Highlights

• 90–95% time reduction on every PDF to ESX conversion, saving 5+ hours per week across the department.
  
  

• Same-day turnaround on a $6M estimate: An 890-line-item fitness center scope was converted, analyzed, and returned in half a day — a process that would have taken 3–4 days.
  
  

• Instant estimate intelligence: ClaimsFlow’s discrepancy report surfaces missing tax, O&P gaps, and pricing anomalies before the estimator even opens the file.
  
  

• Team sanity restored: Eliminated the most dreaded task in the department, freeing estimators to focus on analysis instead of data entry.
  
  

The Problem: The PDF is not a Workable Estimate

BluSky Restoration’s Central Estimating team supports the company with estimates, supplements, and analyses.

The Central Estimating team works heavily in Xactimate. They need to:

1. Supplement received estimates to add missing scope + line items.

2. Break down line items by labor, material, and equipment to create budgets.

3. Compare component costs against benchmarks to create cost analyses.

None of this is possible from a PDF estimate, which is a compressed copy of the estimate that strips key information. Before any work can begin, someone has to rebuild the estimate in Xactimate line item by line item.

Before ClaimsFlow: “Line Item by Line Item by Line Item”

Before ClaimsFlow, every received PDF meant rebuilding the estimate from scratch in Xactimate.

Estimators re-entered each line item in Xactimate one at a time. This required mapping each description to the appropriate trade, inferring the correct activity, adding the relevant line quantity and price – all while cross-referencing against the original PDF on a second screen to confirm accuracy.

“It’s mind-numbing, it’s draining, it’s a big strain on your eyes too, because you’re going back and forth on two screens, trying to make sure every single line item lines up properly.”

A mid-sized estimate could take three to six hours. A large one — 500 to 1,000+ line items — could consume an entire day or even more. For BluSky’s estimating team, where every team member is already juggling multiple projects, that time came at a steep cost.

In fact, PDF to ESX conversions were the single biggest drain on the team’s time and energy.

“This was probably one of the most dreaded tasks for someone to do. No one likes to do this.”

Additionally, it stalled the business. When a conversion takes days, the project can’t move forward.

With ClaimsFlow: Half a Day Instead of Three

With ClaimsFlow, BluSky’s PDF to ESX conversion time dropped by 90–95%.

Amanda runs incoming PDFs through ClaimsFlow and receives a complete ESX file in minutes.

The clearest example: Amanda received a recent 890-line-item estimate for a fitness center. It was just under $6 million. The estimate came from a building consultant, and the project director needed a cost analysis to determine the margins for the job.

“I ran it through the program, and it took under 20 minutes. After a couple tweaks, I was ready to go. I was able to probably save 8 hours on this one particular job.”

Amanda ran the analysis, and had the complete package back to the project director by the end of the same day.

“The Project Director was able to take that estimate with a contract to the customer the very next day, versus maybe having to wait a few days for us to really analyze a PDF estimate.”

On a $6 million project, that turnaround time really matters.

Across all conversions, Amanda estimates she saves at least 5 hours per week — 15 to 20 hours per month — with ClaimsFlow. That volume is growing as more project directors discover the tool.

The Unexpected Value: Estimate Intelligence

Time savings alone justified the tool. But the feature Amanda talks about the most is one she did not expect: Estimate Intelligence.

ClaimsFlow enriches the original PDF into a full Xactimate project. As part of every conversion, ClaimsFlow reconstructs the project tree, flags custom line items, independently priced items, and anomalies.

For Amanda, this turned the conversion step into an analysis step.

“I feel so educated on the estimate before I even open it. Almost like I’ve been at the loss, I know every little detail about the job, because I can pick apart every little dollar and cent.”

The ClaimsFlow dashboard surfaces issues that would otherwise take hours to find manually, or might never be caught at all.

“I can very quickly say, hey, I noticed that the adjuster didn’t put tax on certain materials, or they didn’t put overhead and profit on these specific line items, or they made some global changes to things. It’s awesome.”

For an estimating team that prides itself on precision, understanding all these pieces before opening the file makes everything easier: supplementing, negotiating, and analyzing the estimate.

Looking Ahead

Amanda’s goal is straightforward: no one at BluSky should ever have to manually copy an estimate again.

“I don’t want anyone ever copying an estimate again, if they don’t have to. If it’s 5 or 6 line items, fine, but anything more, there’s really no reason why we can’t just run it through.”

Right now, Amanda handles all ClaimsFlow conversions herself. The plan is to open the tool up to the full company in the coming year, giving every project director and estimator direct access.

For BluSky, the bottleneck is gone. Works that used to take hours or days, now takes minutes. And the data that’s lost in a PDF is now easily accessible in Xactimate where it belongs.