Why SARA — The connected ERP for project-driven companies

The problem

You run an engineering company. Projects are your business. But the tools you use to run them haven't kept up.

Quotes live in Excel spreadsheets, each one formatted differently depending on who wrote it. Purchase requests bounce through email threads and WhatsApp groups — nobody knows what's been ordered, by whom, or whether it arrived. Timesheets are filled out on paper or in disconnected apps, reconciled against payroll manually. Invoices go out late because finance is still piecing together what was actually delivered. And the question every owner dreads — "are we making money on this project?" — can only be answered weeks after it ends, if at all.

Sound familiar?

These aren't isolated problems. They're symptoms of the same root cause: your core business processes are running on disconnected tools, and every handoff between them is a chance for information to get lost.

SARA was built to solve this — by a company that lived it.

How SARA connects your business

SARA ties every activity — every quote, every purchase, every hour logged, every invoice — back to a project. That single thread gives you end-to-end traceability and real-time visibility across your entire operation.

flowchart LR
    QUOTE[Quote] -->|Approved + CPO| PROJ[Project]
    PROJ --> REQ[Requisitions]
    PROJ --> LOG[Logistics]
    PROJ --> TS[Timesheets]
    REQ --> PO[Purchase Orders]
    LOG --> SPO[Supplier POs]
    PO --> CC[Cost Center]
    SPO --> CC
    TS --> CC
    CC --> PROFIT[Profitability]

Every arrow in that diagram is a status-driven workflow with clear ownership: someone creates, someone reviews, someone approves. Every change is logged. Every dollar is tracked to its source.

The following sections walk through the main flows — what they look like in a typical project, and how SARA handles them.

Life of a quote

A quote in SARA isn't just a PDF — it's a living document that connects sales, engineering, and finance from the first customer conversation.

The flow

Create the lead. Sales opens a new quote. Only essential fields are required — customer, description, internal company — so the record is created in seconds.
Define costs in the Quote Engine. Each technical owner fills in the real cost of their scope: mechanics, materials, labor, subcontractors — broken down by budget node. This isn't guesswork in a spreadsheet. It's a structured cost model that can be reused, duplicated, or generated from a previous similar project's actual costs.
Set profit and review. Sales sets profit percentages per cost category (e.g., 5% on materials, 20% on labor). The Quote Engine shows total cost, suggested price, and final margin — all in real time.
Generate the formal offer. Sales prepares the customer-facing document using the Quote Engine data. SARA doesn't lock you into a specific format — you compose the offer the way your client expects.
Send by email. One click generates a versioned PDF (e.g., QUO.0984.01) and emails it to the customer. The sent date is recorded. Previous versions remain available — red for old, green for latest.
Adjust if needed. The customer wants changes. Sales creates a new version: QUO.0984.02. Same quote, new PDF, full version history preserved. No more Quote_v3_final_FINAL.pdf.
Approve. The customer accepts and sends their purchase order. Sales enters the Customer PO (CPO) details and approves the quote. SARA does the rest — see Life of a project.
Or cancel. If the opportunity dies, the quote is cancelled with a reason (internal decision or customer rejection). It stays in the system for reference, not cluttering your active pipeline.
Complementary quotes. Need to add scope to an existing project? Create a complementary quote — same workflow, but the approved budget is added to the original project instead of creating a new one.

Learn more

Full workflow details: Quotes — Workflow

What this replaces

Before SARA	With SARA
Excel files with inconsistent cost structures	Structured Quote Engine, one format across the company
`Quote_v3_final_v2.pdf`	Versioned PDFs with full audit trail
"Who approved this price?"	Cost and profit per node, visible to everyone with permission
Re-quoting similar projects from scratch	Duplicate, generate from project, or use quote templates

Life of a project

A project in SARA is the operational backbone. Every expenditure, every hour, every invoice traces back to it.

The flow

Quote is approved. When sales enters the CPO and approves a quote, SARA automatically creates the project in Active status. No manual data entry. The project inherits the customer, budget structure, and internal company from the quote. Email notifications go out to the project manager and all stakeholders.
Planning begins. The project manager assigns departments, configures budget nodes, and sets up the project structure. If the project involves travel, logistics planning starts in parallel (see Life of a logistic plan).
Purchasing kicks in. The team creates requisitions for materials, equipment, and specialized services — each one linked to a project budget node. Requisitions flow through purchasing for review and become Purchase Orders to suppliers (see Life of purchasing).
Team logs hours. Collaborators capture timesheets against the project. Approved hours feed directly into project costs at each person's real hourly rate — automatically. No reconciliation needed between timesheets and payroll.
Technical closure. When project work is complete, the technical manager initiates closure. SARA checks for pending logistics, open timesheets, or unresolved items before allowing the transition. Once confirmed, no new expenditures can be recorded — the project is frozen for financial settlement.
Financial closure. Finance completes invoicing and collects payment. SARA validates that CPOs, invoices, and payments balance before allowing closure. Any mismatch is flagged for direction review.

