Streamline how you estimate security systems

Countfire is built for the people who produce the numbers: security estimators, and fire alarm estimators at installation and integration companies. That ranges from small independent installers to national contractors and integrators, with teams like Chubb, Siemens, G4S and Adept Fire among the security and fire businesses using Countfire.

It works wherever you tender from. Countfire is fully cloud-based and used by estimating teams worldwide, on projects from single-building fit-outs to multi-site commercial rollouts.

If your week involves counting symbols from PDF drawings, pricing devices in Excel and double-checking everything before a deadline, Countfire was built for you.

The workflow runs from drawing to client-ready estimate:

1. Upload your drawings. Add PDF drawings for the whole project, however many there are.
2. Run automated takeoff. Countfire identifies and counts every instance of each symbol across all drawings, rather than you clicking each one individually.
3. Check accuracy. Built-in checks highlight uncounted items so nothing slips through. Coverage area tools let you verify detector and sensor coverage against the drawing and add devices where regulations require them.
4. Price the estimate. Reuse prices from previous estimates for regularly used items, then adjust for the project in hand.
5. Export and submit. Produce a clear, client-ready estimate with a full breakdown, with every version saved to the cloud for future reference.

Because everything is recorded digitally, you can always trace a number back to the drawing it came from. Useful when a client queries a quantity six weeks after submission.

Countfire handles takeoff and estimating for the full range of security and life safety systems found on commercial drawings, including CCTV, access control, intruder detection and fire detection. The two most common are covered below.

Intruder alarm systems

Count PIRs, door contacts, panic buttons, control panels, keypads, sounders and every other intruder alarm component across a full drawing set in one pass. Coverage tools help you check sensor detection areas, so you can confirm the design works and add devices where there are gaps before pricing.

Fire alarm systems

Take off smoke detectors, heat detectors, manual call points, sounders, beacons and interfaces across every drawing in the project. Coverage area tools check detection against your drawings to help you meet the relevant standards, and accuracy checks confirm nothing has been missed before the estimate goes out.

The biggest saving comes from removing manual counting. Automated takeoff counts every symbol across every drawing at once, so a task that took hours per drawing takes minutes per project. Dextra Group went from around 10 drawings a week to 40, with a team of four estimators.

Beyond takeoff, time is saved at every stage:

• Reusable pricing. Regularly used devices are priced from your previous estimates, not looked up from scratch each time.
• Built-in checks, not re-counts. Accuracy checks replace the second and third manual pass most estimators do to be safe.
• Side-by-side spec comparison. When a revised drawing lands, compare specifications directly instead of hunting for changes.
• One workflow. Takeoff quantities flow straight into the estimate, removing transfer errors between drawing software and spreadsheets.

Less time counting means more tenders submitted, and more time spent on the judgement calls that actually win work.