Scopa for architectural practices
Schedule of Works Software for Architects
When a client asks for a schedule of works, you charge for it — and then somebody in the practice spends a day or more reading the whole set and typing out the line items. Scopa writes that first draft from your own drawings in about 8 minutes.
No subscription. Runs do not expire. Your drawings are deleted as soon as the schedule is sent.
In short
Scopa is construction software that converts an architectural drawing set — drawings, structural engineer's information, Building Regulations drawings and the written specification — into an editable first-draft schedule of works. It is built for UK architects, architectural technicians, estimators and contractors who currently write that schedule by hand. The schedule arrives by email as a spreadsheet in the standard section order or in the NBS (CAWS) arrangement, together with a classified list of everything the drawings left unclear. It costs £49 a run with no subscription, and it does not price the work.
How can an architect produce a schedule of works faster?
Upload the drawing set you have already produced. Scopa reads it and writes the first draft — every item described so that a contractor could put a price against it — and emails it to you as a spreadsheet about 8 minutes later. You then do what you would do with any draft prepared inside the practice: read it against the drawings, correct it, and issue it under your own name.
The fee you invoice for the schedule does not change. What changes is what it costs the practice to produce.
The problem
The schedule is chargeable work. Writing it is not the chargeable part.
Producing the first draft by hand means working through the architectural drawings, the demolition plan, the engineer's information and the specification, and converting all of it into individual work items in the order a job gets built.
It is a reading job before it is a writing job
Every sheet has to be cross-referenced against the others — sections against elevations, the engineer's sizes against the architect's details — before a single item can be written.
The gaps only surface late
A finish that was never specified, or a lintel that appears on one drawing and not another, tends to be found by whoever is pricing the job rather than by whoever wrote the schedule.
It lands at the worst moment
The request usually arrives when the set has just gone out and the practice has moved on to the next job. The work is real, but it is typing rather than design.
How it works
Three steps, and you only do the first and the last
01
Upload the set
Architect’s drawings, Building Regulations drawings, the structural engineer’s drawings and schedules, and the written specification. The more of the set you include, the more of the job it can describe. Tick the new-building box and it will not go looking for alterations that do not exist.
02
Close the tab
It takes five to eight minutes to write. You do not need to wait — add any client choices, PC sums or exclusions first, then get on with the rest of your day.
03
It lands in your inbox
Three files: a spreadsheet laid out to read and print on A4, the same schedule as a CSV for importing, and the confirmations as a PDF. It is a first draft to work from — the hours of typing are gone, the checking is still yours. Your drawings are deleted from our servers the moment it is sent.
What stays under your control
Everything that matters professionally. Scopa writes the description of the work; it does not decide the specification, it does not price anything, and it does not issue anything. The spreadsheet is yours to edit, restructure and put on your own letterhead. Where the drawings did not settle something, it says so in the confirmations list rather than quietly choosing for you.
For the detail of which documents decide which parts of the schedule — and what happens when one of them is missing — seehow Scopa reads a drawing set.
What you receive
Three files, in the format your practice issues
One email, about eight minutes after you upload. Nothing to install, and nothing left in an account you have to go back to.
The schedule, as a spreadsheet
Laid out to read and print on A4. Standard section order — Preparation through to Fixtures & Fittings — or the NBS (CAWS) arrangement with section codes and empty PC sum and price columns. You choose per run.
The same schedule as CSV
For importing into whatever your practice or your client already uses. Same content, no formatting.
The confirmations, as a PDF
Assumptions, exclusions, provisional allowances, PC sums and items needing confirmation — each one classified, so it can go to the client as a list of decisions rather than a list of problems.
If the schedule is going to a quantity surveyor, theNBS (CAWS) format is set out in full — section codes, consecutive references and the empty PC sum and price columns.
Product in action
One real job, published in full
A domestic extension and remodel — the architect's drawings and the structural engineer's drawings exactly as they were issued. Nothing was tidied up first. Every figure below is read from that run.
- 17
- drawings in
- 29 MB
- uploaded whole
- 105
- line items to price
- 27
- confirmations raised
- 8 min
- £49 a run
The worked example page reproduces two sections of the schedule in full, lists the drawing conflicts it found between the architect's and the engineer's information, and lets you download the actual spreadsheet, CSV and confirmations PDF a customer receives.
