NDT Invoicing Software for Inspection Companies in the Middle East

Invoices from timesheets and completed jobs, with payments and reminders. Request a demo. Affordable. Accessible. Fully customizable. Quote on request.

How NDT work is billed across the Gulf

NDT billing in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain looks very different from a small job-by-job invoice. Much of the work runs under long-term service contracts with national oil companies and their contractors — Saudi Aramco, ADNOC group companies, QatarEnergy, KNPC and others — and under EPC contracts on new plants, pipelines and offshore facilities. Crews are large, often expatriate, and mobilised for months. Shutdowns and turnarounds concentrate a huge amount of work into a few weeks.

Getting paid in that environment depends on paperwork matching exactly: the contract schedule of rates, the call-off or service order, the monthly timesheet signed by the client representative, the completion certificate or service entry the client raises, and your invoice. One mismatch and the invoice returns, often weeks later, and the payment cycle starts again.

The Invoicing app in the Atlantis NDT ERP is built to reduce those mismatches. It is part of our NDT ERP, pre-configured for inspection companies and deployed by our team. Approved timesheets, equipment by serial number and consumables drawn from stock become invoice lines carrying the project, PO or work order, site, method and technician.

This page covers manpower-based and job-based billing, shutdown invoicing, expatriate crew costs, technician approval, VAT across the GCC, retention and payment cycles — and how the app handles each.

Manpower billing versus job-based billing

Gulf NDT contracts usually fall into two shapes. Under manpower supply, the client pays a monthly or daily rate per technician by category — Level II UT, RT crew, PAUT operator, Level III — plus agreed overtime. Under job-based contracts, the client pays per scope, per weld, per film or per inspection package. Many companies run both at once, sometimes for the same client.

Timesheets in the ERP record the work type — inspection, travel, standby or setup — with method, site, client and equipment serial, a billable flag and a rate multiplier. For manpower contracts, the approved hours per technician, with overtime multipliers applied, flow straight into billing. Each invoice line can carry the technician, method, rate type and days or hours, so the client's representative can tick it off against the signed monthly timesheet.

For job-based contracts, unit rates such as per weld, per film or per package are set up as service products and rate rules during implementation, following your contract schedules. The Project app records the client PO, contract, site, methods, codes and scope, and the invoice header carries the NDT project, job or PO number, site, invoice type and industry sector.

Working patterns also shape the timesheet. Rest-day and public holiday work usually carries a premium, and reduced working hours during Ramadan under local labour rules change what a normal shift means. Recording these through the rate multiplier as hours are logged, rather than adjusting at month end, is what stops disputes.

Shutdowns and turnarounds

Plant shutdowns across the Eastern Province, Jubail, Yanbu, Ruwais, Ras Laffan and Kuwait's refineries bring together large NDT crews on day and night shifts, often from several subcontractors, for a tightly scheduled window. Clients want daily progress and usually invoices split by unit, work order or package.

The Invoicing app helps in several ways:

• Cost centres on invoice lines let one shutdown be split by unit, package or client work order.
• Separate subtotals for labour, equipment and consumables match how most shutdown budgets are structured.
• Approved timesheets feed billing, so the post-shutdown invoice is a check of hours already approved, not weeks of rebuilding from paper.

Before the shutdown, the Team Assignments app blocks double-booking of technicians and equipment serials, records mobilisation and demobilisation dates and warns when assigned equipment is out of calibration. An out-of-calibration UT set discovered after a shutdown can put a whole package of readings — and its invoice — in question.

The Team Assignments calendar also shows utilisation and next available date for each technician, which helps you decide whether to bring in additional manpower from another branch or country for the peak, and whether the rates on that contract cover it.

Expatriate crews, mobilisation and documents

Most Gulf NDT companies depend on expatriate technicians. That brings costs that do not exist elsewhere: visa and residence permit processing (such as iqama renewals in Saudi Arabia), medical checks, flights, accommodation and site transport. Some contracts include these costs in the manpower rate; others allow mobilisation and demobilisation to be billed separately; some let accommodation or transport be re-charged.

Mobilisation and demobilisation dates are recorded against assignments. Flights, accommodation and per diems are recorded in the standard Expenses app and can be re-billed to the job under whatever rule your contract sets. The Fleet app records vehicle assignment to projects and drivers with mileage, and whether a vehicle may carry radioactive sources, with its transport licence expiry. How mobilisation charges and re-billable costs appear on the invoice is set up during implementation.

Tracking visa or residence permit validity itself is not a built-in feature of the Invoicing app. If you need those documents tracked alongside technician records, that forms part of the customization scope agreed with you. Medical fitness expiry, however, is already part of the employee NDT profile.

