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Change order form and log

Fill in a construction change order in your browser: cost lines, markups, tax, the new contract sum and the new completion date. Print it or save it as a PDF, keep a log of every change and export the log to Excel or CSV.

Free, with no sign-up. What you enter stays in your browser. Contract terms checked on November 8, 2026.

Prefer a file to fill in by hand? Change order Word template (.docx) Change order Excel template with formulas (.xlsx)

Project and parties
This change
Enter 0 when the change does not move the completion date.
Cost of the change
One line per cost. Labor and staff time are hours times an hourly rate. When a change both adds and deletes work, enter the deleted items with a minus sign in the unit cost.
  1. $0.00
  2. $0.00
MarkupsEvery percentage starts blank. Use the markups your contract allows for changes.
Tax and retainageEnter the sales tax rate your state and city apply to this work, or leave it at 0.
The rate your contract sets.
Approved changes that are not in the log
Earlier approved changes you track elsewhere. A credit takes a minus sign.
Change order 1, proposed

$0.00

total of this change

Direct cost$0.00
Overhead0% of direct cost$0.00
Profit0% of cost plus overhead$0.00
Bond and insurance0% of the subtotal$0.00
Change price before tax$0.00
Sales tax0% of the change price$0.00
$0.00

new contract sum

0 days

change to contract time

Your margin, not printed

Enter costs to see the margin.

Your change order

This is the page that prints. The margin stays off it.

Change order No. 1

Title of the change

Date
-
Status
Proposed
Reason
Client or owner request
Project
-
Contract date
-
Owner
-
Contractor
-

Description of the change

Describe the work added, deleted or revised, and reference the drawings, instructions or requests behind it.

Cost breakdown

TypeDescriptionQtyUnitUnit costAmount
Laborh$0.00
Material$0.00
Direct cost$0.00
Change price before tax$0.00
Total of this change order$0.00

Contract sum

Original contract sum$0.00
Net change by earlier approved changes$0.00
Contract sum before this change$0.00
Increased by this change$0.00
New contract sum$0.00

Contract time

Original completion date-
Earlier approved changes0 days
This change0 days
New completion date-

Approval

Signing records agreement on the change in the work, the adjustment to the contract sum and the adjustment to the contract time stated above.

Owner: signatureName and date
Contractor: signatureName and date

Prepared with the change order form at flectic.com/tools/change-order-form

Change order log

Saved in this browser only. Export it to share it or keep a copy.

Change order log

No.DateTitleStatusAmountDays
No changes saved yet. Fill in the form and choose Save to the log.
Proposed
$0.000 changes, 0 days
Approved
$0.000 changes, 0 days
Rejected
$0.000 changes, 0 days
Approved as % of original contract sum
-

How the totals are calculated

The form puts each markup on its own line, in this order. Contracts set their own percentages and bases, so check yours before you send the change.

  1. 01

    Direct cost

    The sum of the cost lines: quantity times unit cost, and hours times rate for labor and staff time.

  2. 02

    Overhead

    Direct cost times the overhead percentage.

  3. 03

    Profit

    Direct cost plus overhead, times the profit percentage. Switch the basis to direct cost only when your contract figures profit that way.

  4. 04

    Bond and insurance

    The subtotal so far times the bond and insurance percentage.

  5. 05

    Tax

    Each tax rate you enter, applied to the change price or to the material and equipment lines only.

  6. 06

    Contract sum and time

    The new contract sum is the original sum plus earlier approved changes plus this change. The new completion date adds the days of earlier approved changes and of this change to the original date.

Worked example

A change with $10,000.00 of direct cost, 10% overhead, 10% profit on cost plus overhead and 1.5% bond and insurance:

LineHow it is figuredAmount
Direct costSum of the cost lines$10,000.00
Overhead10% of $10,000.00$1,000.00
Profit10% of $11,000.00$1,100.00
Bond and insurance1.5% of $12,100.00$181.50
Change price before taxDirect cost plus markups$12,281.50

A credit for deleted work carries no overhead or profit unless you switch that off. AIA A201-2017 section 7.3.8 credits a deletion at net cost and figures overhead and profit on the net increase only; CCDC 2-2020 GC 6.3.6 prices a change directive the same way.

What a change order should include

A change order is a written amendment to the construction contract. AIA A201-2017 and CCDC 2-2020 both define it by three points: the change in the work, the adjustment to the contract sum (the contract price in CCDC 2) and the adjustment to the contract time.

