> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.bold-factory.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Planned versus actual cost > Distinguish expected costs, recorded costs, and variances in Bold. **Planned cost** estimates how much an operation, item, or intervention should cost. **Actual cost** uses what is recorded during execution. Planned and actual costs are both expressed in euros (EUR). Bold does not let you change the currency or combine costs in several currencies. ## Comparison | Concept | Source | | - | - | | Planned cost | Recipes, expected time, base costs, and planned quantities. | | Actual cost | Consumption, lots, time, employees, and actual quantities. | | Variance | Difference between what was expected and what was recorded. | ## Planned item cost Planned cost per unit is used to estimate orders, recipes, manufacturing orders, and comparisons with actual cost. | Item type | Common calculation source | | - | - | | Purchased | Supplier prices, purchase orders, and purchase line cost changes. | | Manufactured | Recipe, active version, materials, time, resources, and related base costs. | | Manual | Value defined by the team when you do not want automatic recalculation. | When the cost updates automatically, Bold stores the total and its per-unit breakdown into materials, labor, and machine: * For a purchased item, all cost is treated as material; labor and machine are zero. * For a manufactured item, direct material comes from purchased components consumed by its own recipe. Inherited material comes from materials previously consumed within the manufactured components or semi-finished items in that recipe. * Direct labor is calculated from the expected person-time of the item's own operations and the average positive hourly cost of active employees. Inherited labor was already consumed in its semi-finished items. * Direct machine cost is calculated from the expected duration of the item's own operations and the main workstation's hourly cost. Inherited machine cost was already consumed in its semi-finished items. The calculation estimates what is needed to produce one unit of the catalog item. Within that unit, an operation can have a relative quantity other than one. Times with a "per unit" frequency scale with that relative quantity; other times apply once. If there is no usable active main recipe, the automatic breakdown is zero. A manufactured item with manual cost, or an ignored item, keeps its total but does not show a breakdown. For manufactured items, Bold preserves the cost categories contributed by semi-finished items. Their material is added as inherited material, their labor as inherited labor, and their machine usage as inherited machine cost. The item details separate direct and inherited semi-finished costs in all three categories. Planned item costs are rounded to a maximum of four decimal places. If a component has a manual cost without a breakdown, Bold allocates that amount to direct material when it is purchased and inherited material when it is manufactured. ## Employee cost Employee cost is the hourly cost Bold applies to labor records. It affects manufacturing orders, operations, and maintenance work orders. To estimate it, use the total cost to the company and divide it by effective annual hours. ```text theme={null} hourly cost = annual cost / effective annual hours ``` For a 40-hour working week, a common reference is `1,826` effective annual hours. Adjust this basis to your collective agreement, calendar, and internal criteria. ## Cost updates Costs can update automatically or manually depending on the item type and operational workflow. | Case | Common update | | - | - | | Purchased item | Updates when a purchase order line is recorded or its unit price changes. The receipt uses that cost to value the lot, but does not recalculate the item's planned cost. | | Manufactured item | Can update from recipe structure, materials, and labor. | | Manual adjustment | Lets you correct or set a cost when external data is unavailable. | The specific policy depends on operational settings and available data. Always review the cost date, source, and scope before using it for financial decisions. ## Manufacturing In manufacturing, actual cost adds consumed materials, recorded labor, and machine cost. Material cost comes from the lots consumed. Co-products are recorded without allocating a share of production cost to them. Rejected quantities also do not change the total used in this calculation; actual cost per unit divides total cost by completed quantity. An order with consumption not linked to a lot, incomplete time records, or missing hourly costs can show an incomplete actual cost. | Cost | Planned source | Actual source | | - | - | - | | Materials | Recipe materials and planned item cost. | Consumed materials and the consumed lot's cost. | | Labor | Planned time and expected or average hourly cost. | Recorded time per employee and their hourly cost. | | Machine | Planned duration and resource hourly cost. | Actual machine time and resource hourly cost. | | Cost per unit | Planned total cost divided by planned quantity. | Actual total cost divided by completed quantity. | ## Maintenance In maintenance, actual cost combines materials and employee time. The history lets you compare assets, causes, actions, and recurring interventions. | Cost | Common calculation | | - | - | | Material per line | Consumed quantity multiplied by the lot's cost per unit. | | Labor per line | Recorded hours multiplied by the employee's hourly cost. | | Total work order cost | Material cost plus labor cost. | ## Common problems | Problem | What to check | | - | - | | Item cost is zero | Purchase price, active recipe, or manual cost is missing. | | Cost changes when a recipe is modified | Automatic cost updates are enabled for the item. | | Actual labor cost is zero | The employee has no hourly cost, or time was not recorded against an employee. | | Costs are very high or low | Check whether you divided by effective annual hours. | | Planned cost differs from actual cost | Planned cost uses planned data; actual cost uses recorded consumption, lots, time, and employees. | ## Related * [Costs](/en/concepts/costs) * [Inventory valuation](/en/concepts/costs/inventory-valuation) * [Manufacturing order costs](/en/guides/costs/manufacturing-order-costs) This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.