Technician approval and certification evidence

Gulf clients commonly require NDT technicians to be approved before they work on site. Saudi Aramco, for example, sets its own requirements in its engineering and inspection standards (SAES and SAIS) and runs contractor and personnel approval processes. ADNOC group companies, QatarEnergy and KNPC have their own vendor and personnel requirements. ASNT SNT-TC-1A based certification and ISO 9712 certification are both widely seen on Gulf sites, often held by the same crew.

The Certificates app records each technician's scheme, level, method, certifying body and expiry, and marks certificates expiring within ninety days or expired. The Timesheets app warns when a technician's certificate is not valid, so the supervisor sees the problem before hours reach an invoice. On a manpower contract, a technician billed while uncertified is a likely deduction or dispute. See the Certificates app for more detail.

Client-specific approvals can be recorded under the "other" scheme option where appropriate; any dedicated client approval register is part of the customization scope agreed with you. Atlantis's own training is based on ASNT SNT-TC-1A; we do not provide ISO 9712 training.

Radiography crews also need radiation safety evidence under national regulators. The employee NDT profile records radiation safety training and radiation badge number.

VAT across the GCC

Tax treatment differs across the region. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Oman apply VAT, each with its own registration, invoice content and filing rules. Qatar and Kuwait had not introduced VAT at the time of writing, though that may change. Saudi Arabia also runs a national e-invoicing programme with its own technical requirements, and other GCC states have announced or are developing e-invoicing plans.

The ERP uses standard Atlantis ERP accounting. During implementation, taxes and invoice formats are configured locally for each country you invoice from, following your tax adviser's instructions — including the tax registration numbers, invoice wording and bilingual Arabic and English layouts clients commonly expect. We make no certification claim for any national e-invoicing programme; where a requirement applies to you, we review it with you and your adviser during scoping and agree what is included.

Companies with branches in several GCC countries often run separate legal entities. How entities, currencies — Saudi riyal, UAE dirham, Qatari riyal, Kuwaiti dinar and others — and inter-company charges are set up is decided during implementation.

Retention, guarantees and payment cycles

Payment cycles on Gulf NDT contracts can be long. Many clients pay only after the monthly timesheet is certified and a service entry or work completion certificate is raised on their side. Retention is commonly held on construction and EPC work, and contracts often require performance guarantees. For a mid-sized inspection company paying salaries and accommodation every month, the gap between work done and cash received is often the biggest business risk.

The ERP sets payment terms per client so invoice due dates reflect the contract. Payments are recorded against invoices using standard Atlantis ERP payments, and standard reminders help you follow up consistently. The outstanding invoices view on the financial dashboard shows exactly which contracts are holding cash.

Retention release tracking and progress billing are configured as part of the customization scope agreed with you. Out of the box, the invoice type separates interim from final invoices, and cost centres keep each contract visible on its own.

Equipment rental and consumables on Gulf contracts

Many Gulf contracts pay for equipment separately — sometimes as a monthly rental alongside manpower, sometimes per shift or per package. Phased array and TOFD sets, AUT systems for pipeline work, crawlers, eddy current and IRIS equipment for exchanger bundles are all high-value units, and they move constantly between sites, branches and sometimes countries.

In the Atlantis ERP, instruments are tracked by serial number in the Asset Management app, with issue and return workflows approved by supervisors and managers, condition recorded at issue and return, reservations with clash prevention and inbound and outbound movements. Rental rates can be recorded against equipment, and equipment can be marked as rented out. Invoice lines carry the equipment serial, so the equipment subtotal ties back to units actually issued to the contract.

Desert and coastal conditions are hard on equipment. The maintenance log records preventive and corrective work, repairs, cleaning, firmware updates and probe replacements, with condition before and after. Calibration records and the calibration certificate register show which units are valid, expiring or expired. When a client asks for proof that the UT set on your invoice was calibrated while it was used, it is on the same record.

Consumables — couplant, penetrant and developer, magnetic particles, film and chemicals, PPE — are tracked with reorder levels, low-stock flags and a movement ledger. During a shutdown, when film and penetrant go quickly, the consumables subtotal on the invoice comes from stock records rather than an estimate made after the event.

From quotation to invoice

Gulf contracts are often won on a detailed commercial offer, then executed over months or years. When the monthly invoice is prepared, the billing team needs the accepted rates, not a revised draft from an earlier negotiation round.

In the Quotations app, NDT service products are flagged by method and category, and each quote carries the job type, site, project dates and applicable codes, with a custom branded PDF. The client can accept online, and the quote converts to a sales order. The project, crew assignments, timesheets, equipment issues and reports then build on that record, and the invoice pulls it together.

For owners and operations managers, that chain answers the questions that matter at month end: what did we quote, what did we deploy, what did the client certify, and what have we billed.

