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The Expenses tab on a project is where you record what the job costs you. Each expense has a type, an amount, and a status, and you can attach receipts, link the subcontractor you paid, and decide whether the cost should reduce the crew’s bonus. The tab keeps a running total, and your expenses feed the project’s Financial Summary.
Every role except Crew Member can view, add, edit, and delete project expenses. If you don’t see an Expenses tab on a project, expenses aren’t turned on for your workspace — see Feature availability.

Video: Tracking Project Expenses and Receipts (1:34)

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Open the Expenses tab

1

Open the project

Open the project from the client, the same way you’d open any project.
2

Click Expenses

Select the Expenses tab. You’ll see Expense Management with every expense logged on the project, or “No expenses for this project” if nothing has been added yet.

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Add an expense

1

Start a new expense

Click + Add Expense. The Add Expense window opens.
2

Pick the expense type

In Expense Type, choose the category that fits the cost. Start typing to search the list. If the type you need doesn’t exist yet, you can create it right here — see Create an expense type as you go.
3

Link a subcontractor (optional)

If the cost was paid to a subcontractor, pick them in Subcontractor. Leave it on No subcontractor otherwise.
4

Enter the amount and status

Type the Amount, then set the Status to Budgeted, Confirmed, or Paid.
5

Add a note and attachments (optional)

Use Note for any detail worth keeping, and drop receipts or documents into Attachments.
6

Decide whether it affects bonuses

Check Affect Bonuses only if this cost should come out of the crew’s bonus for the job. See How expenses affect crew bonuses before you turn this on.
7

Save it

Click Add Expense. The expense appears in the table and the total updates.

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The fields

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Create an expense type as you go

You don’t have to leave the project to add a new category.
1

Search for the type

In Expense Type, type the name you want — for example, Dumpster rental.
2

Add it

If nothing matches exactly, the list offers Add “Dumpster rental” as new type. Select it. The new type is created, selected on your expense, and available to everyone from then on.
Check the list before adding a new type — two names for the same kind of cost make your expense reports harder to read. Admins can tidy up the list later in Expense types.

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Attach receipts and documents

Drag files onto the Attachments area in the expense window, or click it to choose files. You can attach images, videos, and documents.
  • On a new expense, your files upload right after the expense is saved. If an upload fails, the expense is still created and you’ll see “Expense created, but file upload failed” — open the expense and add the file again.
  • On an existing expense, add more files or use the remove control on a thumbnail. Your attachment changes are applied when you click Save Changes.
In the table, click View Attachment on a row to open that expense’s files in a viewer.

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Read the expenses table

Each row in the table is one expense. The columns are:
  • Expense Type
  • Subcontractor — shows a dash when none is linked.
  • Amount
  • Description — the note you added.
  • Created By — who logged it, with the date.
  • Last Updated — who last changed it, with the date.
  • Attachments — a View Attachment link, or a dash when there are none.
  • Status
The footer shows Total Expenses, the sum of every expense on the project whatever its status. On a phone, each expense shows as a card with the same details.

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Change an expense’s status

You can update a status without opening the expense. Click the status in the row and pick Budgeted, Confirmed, or Paid. The change saves right away, and you’ll see “Status updated successfully.”
Status matters for your numbers. The project’s Financial Summary counts every expense in its Expenses card, but Gross Profit only subtracts expenses marked Paid.

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Edit an expense

1

Open the expense

Click the pencil icon on the expense’s row. The Edit Expense window opens with the current details.
2

Make your changes

Change any field, add or remove attachments, or clear the subcontractor.
3

Save

Click Save Changes.
If an expense type has been deactivated since the expense was logged, the expense keeps it — you can still edit other details. You just can’t switch another expense to that type.

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Delete an expense

1

Choose the expense

Click the red trash icon on the expense’s row.
2

Confirm

The Delete expense? dialog warns that the expense will be permanently deleted. Click Delete to remove it.
The expense disappears from the table and from the project total. If it was affecting bonuses, the crew’s bonus is recalculated without it. See Soft delete for what deleting does behind the scenes.

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How expenses affect crew bonuses

Crew bonuses come from finishing a job in fewer hours than the estimate allowed. The hours saved create a bonus pool for the job, and the pool is split among the crew by the hours each person worked. Your crew can follow their share in their Wallet. When you check Affect Bonuses, the expense comes out of that pool before it’s split:
  • The amount taken out is the expense amount times the portion you chose. A 400expenseat∗∗50400 expense at **50%** takes 200 out of the pool.
  • Everyone shares the cost in proportion to their hours, just as they share the bonus.
  • Every status counts. A bonus-affecting expense reduces the pool whether it’s Budgeted, Confirmed, or Paid.
  • It applies to the project’s most recently closed job. If the project has several jobs, only the latest closed one is affected.
  • A pool can go below zero. If expenses are larger than the bonus the crew earned, their payout for the job becomes a deduction.
The bonus is recalculated whenever a bonus-affecting expense is added, deleted, or has its amount or portion changed — and when you turn Affect Bonuses on or off. Crew members see the change in their Wallet.
You can only turn on Affect Bonuses once the project has a closed job with its crew’s hours recorded. Otherwise the expense won’t save, and you’ll see “Unable to save expense. No job exists to affect bonus payouts.” or “Unable to save expense. Missing the information needed to apply a bonus impact.” Leave the box unchecked for now and edit the expense once the job has closed.
Bonuses stop changing once a job is past the Bonus Payout Cutoff (Days) set in your branch configuration, counted from the day the job closed. A bonus-affecting expense added or changed after that point is saved, but it no longer changes anyone’s payout. Jobs whose estimate has no labor hours don’t earn a bonus, so there’s nothing for an expense to reduce.

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Expenses and QuickBooks

If your workspace has connected QuickBooks and turned on Expense Sync, Menaia sends your project expenses to QuickBooks for you:
  • Adding or editing an expense creates or updates a matching expense in QuickBooks. It’s recorded against the project’s client, paid from the account you chose in your sync settings, and categorized under an expense account named after the expense type.
  • Status doesn’t hold anything back. Expenses sync whatever their status, including Budgeted.
  • Deleting an expense that has already synced also deletes it in QuickBooks.
  • If no pay-from account is set, nothing is sent and the expense shows a warning in the QuickBooks Sync Log. Choose the account in the expense sync settings, then edit the expense to try again.
To turn expense sync on or off, or change the account expenses are paid from, see Integrations.

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What’s next

Expense types

Create, rename, and deactivate the categories your team picks when logging expenses.

Wallet

See how bonuses — and bonus deductions — show up for each crew member.