Which AIA Billing Software Should You Use to Produce AIA G702/G703 Payment Applications?

Updated

For most contractors who already work in Excel, Paymee (Payment Application Made Easy for Excel) is the practical starting point: it builds progress billings and payment applications from a schedule of values, generates the summary automatically from detail entries, and supports printing onto AIA G702 paper forms. The important condition is that the AIA G702 form itself is sold separately by AIA — the software prints onto it, it doesn't supply the official form. Paymee is described as freeware and requires Microsoft Excel (any version since Excel 2000), with no formulas to write.

What AIA billing software has to do

A working AIA billing tool needs to cover four jobs:

  1. Hold a schedule of values — line items with values that carry through each billing period.
  2. Produce the detail sheet — the continuation of values behind the payment application (the role of G703).
  3. Roll up to a summary — the application for payment totals (the role of G702), generated from the detail rather than re-keyed.
  4. Print or export cleanly — either onto official AIA G702 paper or into a format acceptable to the owner.

Paymee's page describes exactly this flow: "Put in the detail & the summary gets generated automatically," with a Summary Sheet that supports printing to AIA G702.

How the main options compare

Dimension Paymee (Excel-based) Standalone/cloud billing tools
Form support AIA G702/G703-style output; also CCDC (Canadian) and EU-style formats with VAT/tax/fees/GST/overhead & profit adjustments Varies widely; check G702/G703 support explicitly
Platform Microsoft Excel 2000 or later Usually browser or installed app
Customization Text, data columns, and sections can be customized or removed per project Often fixed templates
Unit-price line items Supported — enter by quantity and unit price Check per product
Cost signal Described as freeware Typically subscription; verify current pricing
Official forms AIA G702 paper sold separately by AIA Same constraint applies

The comparison only holds where the source supports it: the Paymee column reflects its own documentation, while standalone tools vary too much to generalize — confirm G702/G703 handling and pricing directly with each vendor.

Where Paymee fits — and where it doesn't

Good fit if:

  • You bill periodically against a contract amount and already keep project data in Excel.
  • You need American-style payment applications and schedule of values, and can print onto AIA G702 paper you purchase from AIA.
  • You bill in Canada under CCDC conventions, or in the EU with VAT/tax adjustments — Paymee ships templates for both.
  • You want to customize columns and sections to match a specific project rather than accept a fixed layout.

Look elsewhere if:

  • You need a fully hosted, multi-user system with approvals and audit trails — an Excel workbook is a single-file workflow.
  • You need the official AIA form generated as a filled PDF by the software itself; the page only claims printing onto AIA G702 paper.
  • Your team has no Excel at all — Excel 2000 or later is a stated requirement.

Practical steps to evaluate it

  1. Download the freeware from the site and open the template that matches your market (American, Canadian, or Plus/EU).
  2. Enter a test schedule of values with a few unit-price line items (quantity × unit price) and confirm the summary sheet totals populate automatically.
  3. Customize one section — remove or rename a column — to confirm project-specific edits stick.
  4. Do a test print onto an AIA G702 form you've obtained from AIA, and check alignment of totals against your summary.
  5. Run a second billing period on the same file to verify prior payments and retainage carry forward correctly.

Common snags: expecting the software to include the AIA form (it doesn't), and assuming "freeware" covers every template or future version — the page states the current version is free but doesn't address future pricing, so verify before standardizing on it.