Reports, digital twins and the financial dashboard

Clients usually want the inspection report before they certify the work. The ERP's NDT Reports app runs reports through review, approval and sending, capturing work order, drawing, WPS and procedure references, so report and invoice come from the same job. For asset owners who want findings in context, our companion product, Digital Twin Reporting Software, places inspection results on a 3D model of the asset. It is a separate product that works alongside the ERP and is a strong differentiator in owner-side bids.

The financial dashboard shows revenue, cost of sales, gross margin, operating expenses, EBITDA, outstanding invoices, vendor bills and expenses, with a 12-month view. With cost centres by country or contract and industry sector on each invoice, you see whether manpower contracts, shutdowns or project work actually carry the margin.

Implementation in the Gulf

We deploy and configure the ERP for you. Typical scope includes rate schedules mapped to technician categories, methods and multipliers; VAT and invoice layouts configured locally per country; cost centres by contract and branch; equipment by serial with rental rates; consumables; payment terms; and training for billing, supervisors and technicians. The ERP is affordable, accessible and fully customizable, with pricing on request. See all ERP apps.

Offshore, pipeline and construction projects

Beyond plant shutdowns, a large share of Gulf NDT work comes from projects: offshore platform and jacket fabrication in yards along the Arabian Gulf coast, offshore hook-up and maintenance campaigns, cross-country and in-plant pipelines, and new gas processing, petrochemical and power facilities built by EPC contractors. Each brings a different billing pattern.

Fabrication yard work is often billed per joint, per film or per package against the yard's weld tracking, with the inspection report as evidence. Offshore campaigns may be billed per technician-day with separate rates for offshore days, travel to and from the marine base and standby while waiting for a vessel or weather window. Pipeline projects typically run AUT or RT crews behind the welding spreads, billed per crew-day or per weld.

In the Atlantis ERP, day and shift work flows from approved timesheets, with work type — inspection, travel, standby or setup — and a rate multiplier on each entry. Unit-rate billing such as per joint or per film is set up as service products and rate rules during implementation, following your contract schedules. Cost centres split one EPC contract by area, package or subcontract, and the invoice header carries the project, PO or work order, site and sector.

EPC contractors in the region usually require subcontractor invoices to match their own progress measurement and are often paid late themselves. Having each invoice backed by approved timesheets, equipment issue records and approved reports puts you in the strongest position when payment is negotiated down the chain.

Who uses the Invoicing app in a Gulf NDT company

• Accounts and billing staff prepare monthly manpower invoices and package invoices from approved records, apply the right VAT treatment for each country, record payments and follow up on overdue accounts.
• Site supervisors and camp or project coordinators approve daily timesheets, confirm overtime, rest-day and standby entries, and get the monthly timesheet signed by the client representative.
• Contract and commercial managers check invoices against the schedule of rates, call-off orders and client completion certificates, and track retention and outstanding amounts per contract.
• Branch managers in, for example, Dammam, Jubail, Abu Dhabi or Doha see their own cost centre figures on the financial dashboard.
• Owners and general managers watch margin, receivables and cash exposure across countries and contracts.
• Technicians log hours by work type from site; accurate entries reduce month-end disputes.

Access rights follow the standard Atlantis ERP permission model and are set during implementation, so a branch accountant sees their entity's invoices, supervisors approve their own crews' hours, and the owner sees everything. For companies with many nationalities on the payroll, keeping technician records and timesheets in one controlled system is also a cleaner position when clients audit your manpower.

Frequently asked questions

Can it bill monthly manpower rates with overtime?

Yes. Approved timesheet hours with rate multipliers feed billing, and lines carry the technician, method and rate type.

Is it certified for Saudi e-invoicing?

No certification is claimed. Taxes and invoice formats are configured locally during implementation, and any e-invoicing requirement is reviewed with you and your adviser.

Can invoices be in Arabic and English?

Yes. Bilingual layouts are configured during implementation.

Can mobilisation and accommodation be re-billed?

Yes. Expenses can be re-billed to jobs, and the rule for mobilisation charges is set during implementation.

Does it record both ASNT and ISO 9712 certificates?

Yes, and timesheets warn when a technician's certificate is not valid.

Can it track retention?

Retention is configured as part of the agreed customization scope.

Book a Gulf-focused demo

Bring a real month of manpower billing or a shutdown package, and we will run it from approved timesheets to invoice. Book an Invoicing demo or request a quote for the Atlantis NDT ERP.

Invoicing by region

• Invoicing global overview
• Invoicing in United States
• Invoicing in Canada
• Invoicing in UK & Europe
• Invoicing in India

Works with

• Purchase: Purchase orders for consumables, film, couplant and equipment.
• Inventory: Stock of consumables, sources and equipment across sites.
• Expenses: Field expenses and per diems, approved and rebilled to jobs.

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