The Trades Guide to Modern GBQ

Most work a tradie quotes arrives as a description and a hope: a builder on the phone, a photo of a plan, a guess at the hours. A Modern GBQ package is different. The Grace Estimation Method (GEM) has already turned the job into engineered quantities — so many metres of pipework, so many points, so many square metres of tiling — and the AU labour pack has already put hours against each one for your trade. The builder gathers those lines into a package and sends it to you. You price what is on the page.

What arrives

the labour of your trade on one builder’s quote: hours, quantities, stage, suburb and state, start window, shared drawings

What you answer

a lump sum ex GST; unit rates per activity optional; availability, validity, notes

Who sees your answer

the builder, after the deadline — never other tradies

What it becomes

the price of that trade’s work on the builder’s quote, shown as a trade quote in your name

What it costs

nothing to be sent a package; your plan counts the packages you open

Where: Create account (/register?for=trades)

Choose Tradie or trade contractor on the sign-up form and give your business name, the trades you do (one or more — electrician, plumber, bricklayer, tiler, painter and the rest of the labour pack’s list), the state you work in and the suburbs or radius you cover, and, where your trade is licensed, your licence number. The licence is optional at registration: add it when you have it to hand. Pick your market (it decides which Terms of Service and Privacy Policy apply, and each opens in a new tab so you can read it first) and accept the Marketplace Agreement — the additional terms covering packages, answers and conduct on the marketplace. Your Trade organisation is created with your account. Confirm your email from the link we send, then log in. Every legal document is always readable at the Legal page, without logging in.

A new trade organisation starts as Pending verification. While it is pending you can look around your workspace and the guides, but no package can reach you. The Modern GBQ team checks the business — and, for the licensed trades, the licence number — and marks it Verified; you are told in the app and by email. If verification is declined, the reason is shown on the organisation page and a Support ticket asks for the decision to be reviewed.

On My organisation, keep your contact details current — contact name and email, phone and mobile, website, ABN or ACN, and address — and your trades, service area and licence number. Add your teammates as members by their email address — they must already have a Modern GBQ account. Everyone in the organisation shares the same workspace, packages and answers, and any active member can answer on the organisation’s behalf.

Where: Trades workspace, from the sidebar

The workspace is the one page to check. It opens on the packages that need something from you, in the order to handle them:

Each package shows the builder’s name, the stage of works, the suburb and state, the deadline and the start window. Your current plan, its renewal date and your package allowance are on My organisation under Plan and billing. Packages, deadlines and acceptances land in the Notifications centre, and every in-app notification is also sent to your email address, so a new package reaches you without the app open.

Where: the package page, from the workspace

A package is cut from a priced quote version the builder owns: their own client’s project, or a homeowner’s project where they are the selected builder and the owner shares rates. Every line on that quote carries labour hours from the labour pack’s activities, and every activity belongs to a trade. The builder ticks your trade and the platform gathers its activities into one package. Opening a package for the first time uses one of your plan’s packages for the month; the page asks you to confirm before it does, unless your plan is unlimited or you have opened it before.

A package gives you everything needed to price seriously:

• The activities — each line of your trade’s work with its quantity and unit, the hours the labour pack allows for it, and the stage of works it sits in. For an electrician that is rough-in per point, power points and switches, light fittings, the switchboard; for a plumber, pipework by the metre, fixtures each, rough-in per point.
• The basis — labour only (the builder supplies the materials) or supply and install (your price covers the materials too). The builder chooses per package and the page says which.
• The job — the suburb and state, the start window the builder expects, and the drawings and documents the builder ticked to share, each downloadable from the package page.
• The deadline and the package’s current status.
• Your answer history on this package — every version your organisation has submitted, kept in full.

Where: Your answer, on the package page

An answer is one number and a few facts. Your price is a lump sum for the whole package, typed ex GST in the quote’s currency — the form says so, and as you type it shows the figure the builder will compare. Unit rates per activity are optional: give them if that is how you quote, and the builder gets a richer comparison; leave them out and the lump sum is enough. Then availability for the start window (available, available later with a date, or not available), how long the price holds (a validity date), and notes for anything the package did not say — access, site conditions, what you have assumed.