FieldWhat to put in it
Number and dateA running number for each contract, so the log, the pay application and the invoice refer to the same change.
Project and partiesProject name and number, the owner, the contractor, and the architect or engineer when the contract names one.
DescriptionThe work added, deleted or revised, with the drawing, instruction or request that started it.
ReasonClient request, design change, unforeseen condition, error or omission, or allowance adjustment. It shows later who caused the cost.
Cost breakdownLabor, material, equipment, subcontract and other costs, then each markup and the tax on its own line, so the owner can check the price.
Contract sumThe original sum, the net change by earlier approved changes, the sum before this change, this change and the new sum.
Contract timeThe days the change adds or removes, and the new completion date.
SignaturesThe owner and the contractor, and the architect under AIA A201-2017. The AIA says its G701 form takes effect once all three have signed.

The form follows the order of the contract sum and contract time summary used on AIA G701. It is not an AIA or CCDC document and uses none of their wording.

Change order, change directive or minor change

Both standard contracts separate an agreed change from a change the owner orders before the price is settled. Once price and time are agreed, a change directive is recorded as a change order.

InstrumentAIA A201-2017 (US)CCDC 2-2020 (Canada)
Change orderRecords agreement on the change in the work, the adjustment to the contract sum and the adjustment to the contract time. The owner, the contractor and the architect sign it.A written amendment prepared by the consultant and signed by the owner and the contractor. It records the change, the amount or method of the price adjustment and the time adjustment.
Change ordered before the price is agreedConstruction change directive. Used when there is no full agreement on a change order. The owner and the architect sign it and the contractor proceeds with the work.Change directive. A written instruction prepared by the consultant and signed by the owner. It must fall within the general scope of the contract and cannot change the contract time alone.
Change with no cost or time effectOrder for a minor change in the work, issued by the architect alone. It cannot adjust the contract sum or extend the contract time.Supplemental instruction from the consultant, with no adjustment to the contract price or the contract time.

Costs that count when a change is priced on cost

For a construction change directive priced on cost, A201-2017 section 7.3.4 limits the costs, unless the contract documents say otherwise, to labor with payroll taxes, required fringe benefits and workers' compensation insurance; materials, supplies and equipment, including transportation; rental of machinery and equipment, excluding hand tools; bond and insurance premiums, permit fees and sales, use or similar taxes related to the change; and supervision and field office staff the change requires.

CCDC 2-2020 GC 6.3.7 counts the actual cost that contributes directly to a change directive: labour, products, construction equipment and temporary work, subcontract amounts, and other costs such as inspection and testing, waste removal and contract securities. The form's line types follow the same split.

Change requests for engineering and architecture firms

Choose Consultant change request at the top of the form. The lines become staff time, subconsultant, expense and fixed fee, the owner becomes the client and the contract sum becomes the agreed fee.

The log then tracks additional services against the original fee, with approved, pending and rejected totals and approved changes as a share of the fee.

  • Odoo Engineering Services package

    In this package, client change requests go through an approval step and become their own billing line, on the same record as the work package budget, timesheets and invoices.

    Odoo for engineering firms

  • Odoo Architecture and Planning package

    In this package, additional-service requests are approved first and then billed as their own fee line, with fee used by phase visible before the phase closes.

    Odoo for architecture firms

Retainage and holdback on changes

An approved change is billed with the rest of the contract, so retainage or holdback usually applies to it as well.

  • United States: retainage

    The contract sets the retainage rate. On federal fixed-price construction contracts, FAR 52.232-5 lets the contracting officer retain up to 10 percent of a payment when progress is not satisfactory.

  • Ontario: holdback

    The Construction Act requires each payer to retain a basic holdback of 10 percent of the price of services or materials as they are supplied (section 22). Section 26 also sets a mandatory annual payment: after each anniversary of the contract date, the owner publishes a notice and pays the accrued holdback unless a lien has been preserved or perfected.

  • Other provinces

    Each province sets holdback in its own lien legislation. CCDC 2-2020 applies the holdback percentages that legislation sets to each progress payment.

The form holds retainage or holdback on the price before tax or on the total with tax, whichever your contract uses.

Sales tax, GST and HST on a change

Tax on a change follows the same rules as tax on the contract, and those rules differ by state and province.

  • United States

    Each state decides how sales tax falls on construction work, and the contract form can change the answer. In Texas, a contractor on a lump-sum residential repair contract pays tax on materials when buying them and does not charge the customer tax; on a separated contract it collects tax from the customer on the materials. Set the form's tax to the change price or to the material and equipment lines to match.