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> ACTV : Created (from quote approval)
    ACTV --> TCLS : Technical closure
    TCLS --> FINA : Financial closure
    ACTV --> FINA : Emergency finalize
    TCLS --> ACTV : Re-opened
    FINA --> ACTV : Re-opened

Learn more

Full workflow details: Projects — Workflow

What this replaces

Before SARA	With SARA
Project folder on a shared drive, information scattered	Single source of truth, every transaction linked to the project
"Did we order those materials?"	Every PO visible on the project, with status and delivery tracking
Manual cost accounting at project end	Real-time cost accumulation in the Cost Center
Closure that drags on for months	Structured two-phase closure with validation gates

Life of purchasing

Purchasing in SARA is a structured pipeline — from request to delivery, with full traceability at every step.

The flow

A team member needs something. Any collaborator creates a Product Requisition — a four-section form (General, Files, Budget, Items). They select the project and budget node, add items manually or import them from a CSV or CFDI XML. They save as draft or send for processing.
Purchasing reviews the queue. The purchasing team opens Requisition Administration and sees all pending requisitions across the company. They review each one, verify budget availability, and assign items to Purchase Orders — or reject items that need clarification.
Purchase Orders are issued. Each PO is created against a supplier, with the assigned items, quantities, and prices. POs are versioned (e.g., PO.0042.V1) and can be modified, reviewed, rated, and tracked through to delivery.
Supplier delivers. As items arrive, the PO is updated. The requisition's item counter shows progress — Received / Total — so the original requester can see exactly where their order stands.
Payment is processed. The PO's Review modal tracks invoices and payments. When everything is received and paid, the PO is finalized.

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> INPG : Requisition saved (draft)
    INPG --> PEND : Sent by requester
    PEND --> PO : Items assigned to POs
    PO --> DELIVERED : Items received
    PO --> PAID : Payment processed
    PEND --> REJC : Rejected by purchasing

Learn more

Full workflow details: Product Requisition — Workflow · Purchase Orders — Workflow

What this replaces

Before SARA	With SARA
"Did purchasing get my email?"	Requisition queue visible to both requester and purchasing
No link between what was requested and what was bought	Every PO traces back to a requisition and a project budget node
Supplier performance is anecdotal	Structured 4-axis ratings (quality, price, service, response time) per supplier
Receiving and payment disconnected from the request	End-to-end status tracking: requested → ordered → received → paid

Life of a logistic plan

For companies that send people to project sites, logistics is a major cost center — and often the least controlled. SARA turns travel planning into a structured, auditable process.

The flow

A trip is needed. A logistics coordinator opens the Logistics Calendar — a Gantt-style view showing all travel across the company. They click a date, select the collaborator, and specify what's needed: flight (round-trip or one-way), hotel, vehicle, and the project/department context.
The event is confirmed. When the trip is ready to proceed, the coordinator confirms the event. SARA automatically generates a Logistics Plan (LP) with a unique code (e.g., LP.0042) and sends email notifications to the traveler and logistics team.
Resources are booked. The logistics team opens the LP Administration workspace and books each item:
- Flights — origin, destination, type, supplier, dates, cost, currency, taxes. Confirmation document uploaded.
- Hotels — supplier or company property, check-in/out dates, occupants (including roommates from other LPs).
- Vehicles — type, pick-up/drop-off dates, supplier, cost. Additional passengers assigned.
- Extra services — visas, gratuities, miscellaneous costs.
Supplier POs are issued. For each booking, a Supplier Purchase Order (SPO) is created — either inline from the booking form, or in bulk from the "without SPO" tabs that show all pending bookings across all plans.
The trip is completed. When all bookings are settled and the trip is over, the LP status is set to Complete. All SPO costs flow into the project's Cost Center automatically.