A price far from what the labour pack’s hours would come to — well above or well below — gets a warning before it is sent, so a slipped digit does not go out in your name. The warning never stops you; it asks you to look twice.

For as long as the package is open for answers you can revise: the form pre-fills from your latest version, and submitting creates a new numbered version rather than editing the old one. Every version is kept, and the builder always compares your latest. You can also decline a package, with a short reason if you like; declining at this stage costs nothing.

Answers are blind between trades: you never see another tradie’s answer and they never see yours, before or after the deadline. The builder sees nothing until the deadline either — the comparison opens when the package closes, so the first answer in gains nothing and the last loses nothing. What the builder then compares is the lump sum, the hourly rate it implies against the package’s hours, availability, validity and your rating, side by side.

The deadline is enforced. The builder sets it when the package is sent, from the platform’s response window, and the package page shows the exact date and time. An answer after it is refused, and the workspace marks such a package Deadline passed. Set a reminder when a package arrives; the notification centre sends one as the deadline nears.

Where: the package page, and your workspace’s Accepted card

After the deadline the builder accepts one answer. If it is yours, you are told in the app and by email, and your figure goes straight into the builder’s quote: it replaces the labour pack’s rate for your trade on that version, and the quote and its report show the line as a trade quote in your business name. For supply and install, the materials on those lines take your price too. Nothing is retyped and there is no second version of the figure. If another trade is accepted, you are told that as well, without the winning figure.

Re-pricing the quote keeps your figure while the package’s quantities are unchanged. If the builder changes the quantities afterwards, the package is marked quantities changed, confirm with the trade, and you are asked to confirm or revise your price against the new figures before it is used again. You are never held to a price for work that grew without you being told.

Every trade organisation carries a rating that follows it around the marketplace, built from completed packages the way a builder’s is built from engagements. It starts neutral: a new trade shows new, never a number it has not earned. Declining after acceptance is the one event that lowers it. The rating and its history are on My organisation, and the builder sees it beside your answer.

Where: the plans for trades, and My organisation for the plan you are on

Trade plans differ only in how many packages you can open a month. A package is counted when you open it for the first time; reopening it, answering, revising and declining use nothing, and builders pay nothing to send. When the allowance is used up, opening another package is refused until the period resets, and the page points you to the plans.

To move up, choose the plan on the plans page and pay by card; the plan is on your organisation straight away. Plan prices are in Australian dollars and include GST.

Electrical, plumbing, gas fitting and air-conditioning are licensed trades. A trade registered under any of them needs a licence number on file that our staff have checked before a builder can accept one of its answers. You can register without the number and add it on My organisation; staff check it at verification, or when it is added later, and you are told when it is done. Until then you can receive and answer packages — only the acceptance waits. The directory a builder picks from shows licence checked or nothing; it never shows the number itself.

• You see the builder’s name — you are working for the builder — the job’s suburb and state, the package’s quantities, hours and stage, the start window, and the drawings the builder ticked to share.
• You never see the homeowner’s name, street address or contact details, the builder’s margin or the rest of the builder’s quote, the owner’s price, or another trade’s answer.
• The builder sees your business name, your trades, your rating and whether your licence was checked, and — after the deadline — your answer.
• Your answers feed nothing else. Accepted trade quotes are not fed into the platform’s market price tables; they price the builder’s quote and nothing more.

• Modern GBQ does not process payments, hold funds, or create contracts — a package is an invitation to price, and an accepted answer is a figure on the builder’s quote; the work is agreed between you and the builder directly.
• Every price you give is ex GST; GST is added once, by the builder, on the price to the homeowner.
• Answers are blind between trades and the deadline is enforced; an answer after it is refused.
• Declining a package costs nothing; declining after your answer is accepted needs a written reason and costs rating.
• A licensed trade’s answer cannot be accepted until our staff have checked the licence number on file.
• The Marketplace Agreement you accepted at sign-up governs marketplace conduct; it and every other document are always readable at the Legal page.