Crew on the Fly or “Open Crew” setup

What is a “Crew on the Fly”? It is nothing more than a crew with no labor or equipment. Sometimes it referred to it as a “blank” or “open” crew.  It is useful when you want to use a one time crew that doesn’t exist in the standard setup. You add labor and equipment after bringing it up in an activity by using the Modify Crew routine. Historical Note: Mike Rydin, founder of HCSS, in the early nineties said that I invented the concept of an open crew (it was not that hard).  Not too many people around from that time period to argue. So as the inventor I never meant it to be the crew that is used for all activities and here is why. Creating a custom crew for every activity will not accurately reflect actual field costs. On a construction project there are set crews and they will stay as a crew until the end of the project. It is a best practice to use standardized crews at least to start with so that the estimating group has a baseline to review. And if all the crews are “Open Crew” then there is no possibility of changing a crew through out the estimate with just a few keystrokes.  But for the few biditems that a crew is not setup (and not a major cost item) the “Open Crew” is a good solution.