Learn more

Full workflow details: Logistics — Workflow

What this replaces

Before SARA	With SARA
Travel arranged through WhatsApp, email, and phone calls	Structured calendar → plan → booking → SPO pipeline
No link between travel costs and the project that incurred them	Every flight, hotel, and vehicle traced to a project budget node
Expired passports or visas discovered at the airport	Red indicators on the calendar for collaborators with expiring documents
"How much did we spend on travel last quarter?"	Every logistics cost visible in real time in the Cost Center

Life of timesheets

Timesheets in SARA aren't just attendance records — they are live project cost data. Every approved hour updates the project's financial picture immediately.

The flow

Collaborators capture their time. Each person opens Timesheets Capture and fills in their week: work on-site, work offline, day off, training, travel. They select the project or department, mark billable hours, and submit.
Supervisors review and approve. The Timesheets screen shows all pending submissions. Supervisors can approve individually or in bulk. A dedicated "Accounting Summary" view aggregates hours by project and collaborator for payroll and billing review.
Approved hours feed the Cost Center. The moment a timesheet is approved, the hours are priced at each collaborator's configured hourly rate and added to the project's cost in the Cost Center. Extra hours above the configured threshold are billed at the overtime multiplier.
Billable hours sync to invoicing. Billable hours are automatically sent to FreshBooks as time entries, ready for invoicing — no manual data entry. Kimai time-tracking data can also be imported and bulk-approved.

Learn more

Full workflow details: Timesheets — Workflow

What this replaces

Before SARA	With SARA
Paper timesheets or disconnected apps	Unified capture, approval, and cost calculation
Payroll reconciliation takes days each month	Hours priced and categorized in real time
"Did we bill all those hours?"	Billable flag on every entry, auto-synced to invoicing
No link between hours worked and project profitability	Every hour traces to a project and appears in the Cost Center

Life of a customer PO

The Customer PO (CPO) is the financial anchor of every project — it represents the customer's commitment to pay. SARA tracks it from creation to final payment.

The flow

The first CPO comes from the quote. When a quote is approved, the CPO entered by sales becomes the project's first CPO — status Active, version 1. Display code: CPO.0042.1. No additional approval needed for the initial registration.
New versions when the customer updates. If the customer issues a revised PO, a new version is created. The previous version is cancelled, the new one enters Pending Direction Approval. All invoices, payments, and notes are carried forward automatically.
Direction reviews and approves. Direction reviews the new version and either approves (→ Active) or rejects (→ In Progress for correction). This gate prevents unauthorized scope or amount changes.
Finance registers invoices and payments. As work is billed and paid, finance records each invoice and payment against the CPO in the Review modal. The progress bar shows invoiced % and paid % with color coding — red to green.
The CPO is finalized. When invoiced equals CPO amount and paid equals CPO amount, SARA auto-finalizes the CPO. If there's a mismatch, it's flagged for review before closing.

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> ACTV : First CPO (from quote)
    ACTV --> APDR : New version requested
    APDR --> ACTV : Direction approves
    APDR --> INPG : Direction rejects
    INPG --> APDR : Resubmitted
    INPG --> CANC : Cancelled
    ACTV --> FINA : Finalized (amounts match)
    ACTV --> MISM : Mismatch detected
    MISM --> FINA : Mismatch approved
    FINA --> ACTV : Reactivated

Learn more

Full workflow details: Customer POs — Workflow

What this replaces

Before SARA	With SARA
POs stored as PDFs in a folder, hard to find	Every CPO linked to its project, with version history
"Have we invoiced this CPO yet?"	Real-time invoiced % and paid % per CPO
Surprise at project end when payments don't match	Mismatch detection at finalization, not months later
No approval gate for PO changes	Direction review required for every CPO version change

The result — real-time visibility

All the flows above converge in one place: the Project Cost Center.

Select one or more projects, and SARA shows you — side by side, in real time, all amounts converted to your base currency — a complete financial picture:

Profit — actual (payments received minus costs) and potential (full CPO value minus costs)
Cost — broken down by category: supplier POs, specialized services, logistics, hours, refunds, salary, per diem
Budget — static or dynamic, with per-node breakdown and variance
Income — every CPO with received and pending amounts

All with color-coded indicators: green (healthy margin), orange (watch), red (intervention needed).

No spreadsheets. No waiting for month-end close. No surprises.

Learn more

Full dashboard details: Project Cost Center — Transactions

Key benefits

Traceability. Every dollar spent and every hour worked traces back to a project, a budget node, and a person. Audit-ready, always.

