 Major equipment — material stored-material line
- 03 Equipment rigging & set
- 04 Sheet metal fabrication — shop labor fab-progress line
- 05 Duct install — Level 1
- 06 Duct install — Level 2
- 07 Hydronic mains
- 08 Branch piping & VAV
- 09 Refrigerant piping
- 10 Insulation subcontract
- 11 Controls / BAS subcontract
- 12 Start-up & commissioning
- 13 Test & balance subcontract
- 14 O&M, training & closeout
Giving each subcontract its own line matters twice: it is how you bill the work, and it is how you see at a glance how much of your next draw is riding on somebody else finishing first.
That longer list is an illustration, not a template — your SOV is negotiated with your GC. SubMark gives you the SOV to build, and tracks every draw, retainage amount and payment against it. It is your record of the job, not a replacement for the GC’s billing system — you submit the draw the way each GC requires and log it here.
Read next
Schedule of values for subcontractors: how to build one that bills clean
Where to break out line items and how to carry the two lines a mechanical SOV is usually missing — stored equipment and shop fabrication — without the GC’s PM striking them.
T&M tickets in commercial construction: getting signed, and getting paid
Temporary cooling, after-hours tie-ins and start-up help are all T&M work — what belongs on the ticket, and how to turn a month of signed tags into one change order.
Inside SubMark
One calendar for every crew on every job.
Shop crews, field crews and a crane date that cannot move. SubMark schedules every worker across every job in one calendar and flags the conflict before it costs you the pick.
On from day one, in every trade’s setup.
Nothing is paywalled by tier. These eight are switched on in every one of the 29 trade packs, HVAC / mechanical included, from the moment you finish setup.
T&M Tags
Field tickets priced off your own rate lists and signed by the GC on the spot.
Change Events
The field logs a scope change with photos the day it happens, then it converts to a CO.
Draw Calendar
Every GC’s billing cutoff and submission method in one calendar, with reminders.
Submittals
Submittal packages with a material library, cover sheets and merged PDF export.
Daily Labor Logs
Weather, narrative, labor, materials and photos, with a submit-and-review workflow.
Timesheets
Weekly rollups with worker signatures and supervisor approval, plus a payroll summary export.
Where Workers Are
A live view of which workers are on which job today.
Safety
Toolbox talks, inspections, incidents, and certification and COI tracking with expiry dates.
Pick HVAC / Mechanical at setup and SubMark loads the HVAC pack: mechanical phase names, checklists and material lists, and a schedule-of-values breakdown shaped like a mechanical job. Anything the pack gets wrong, you change in Settings.
The worker types are already there too — Installer, Sheet Metal, Apprentice, Foreman and Service Tech — on every worker record and on every daily labor log. The only thing left to enter is your own rates.
Questions
HVAC / Mechanical subcontractors ask us these.
Is this service and dispatch software for HVAC?
No. SubMark covers the construction side: bid, contract, submittals, installation, progress billing against a schedule of values, change orders and retainage. If your business is service agreements, maintenance routes and dispatch, a field service platform is the right tool. Plenty of mechanical contractors run both — SubMark is for the project half.
Can I bill for equipment sitting in a warehouse?
You build the schedule of values, so yes — carry stored-material lines for the equipment package and bill them as units are delivered, separately from the rigging and installation labor. SubMark tracks what you billed on each line, what was certified, what retainage is held and when payment came in.
Can I keep shop fabrication labor separate from field labor?
Yes, with one setup step. Switch phase tracking on and add a Shop Fabrication work type in Settings, and hours logged against it stay distinct from install hours in the building, with budget versus actual on that phase on its own — which is the number you need when the GC’s PM asks what a fabrication line on your schedule of values is for. Left off, job costing still shows labor, material and sub cost for the whole job, grouped by cost type.
We hire controls, insulation and test & balance. Does SubMark track them?
Yes. There is a directory of the subs you hire with their COI and W-9 on file and the expiry dates tracked, plus per-job work authorizations and master agreements that auto-fill from the project and get tracked through signing. You can invite a sub into the project with scoped access so they log their own work. Two honest limits: there is no prequalification questionnaire, and lien waiver tracking covers the waivers you send your GC, not the ones your subs owe you.
The GC wants temporary cooling off our equipment. How do we track that?
As a change event the day it is asked for, with photos and a date, then as a T&M tag or a change order depending on how it is priced. SubMark will not win the warranty-start argument for you, but it will give you a dated record of when the GC started running your equipment, who authorized it, and what you logged against it — which is usually what the argument turns on.