  • Canada

    CCDC 2-2020 states the contract price without value added taxes, which it defines to include GST, HST and QST, and adds them to each payment. With the CAD setting the form keeps tax out of the contract sum for that reason. Provincial sales tax on a contractor's materials differs by province.

Province or territoryGST or HSTPST, RST or QST
Ontario13% HSTNone
Nova Scotia14% HSTNone
New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island15% HSTNone
British Columbia5% GST7% PST
Manitoba5% GST7% RST
Saskatchewan5% GST6% PST
Quebec5% GST9.975% QST
Alberta, Northwest Territories, Nunavut, Yukon5% GSTNone

Rates from the Canada Revenue Agency table for supplies made on or after April 1, 2025.

How Flectic can help

A form handles one change. Across a job, each approved change has to reach the budget, the purchase orders and the next invoice.

Flectic implements Odoo for contractors from tender to handover, so job costs stay visible while the work is still running. The Odoo Construction package connects quotations, job budgets, site schedules, procurement, labour and milestone billing, and reviews recorded costs, purchase commitments and approved revenue against agreed cost codes. Core covers one legal entity and is proposed at 18 to 22 weeks. Odoo bills licenses separately from the package: Odoo Standard costs $24.90 per user a month in year one.

Book a free discovery callOdoo for construction companies

Still choosing a platform? The free Digital Transformation Assessment is three working sessions, then a written analysis of how your firm runs today and how Odoo or Microsoft Dynamics 365 would close the gaps. For how construction accounting software handles job costs, retainage and billing, read Construction ERP and Accounting Software Compared.

Sources

Contract and tax terms checked on November 8, 2026 against: AIA: change orders and construction change directivesAIA: overhead and profit on deductive change orders (A201-2017 section 7.3.8)AIA G701-2017 sampleCCDC 2-2020 Stipulated Price ContractOntario Construction Act, sections 22 and 26FAR 52.232-5 (federal retainage)CRA GST/HST ratesTexas Comptroller: lump-sum and separated contracts

Questions about change orders

What is a change order in construction?

A change order is a written amendment to the construction contract, signed by the owner and the contractor, that records three things: the change in the work, the adjustment to the contract sum and the adjustment to the contract time. AIA A201-2017 and CCDC 2-2020 both define it by those three points. Under A201 the architect signs too.

What is the difference between a change order and a construction change directive?

A change order records a change both sides have agreed on, including its price and its effect on time. A construction change directive (a change directive in CCDC 2) orders the contractor to proceed before price or time is agreed. The owner signs it, the contractor goes ahead, and the adjustment is settled later and then recorded in a change order.

How do you price a change order?

Add up the direct cost of the change: labor hours times rate, materials, equipment rental and subcontract amounts. Then apply the markups your contract allows, in the order it sets: overhead, profit, then bond and insurance premiums. Add the tax that applies to the work. This form shows each step on its own line so the owner can check it.

What markup is allowed on a change order?

The contract decides. Many contracts state an overhead and profit percentage for changes, or a fee for change directives. Under A201-2017, when the architect sets the price of a change directive, overhead and profit follow the agreement or, if it names no amount, a reasonable amount. The form leaves every percentage blank so you enter the figures your contract sets.

Do overhead and profit apply to a credit change order?

Usually not. A201-2017 section 7.3.8 gives the owner a credit at net cost for deleted work and figures overhead and profit on the net increase only, and CCDC 2-2020 reduces the price by the net decrease without the fee. The form applies no markup to a net credit unless you switch that off.

What should a change order log include?

Each change order number, its date, a short title, its status (proposed, approved or rejected), the amount and the days it adds or removes. Totals of approved and pending changes, and approved changes as a share of the original contract sum, show at a glance how far the job has moved from the bid.

Is this an AIA G701 or CCDC form?

No. The document follows the order of the contract sum and contract time summary used on AIA G701, but it is not an AIA or CCDC document and uses none of their wording. If your contract requires G701, G714 or a CCDC form, use that form and keep this page for pricing and the log.

Does my data leave the browser?

No. The form, the totals and the log run in your browser. The log is stored in this browser only, and the PDF, CSV and Excel files are created on your device. Clear the log with the button under it.

Where to go from here

Talk to a consultantBook a free discovery callA 30-minute call with a senior consultant, ending with a recommended first phase or a clear reason to wait.Run the numbersEstimate your Odoo cost$24.90Odoo Standard, per user a month in year onePlan, users, hosting and implementation, with first-year and three-year totals.
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