Real-time financial visibility. The Cost Center shows profitability as it happens — not weeks after the project closes.

Clear ownership. Status-driven workflows mean every record has a current owner. Nothing falls through the cracks.

Versioned everything. Quotes, POs, CPOs — all versioned with full history. You can always see what changed, when, and by whom.

Single source of truth. One system for sales, purchasing, logistics, HR, and finance. No more reconciling data across departments.

Built by a company that uses it. SARA isn't a generic ERP retrofitted for project work. It was built by AUROM, an engineering company, to run AUROM's own operations. Every feature exists because someone needed it to get real work done.

Multi-device, no installation. Web-based responsive interface. Works on desktop, tablet, and phone. No client software to install or maintain.

Integrated, not isolated. Connects to Kimai for time tracking, FreshBooks for invoicing, and can send WhatsApp notifications via N8n for time-sensitive alerts.

More workflows SARA handles

The flows above are the core project-to-cash pipeline, but SARA covers many other day-to-day processes that keep a company running. Here are a few more — every one follows the same status-driven, audit-logged pattern.

Vacation and time-off requests. Collaborators submit requests through a two-step approval pipeline (supervisor → HR). Available days are calculated per person based on tenure and admission date — not the calendar year. Smart day counting excludes weekends, holidays, and company-specific exempt days. Approved vacations appear on the company-wide calendar automatically. Learn more

Expense reimbursements. Employees submit out-of-pocket expenses with receipts and — for Mexican operations — CFDI fiscal XMLs. Each refund links to a project budget node or department line. Manager approves, finance pays, and proof of payment is attached. Every refund gets a sequential code (RF.XXXX) and full audit trail. Learn more

Travel expenses with automatic card-statement import. Company card transactions are imported from bank statements and attributed to projects or departments automatically. No more manual matching of charges to trips. Learn more

Departmental budget administration. Annual budgets per department with real-time spend tracking — every PO charged against a department line item reduces the remaining balance immediately. Bulk-generate next year's budget from current-year actuals. Learn more

Inter-company balance. For organizations with multiple internal companies, SARA tracks what each company owes the others in real time. POs, refunds, and inter-company payments are netted into a company × company balance matrix. Learn more

Inventory and warehouse. Track stock across multiple warehouses, with movements linked to projects or departments. Learn more

Document and patent management. Centralized storage for project documents, company policies, and intellectual property records — all linked to the relevant projects, collaborators, or departments. Learn more

Feedback and suggestions. Any collaborator can submit feedback — anonymous or identified — through a global button. HR reviews and resolves each submission, with email notifications on closure. Learn more

Beyond workflows — your company's memory

SARA isn't just about moving things through pipelines. It's where your organization's critical information lives — the things you need to know before they become emergencies.

Document expiry tracking. Every collaborator can have documents with expiration dates — passports, visas, driver's licenses, professional certifications, work permits. SARA warns you 90 days before any document expires, sends an email on the expiration date, and provides a real-time dashboard with color-coded countdowns: green (90+ days), orange (counting down), red (expired). No more discovering an expired visa the night before a trip.

Plant access control. Every collaborator assigned to a customer site has an access authorization with an expiration date and supporting documents (permits, safety certs, authorization letters). SARA shows a live countdown — days left — and automatically inactivates access when it expires. Red indicators on the logistics calendar warn you before you book someone who can't enter the site.

Training and certifications. HR maintains a training catalog and assigns trainings to collaborators. Completion dates and proof documents — certificates, diplomas — are stored per person. When a certification is required for plant access, you know who has it and who doesn't.

Company events and knowledge preservation. Team gatherings, celebrations, milestone events — stored with photo galleries and accessible to the whole organization. Not a social media timeline, but a private, permanent record of your company's culture and history.

The same audit trail that tracks every dollar also tracks every document, every expiration, and every certification. When an auditor asks, when a client requires proof, when a trip depends on a valid passport — the answer is in SARA.

Is SARA for you?

SARA is built for project-driven companies — engineering firms, system integrators, industrial automation providers, construction and installation contractors. Organizations where every project has a budget, a team, purchases, travel, hours, and a customer to bill.

If your company manages 20+ projects a year, with purchasing volumes that outgrew email and profitability questions that need answers faster than your current tools can provide — SARA is worth a conversation.

Contact us to explore whether SARA fits your operation.

SARA — Sistema Automático de Reportes AUROM. Built by engineers, for engineers.