PayPolka

Estimates

An estimate is the quote, bid, or proposal you send a client before the work begins. In PayPolka you build it from your saved labor rates and catalog or from manual line items, send it for online approval, and let your client accept or decline from a private link. Once an estimate is accepted, you can turn it into one or more invoices. See Billing an estimate for that.

Creating a new estimate

From the Estimates section, choose New estimate and fill in the basics:

  1. Client. Pick who the estimate is for. The estimate will be addressed to that client and sent to their primary contact.
  2. Issue date. When the estimate is dated.
  3. Valid-until date. The date the quote is good through. After this date passes, a sent estimate is shown as expired (see Statuses below).
  4. Subject. A short title for the job, for example “Panel upgrade.”
  5. Notes. Any terms, scope details, or notes you want the client to see.

When you choose a client, PayPolka fills in the tax % and discount % from that client’s saved defaults. These are snapshots — they belong to this estimate, so you can adjust them here without changing the client’s defaults, and later changes to the client’s defaults won’t alter an estimate you’ve already created.

Adding line items

Estimates use the same line item editor you’ll see on invoices. There are two ways to add rows.

Add from catalog

Select + Add from catalog to open a side drawer grouped into two sections:

  • Labor Rates — your reusable hourly rates.
  • Catalog Products — your reusable products, services, materials, and fees.

Pick an item and it drops in as a new row. Everything copied in is a snapshot, so you can edit it on the estimate without affecting your saved presets.

Labor rows use these labels:

  • Labor Category
  • Description
  • Qty Hours — starts blank. You must enter the hours before you can save.
  • Price

Catalog rows use these labels:

  • Type
  • Description
  • Quantity — defaults to 1.
  • Price

Add line item

Select + Add line item to add a blank manual row you fill in yourself. Each line item has a type: labor, service, expense, materials, travel, or other.

Every row — whether it came from the catalog or was added manually — stays fully editable after you insert it. You can change the description, quantity, and price, or remove the row entirely.

Attaching files

You can attach supporting files to an estimate, such as a detailed proposal or a spec sheet. These travel with the estimate so your client can review them alongside the quote.

Sending the estimate

When the estimate is ready, send it. PayPolka emails it to the client’s primary contact with a link to the public estimate page, where they can review it and accept or decline. To accept, the client types their signature name; PayPolka records the time and can also capture optional notes from them.

Estimate numbers

Every estimate gets an automatic number that starts with EST-, for example EST-001. Numbers are assigned in sequence per account. You can set the prefix in Account settings.

Statuses

An estimate moves through these statuses:

  • Draft — being built, not yet sent.
  • Sent — delivered to the client and awaiting a response.
  • Accepted — the client approved it.
  • Declined — the client turned it down.

There are also two derived states you’ll see in the list:

  • Expired — a sent estimate whose valid-until date has passed.
  • Archived — an estimate you’ve put away (see below).

The estimate list

The Estimates list shows all your estimates with status filters across the top: All, Draft, Sent, Accepted, Declined, and Archived. Use these to quickly find what you’re looking for.

Archiving and reopening

If an estimate is no longer active — for example it expired or the job fell through — you can archive it to clear it out of your working views. Archived estimates stay in your records and show under the Archived filter. You can reopen one if it becomes relevant again.

The link your client uses to view an estimate is a bearer link: anyone who has the URL can open it, so treat it like a private link. If a link is shared too widely or you want to invalidate the old one, you can regenerate it. Regenerating creates a fresh link and immediately disables the previous one.

Next steps