Does it connect to QuickBooks?
Yes. Connect QuickBooks Online once and bills and purchases pull into job costing (hourly, if you switch auto-pull on) so material and sub costs sit against the right job; draws go across as QuickBooks invoices and POs as purchase orders, one at a time with a click; and a coverage meter shows how much of the cost pulled from QuickBooks is coded to a job.
Do my field crews cost extra?
No. Field users are free and unlimited, and so are the subs you invite into a job. You pay one company subscription: $249 a month with your first 3 office users included, then $39 a month each. The whole breakdown is on the pricing page.
See it on an HVAC / mechanical job.
Start the trial, confirm HVAC / mechanical on the first screen, and the pack loads your phases, checklists and worker types in your own words. Or take a 30-minute walkthrough with the person who built it, on your kind of jobs, instead of a canned demo script.
14-day free trial, no card needed. See the whole product →
$249/mo for your company, your first 3 office users included, $39/mo each after that. Field crews are free and unlimited. See what's included →
Other trades
Electrical
Gear you pay for months before you bill it, rough-in hours that disappear, and every tenant change landing on your scope.
Plumbing
First in the ground and last out of the building — with a quarter of the contract value stuck behind the finish trades.
Drywall & Framing
A third to half the contract spent on board before anything is hung, five finish passes nobody can measure, and three punch walks and a clean-up that are all on you.
Concrete
Pour days that cannot move, ready-mix invoices you reconcile weeks later, and forms that are capital cycling across placements.
Fire Sprinkler
Weeks of hydraulic engineering before you can bill a dollar, and every phase gated behind an inspection you do not schedule.
Glazing & Glass
Custom material you cannot order until you field measure, cannot return once you do, and cannot bill until a water test passes.
Roofing
A tear-off that owns the building until dry-in, rotten deck nobody bid, and a warranty package standing between you and retainage.
Low voltage
Drop counts that move with every furniture plan, cable sitting in a locked IDF for months, and a final 10% that waits on a test report.
Fire alarm
A quarter of the contract behind an acceptance test you do not schedule, retests you never bill, and device counts that move all year.
Painting
The last trade on the schedule, four return trips for other people’s damage, and prep bid against a wall nobody left you.
Flooring
A slab that fails its moisture test, prep bid against a flatness spec nobody hit, and a whole building’s material stored for months.
Masonry
Scaffold that is capital, grout lifts gated by an inspector, and a mock-up panel holding up the whole brick order.
Structural & Misc Steel
Two thirds of the contract is detailing, mill material and shop work, earned before a single piece is erected, and the last five percent is a handrail holding your retainage.
Wood Framing
Fourteen buildings billed as one percentage, a lumber package that is 40% of the contract before a wall goes up, and blocking you owe six other trades that nobody drew.
Excavation & Sitework
The only schedule of values on this site that opens without a single line for product you buy: your contract is production, billed against quantities somebody else surveyed.
Waterproofing
Work that is buried within a week of going in, blamed for every drop of water for the next ten years, and finished with sealants months after everyone forgot you were on the job.
Doors, Frames & Hardware
Half the contract is product you buy months early, and the last three openings out of four hundred hold your punch, your final draw and your retainage.
Demolition
A scope nobody can see until you open the wall, extra work that leaves in the dumpster before anyone prices it, and retainage held for a year after you demobilized.
Insulation
A four-day window between rough-in inspection and board that nobody protects, half the contract sitting in material you staged weeks early, and firestopping everyone assumed was yours.
EIFS / Stucco / Plaster
A schedule set by cure time that nobody believes, a weather barrier you bury on day two and get blamed for in year three, and joints drawn by somebody else that crack on your wall.
Acoustical Ceilings (ACT)
Grid that cannot start until every trade above the ceiling is finished, tile that drops in the last three weeks of a two-year job, and a finished ceiling the whole building then uses as an access hatch.
Paving & Asphalt
Material with a clock on it and a crew on the clock whether you place or not, a subgrade somebody else owns, and six months of construction traffic on the binder course you have to warrant.
Tile & Stone
A finished floor installed on somebody else’s slab, to a flatness tolerance the concrete sub was never asked to hit, with waterproofing and movement joints that belong to nobody until the warranty call comes.
Millwork & Casework
Half your contract earned in your own shop before anything reaches the site, built to a drawing of walls somebody else framed, with the furnish-and-install line drawn in a meeting you were not in.
All trades
SubMark ships a setup pack for 29 commercial trades. See the full list.