Comparison
Writing the first draft by hand, and writing it with Scopa
The checking does not move. That row is the honest one, and it is why this is a drafting tool rather than a replacement for professional judgement.
| By hand | With Scopa | |
|---|---|---|
| Time to a first draft | A day or more of fee-earning time | About 8 minutes |
| What it costs the practice | Someone's day | £49 a run |
| What you start from | An empty document | 105 items across 16 sections |
| Missing information | Found as you write, or later by the contractor | Listed up front and classified |
| Conflicts between drawings | Found if somebody notices | Flagged, with the engineer's version used |
| Output format | Whatever you build in Word or Excel | Standard sections or NBS (CAWS) |
| Checking and professional judgement | Yours | Still yours |
Who it is for
- Small and medium architectural practices asked by a client to produce the schedule of works
- Architectural technicians preparing tender information from a completed set
- Practices that issue in NBS (CAWS) and want the arrangement produced for them
- Anyone who has a full drawing set and currently writes the schedule from a blank document
Who it is not for
- Anyone wanting the work priced — Scopa writes the scope, never the rates, quantities or totals
- Anyone wanting a programme. A schedule of works is not a time schedule; there are no dates or durations anywhere in the output
- Projects with no drawings yet. It reads what has been drawn, so a concept sketch will not produce a usable schedule
- Anyone expecting a finished document to issue unread
A first draft, and the practice's name still goes on it
An architect issuing a schedule of works stands behind it professionally, so it is worth being plain about what this is. Scopa produces a draft by reading your drawings, and AI can make mistakes. It should be read against the set and corrected before it is issued or priced — exactly as you would read a draft written by a junior member of the practice.
What it removes is the typing, not the checking. The confirmations list is the tool telling you where it was unsure, which is the opposite of a document that hides its own gaps.
If someone in the practice has already tried this with a general AI assistant, thecomparison is here — including the cases where you should not pay for a run.
Your client's drawings are held only for the few minutes the run takes and are deleted the moment the schedule is emailed. Nothing is kept afterwards.
Pricing
£49 a run, and no subscription
One drawing set in, one schedule of works out. Runs do not expire, so a practice producing a handful of schedules a year pays for those and nothing else.
£49
A single run
£49 a schedule
£199
5 runs
£39.80 a schedule
£349
10 runs
£34.90 a schedule
Questions architects ask
- Can an architect use Scopa to produce a schedule of works?
- Yes. Scopa is built for exactly that job: you upload the drawing set you have already produced for the client, and about 8 minutes later a first-draft schedule of works arrives by email as a spreadsheet. You read it against your own drawings and issue it under your own name, the same way you would with a draft written by anyone else in the practice.
- Does this replace the schedule of works I charge my client for?
- No — it produces the first draft of it. The service you provide and the fee you invoice do not change. What changes is the internal time between the client asking and you having something to read, check and issue.
- What do I need to upload?
- As much of the set as you have: existing and proposed drawings, the demolition plan, the structural engineer's drawings and schedules, and the written specification. The existing layout matters — without it there is no way to work out demolition or making good. A window type or a finish is often stated only once, in a schedule or the specification, so those are worth including too.
- Can Scopa produce a schedule in NBS (CAWS) format?
- Yes. You choose per run between the standard section order — Preparation through to Fixtures & Fittings — and the NBS Common Arrangement of Work Sections, which comes with section codes, consecutive numbering and empty columns for PC sums and prices. The choice is remembered for next time.
- Does Scopa price the work?
- No. It writes what the work is, where it is and how it is described, and stops there. There are no rates, no quantities and no totals anywhere in what it sends you. In the NBS (CAWS) format the PC sum and price columns arrive empty, because what a job costs is a commercial judgement rather than something a drawing can state.
- Does it tell me what the drawings left unclear?
- Yes, and it is the part worth reading first. Alongside the schedule you get a classified list of assumptions, exclusions, provisional allowances, PC sums and items needing confirmation. On the published worked example that list ran to 27 entries. Anything marked TBC is carried as provisional rather than as firm scope.
- What happens when the architect's and the engineer's drawings disagree?
- The item is written from the structural engineer's version and the conflict is flagged in the confirmations list, so you have something to price and a note telling you to settle it — rather than a gap where an item should be.
- Am I responsible for what it produces?
- Yes, in exactly the way you are responsible for any draft prepared inside your practice. It is a first draft written by AI reading your drawings, and AI can make mistakes. It saves the writing, not the checking. Read it against your own set and adjust it before you issue or price anything.
- Do you keep my client’s drawings?
- No. They are held only for the few minutes it takes to produce your schedule and are deleted the moment it is emailed to you. A nightly sweep removes anything left behind by a run that failed part-way.
- Is there a subscription?
- No. Scopa is £49 a run — one drawing set in, one schedule of works out. Packs bring the unit price down: £199 for 5 runs and £349 for 10. Runs do not expire, so a practice that produces a handful of schedules a year pays only for those.
Put a set through and hold it against what you would have written
£49 a run, about 8 minutes, and the drawings deleted as soon as it is sent.
Not sure it suits your sets? Ask us — a contractor who prices work from practices like yours will answer.