Quoting software for plumbing and HVAC distributors

Why plumbing and HVAC lists are slow to quote

Nobody orders from a supply house by part number. They order by what the part does, in the shorthand of the trade, and one short description fits several SKUs.

• Fittings: “2 in PVC 90” could be Schedule 40 DWV or pressure, short or long sweep, hub by hub or hub by spigot. “3/4 ball valve” could be FIP by FIP, sweat, press or PEX crimp, full port or standard port, lead-free or not.
• Tube and pipe: “1/2 PEX” is PEX-A or PEX-B, red, blue or white, in a 100, 300 or 500 ft coil or in straight lengths. “3/4 copper L” is a 20 ft stick or a coil.
• Equipment: “40 gal gas heater” still needs natural gas or LP and atmospheric or power vent. “3 ton condenser” needs an efficiency rating, a refrigerant (R-410A or R-454B) and a matching coil.
• HVAC parts: “45/5 440 dual run cap”, “2-pole 30A 24V contactor”, “20x25x1 MERV 8, case of 12”. The numbers are exact, but your shelf may carry three brands of each.
• Units: feet, sticks, coils, cartons, bags of 100, each. The customer’s unit is rarely the unit you price in.
• Prices: contractor tiers, builder or job pricing, and copper and brass lines that move with the market.

Every line is a lookup, a stock check and a price. Qotora prepares that work for you; your counter keeps the judgement.

From the plumber’s text to a quote you can check

1. Receive the request in whatever form it arrives: a pasted text, an email, a PDF material list, an Excel sheet, a photo of a list written on a delivery slip, or a voice note.
2. Find each line in your catalogue: Qotora reads “2in pvc 90” or “3/4 ball valve FIP” the way a counter person would and searches your own products, with your part numbers.
3. Apply your price rules: the customer’s tier, your discounts and your margins. Prices come from your own catalogue data; Qotora never invents a price or a margin.
4. Flag what is unclear: when a line fits several products, Qotora asks a precise question instead of guessing.
5. Review and send: a person checks every line, then sends the quote. Nothing goes out automatically.

When “3/4 ball valve” could be four products

The expensive mistake at a supply house is not a slow quote. It is the wrong valve on a truck headed to a job. So when a request does not say enough, Qotora does not pick the likeliest SKU. It shows the candidates from your catalogue and asks the one question that separates them.

The same rule applies to substitutions. If a brand is out of stock, Qotora can propose an equivalent from your catalogue, but it is only a proposal: it stays flagged until a person on your team confirms it, and nothing is swapped on its own.

Coils, sticks, cartons and contractor pricing

Your packaging rules are loaded during setup: how many feet in a coil, how many fittings in a bag, what a case of filters holds. When a customer writes “3 coils” or “2 cases”, Qotora shows what they wrote next to the quantity it worked out, so the person reviewing can see both.

Pricing follows the customer. The tier you have set for a contractor applies to the whole quote, and when a customer has no tier on file, the person reviewing picks one and it is remembered. For copper and brass, Qotora applies the price your catalogue data holds when the quote is prepared. It does not look up commodity prices or add a surcharge of its own, and a line with no price in your data is flagged for you to fill in.

HVAC: parts by the number, equipment by the model

Service techs order parts by exact values and sizes: capacitor microfarads and voltage, contactor poles and coil voltage, filter dimensions, line set diameters and lengths. Qotora searches your catalogue for those exact values and sizes, and when two products differ only by a value the customer did not give, it asks instead of choosing. A “45/5 440” cap is not a “35/5 370” cap.

Equipment is different. When a request names a tonnage and an efficiency but not a model, Qotora asks which of your models the customer means. It does not certify that a condenser, a coil and an air handler form a rated match: that stays with your people and the manufacturer’s data.

For a line you do not stock, the Team and Network plans can draft a price request to the right supplier, in their language, without naming your customer or the job. It is ready to open in your email, you send it yourself, and when the supplier answers, their cost goes through your margin rule before it reaches the line.

Your catalogue, your prices, your control

• Your catalogue and stock: Qotora matches against your own products, not a generic list.
• Your price rules: tiers, discounts and margins are the ones you set.
• Read-only on your system: Qotora reads your data and never writes into your software.
• A human decides: every quote is reviewed before it is sent, and there is no automatic sending.
• Corrections are remembered: when your team fixes a line, the correction counts the next time the same words arrive.

Getting started

The Counter plan is US$49 for the first month, then US$149 a month, for up to 150 quotes sent per month and unlimited users. Setup is included: our team connects Qotora to your software or imports your catalogue, stock and prices. You have a 7-day money-back guarantee, counted from the first quote you send with Qotora.

Distributors that send more quotes can choose the Team plan (US$349 a month, up to 500 quotes sent) or the Network plan (US$799 a month, up to 2,000 quotes sent).