Built for security, AV and automation contractors — by one.
155 installed-labor time standards, a real margin model, and the proposal language that stops jobs from leaking hours.
Get the Bid Kit — $297 Instant download · single-company license · 30-day refund
The first is whether you knew what the labor actually was before you sent the number. Most shops don't. They run it off a spreadsheet somebody built five years ago, or off gut — and the gut is calibrated on the last job, which was also a guess.
The second is whether the proposal said what was excluded. Every unbilled hour you have ever eaten traces back to a sentence nobody wrote down.
The LowVolt Bid Kit is both of those, fixed.
Ten tabs, fully linked. Settings feed the builder; the builder feeds the summary.
Eight pages, built around the section that actually decides the margin.
Nine pages that protect the estimate after it leaves your desk.
Loaded labor cost, material, sales tax, subs, overhead and contingency — then your sell price solved backwards from the margin you actually want. Plus a straight time-and-material cross-check, so you catch a wrong rate before the customer does.
The 155 labor hours that ship with this workbook are industry-typical baselines. They are a competent starting point and they are not measured data from your company. Anyone with an internet connection can obtain a plausible list of labor hours.
What you are buying is the structure — a model that turns hours into a defensible price, the questions a good estimate has to answer, and a method for replacing those baselines with your own numbers.
That method is the Calibration tab. Log what each finished job actually took; once a task has three jobs behind it the workbook tells you your own number instead of ours. Twenty rows of your data beats all 155 shipped baselines, because it is the only data in the file that is true for your crews.
If you want software that hands you correct numbers on day one, this is not it, and neither is anything else honest. If you want the thing that gets you there by job four, buy it.
Take your # of monitoring accounts. Multiply by $3. Multiply by 40. That's what a $3/month rate increase across your base is worth to the value of your company.
$24,000 of enterprise value from one letter. No trucks rolled, no cable pulled, no technician hired. The workbook runs it on your actual numbers, at 30x, 40x and 50x.
| What shops use today | Cost |
|---|---|
| Excel and memory | $0 |
| Industry-standard alarm contract forms, per form | $625 – $1,575 |
| Attorney-drafted master service agreement | ~$6,000 |
| D-Tools Cloud | $99 – $1,199 / mo |
| D-Tools System Integrator (5-seat minimum) | $9,000 / yr floor |
| LowVolt Bid Kit — once, every machine you own | $297 |
D-Tools is a good product built for a shop bigger than yours. This is not a replacement for a full estimating platform — it is the structure most shops never had in the first place.
Checkout is handled by Lemon Squeezy, our authorized reseller. Your card statement will show LEMONSQUEEZY.COM, not LowVolt — that's normal, and your receipt will say so too.
Build one bid with it. If it doesn't change the number you were going to send, email me and I'll refund you — and you keep the files. I'd rather have the feedback than the $297.
Every unbilled hour you have eaten on a security job traces back to a sentence that was never in the proposal. Here are the twelve exclusions that belong in every proposal you send — written out, ready to paste. One page, no cost.
One email with the PDF. You can unsubscribe from anything that follows in one click.
No — and I would rather say so now than have you find out. They are industry-typical baselines for a two-person crew on new construction, per unit. A competent starting point, not measured data from your company.
The workbook ships with a Calibration tab specifically to fix that. Log what each completed job actually took; after three jobs on a given task it computes your real number and tells you to replace ours. By job four the file is measuring your crews rather than guessing at them. That transition is the product.
No — they are generic placeholders, and the workbook says so on the tab. Replace them with your distributor pricing before you quote. That is the single biggest accuracy win in the whole file and it takes one paste.
It is a business tool, not legal advice. The proposal template covers scope, exclusions, payment and acceptance — the commercial structure. Limitation of liability, indemnification and subrogation language belong in a signed agreement drafted by an attorney licensed in your state. Have counsel review anything customer-facing before you issue it.
Excel 2016 or newer, Excel for Mac, and Microsoft 365 all work. LibreOffice Calc works. Google Sheets will import it and the formulas calculate, but it drops the data-validation dropdowns on the Bid Builder — you would type the codes instead of picking them.
Use it on unlimited jobs inside your own company, install it on every machine you own, modify it however you like, and put your own branding on the customer-facing documents. You cannot resell or redistribute the files themselves, or include them in something you sell. A reseller license is available — ask.
Shops already running a full estimating platform, and anyone who wants software that does the thinking for them. This gives you the structure. You still have to know your trade.
It will show as LEMONSQUEEZY.COM, not LowVolt. Lemon Squeezy is our authorized reseller and merchant of record — they process the payment and handle sales tax. Your emailed receipt names the product, so keep it for your records. If you don't recognize a charge, email me before disputing it and I'll sort it out same day.
Email me. If you think a labor unit is wrong, tell me why — the next version gets built from what buyers ask for, and updates are free for 12 months.