Stop Digging Through Folders for Mill Certs and Heat Numbers
EN1090 paperwork, heat-number traceability, and payment applications with retention. Tracked by hand, they slow down job close-out and getting paid. One system keeps that paperwork ready before anyone has to ask for it.
Get the paperwork off your desk
20 minutes. Bring the last close-out pack that took you a day.
The paperwork problem every fabricator knows
EN1090 paperwork (the standard for structural steel work) piles up all job long. It all comes due at once when a job closes out.
A client asks which heat number or mill cert went into a beam. Finding the answer means digging through folders and old emails.
Payment applications (bills for work done so far) and retention (a slice of each payment held back until later) get tracked by hand in a spreadsheet. It is easy to get a number wrong.
One missing document can stall a job walkthrough, or hold up a payment you already earned.
How long did the last close-out pack take to pull together? That was time you could not bill.
How it works
Compliance, traceability, and getting paid — tied to the same job record.
Your EN1090 pack, generated for you
EN1090 is the standard for structural steel fabrication. The platform builds the paperwork it asks for: a welder-qualification register, an NDT (non-destructive testing) inspection log, and a Declaration of Conformity you can hand a client. It does not certify your shop. Certification comes from an outside audit, where a notified body checks how you work. We make the paperwork. We do not replace the audit. What changes is that the paperwork is ready when the auditor asks, instead of scattered across desks.
Trace every heat number back to the job
Every load of steel comes from a mill. It comes with a heat number (a batch ID stamped into the steel) and a mill certificate (a paper from the mill proving what that batch is made of, under the EN 10204 3.1 standard). Log that heat number and cert once, tied to the job. Then, when a client asks which batch went into their beam, you have the answer in minutes, not days.
Bill staged work and track retention
Big fabrication jobs get paid in stages, not all at once. Each payment application covers the work done so far. A slice of it — retention — is held back until the job is signed off. The platform tracks each staged bill and how much retention is still owed. So nothing gets billed twice, forgotten, or released early by mistake.
We set it up for you
This is not software you set up alone. We learn how your shop already handles EN1090 paperwork, traceability, and payment applications. Then we set the platform up around that — the platform, and we set it up for you.
What changes
Close-out paperwork stops being days of digging. It is ready in the job record already.
Payment applications go out on schedule. Retention is tracked, so nothing gets billed wrong.
A client asks for a heat number or mill cert. You pull up the answer while they wait.
Who you're working with
MetaBinary is Joseph Rose. He spent 20+ years building software for enterprise, and was CTO/COO of a manufacturing estimating software company. He co-founded FastCastings, which built the world's first instant online metal-casting costing engine. You talk to him, not a sales rep.
He has sat in shops like yours.
Questions fabricators ask
- Does this make us EN1090 certified?
- No. Certification comes from an outside audit — a notified body checks your shop. What we do is build the paperwork that audit needs: the welder register, the NDT log, and the Declaration of Conformity. We make the paperwork. We do not replace the audit.
- What is a heat number and a mill certificate, and why do they matter?
- A heat number is a batch ID stamped into a piece of steel. It traces the steel back to the mill run it came from. A mill certificate is the paper from the mill proving what that batch is made of, under the EN 10204 3.1 standard. Together they prove which steel went into which job — something clients and auditors both ask for.
- What is retention, and how do you handle it?
- Retention is a slice of each payment a client holds back until the job is fully signed off. It protects them against defects. The platform tracks each payment application against the job. It keeps a running total of retention withheld and retention still owed, so it does not get lost in a spreadsheet.
- Do you track every individual piece of steel, or the batch it came from?
- Batch level. Traceability is tied to the heat number and mill certificate for the lot a piece came from. It is not a unique serial number stamped on every single piece. For structural steel, that is the level EN 10204 3.1 traceability actually asks for.
Ready to get the paperwork off your desk?
Tell us a bit about your shop. We'll set up a free consultation to see if it's a fit.