To convert an AIA pay application to Excel, upload the PDF to a converter that detects the G703 continuation sheet table and exports a spreadsheet, rather than retyping the schedule of values line by line. You get one row per line item with scheduled value, previous billings, work completed this period, stored materials, and retainage kept as real numbers, so the totals foot and the balance to finish calculates on its own. That takes seconds instead of the half hour a full continuation sheet costs by hand, and it removes the transposed digit that turns into a billing dispute two months later.
Last updated July 2026
Every general contractor and every subcontractor deals with the same monthly problem. The pay app arrives as a PDF, usually signed and often scanned, and none of the arithmetic you need to do on it works while it sits in that format. Here is what the form actually contains, how to get it into a spreadsheet, and how to check the result before it feeds a draw.
What is an AIA pay application?
An AIA pay application is the standard package a contractor submits to bill for work completed during a period on a construction project. It has two parts: the G702 Application and Certificate for Payment, which is the one page summary and signature block, and the G703 Continuation Sheet, which lists every line item from the schedule of values and shows how much of each has been completed. The architect certifies the amount, and the owner pays against it. It has become the industry standard for progress payments between owners, general contractors, and subs.
What is the difference between G702 and G703?
The G702 is the summary and the G703 is the detail. The G702 shows the original contract sum, change orders, total completed and stored to date, retainage, previous payments, and the current payment due, all as single figures with signature and notary blocks. The G703 is the line item breakdown behind those figures, one row per item from the schedule of values. When you convert a pay app for analysis, the G703 is the sheet that matters, because that is where the numbers you need to total live.
What does each column on the G703 mean?
The continuation sheet uses lettered columns, and knowing what each one holds is what lets you check a converted file. These follow the AIA instructions for the G703 form.
| Column | What it holds |
|---|---|
| A | Item number identifying the portion of the project |
| B | Description of work for that line item |
| C | Scheduled value, consistent with the schedule of values submitted at the start of the project |
| D | Work completed that was covered by the previous application |
| E | Value of work completed at the time of this application |
| F | Materials presently stored, not yet installed, for which payment is sought |
| G | Total completed and stored to date, the total of columns D, E, and F |
| % | Percentage completed, column G divided by column C |
| H | Balance to finish, the difference between column C and column G |
| I | Retainage, used where the contract permits variable retainage line by line |
Two of those are worth remembering because they are how you audit a converted sheet in about ten seconds. Column G has to equal D plus E plus F on every row, and column H has to equal C minus G. If either identity breaks after conversion, a number landed in the wrong column or came through as text.
How do you convert a G703 PDF to Excel?
Upload the PDF to a converter built to find tables, and download the spreadsheet. The steps in practice:
- Drop the pay app PDF into the PDF to Excel converter. If you are reviewing a whole billing cycle, upload every subcontractor sheet at once with the batch converter.
- Let it read the continuation sheet. It carries the line item table across every page, which matters on a job with two hundred cost codes where the G703 runs five or six pages.
- Download XLSX or CSV, then run the two column checks above before you use the numbers.
Signed pay apps are usually scanned, which means the PDF is an image with no text layer underneath. A converter with OCR handles that, and it is the difference between getting a spreadsheet and getting an empty grid. The construction workflow page covers the rest of the paperwork that goes through the same intake.
Why do the amounts come through as text?
Because currency formatting on the printed form is not a number as far as a spreadsheet is concerned. A scheduled value printed as $148,000.00 carries a dollar sign and commas, parentheses are often used for negatives on change order lines, and scanned sheets can pick up a stray space. Any of those leaves the cell left-aligned and inert, and SUM quietly returns zero or skips rows.
The fix is to convert the column to real numbers before you total anything. The walkthrough on converting text to numbers in Excel covers the reliable methods, and it is worth doing on every dollar column at once rather than chasing one broken total later. A quick tell that you have the problem: your totals row is short by exactly the value of a few line items, which are the ones that came through as text.
How do you check a converted pay application adds up?
Rebuild the form's own math in three helper columns and look for anything that is not zero. Add a column for D plus E plus F and subtract column G from it. Add a column for C minus G and subtract column H from it. Then total column C and compare it to the contract sum on the G702. If those three checks come back clean, the conversion is faithful and you can bill or review off it.
Watch the rounding while you do this. If you round each line and then total, the sum can miss the G702 figure by a few cents, which is enough to get a pay app kicked back. Round in the formula rather than by changing the number format, and total the unrounded values. The guide on rounding numbers in Excel explains why a column that looks right can still add up wrong.
What is a schedule of values?
A schedule of values is the contract broken into billable pieces, agreed at the start of the project, and it becomes the first G703. Each row is a portion of the work with a dollar amount, and the rows have to total the contract sum exactly. Every pay application after that bills against those same rows, which is why the scheduled value column stays fixed for the life of the job unless a change order modifies it.
That fixed structure is what makes the converted spreadsheets so useful. Because column C never moves, you can stack twelve months of converted continuation sheets side by side, keyed on the item number, and see the billing curve for every cost code without touching the accounting system.
Can you use Excel for AIA billing?
Yes, and a large share of subcontractors do. Excel handles the continuation sheet math without complaint, and once the line items are in a sheet the percent complete, balance to finish, and retainage columns are ordinary formulas. What Excel will not do is produce the certified, signed G702 with the architect's certificate, so most workflows end with the spreadsheet driving the numbers and the signed PDF being the document of record.
The practical setup is a workbook with the schedule of values on one tab, one tab per billing period, and a summary tab that pulls the current period figures forward. Converting last month's signed PDF back into the workbook is how you keep the two in sync when the general contractor makes an adjustment you did not make in your own file.
How do you total retainage across every subcontractor?
Convert each subcontractor's continuation sheet, stack the rows into one sheet with a trade or vendor column, then total the retainage column by vendor. On most jobs retainage is a flat percentage held from total completed and stored to date, so if the contract does not use line item retainage you can calculate it from column G instead of relying on column I, which is often left blank. A conditional total by vendor with SUMIF gives you the held amount per sub in one formula.
This is the number that matters at closeout, because retainage release is where jobs stall. Having it in a spreadsheet, traced back to each signed pay app, means you can show a sub exactly what is held and why. The same stacked file also tells you which trades are billing ahead of their actual progress, which is a conversation worth having before the next draw rather than after.
What about the invoices behind the line items?
A continuation sheet summarizes; the backup does not. Sub invoices, material tickets, and lien waivers arrive as their own PDFs, and on a busy job that stack is bigger than the pay apps. Converting them the same way gives you invoice lines you can match against the commitment, and if approvals are the bottleneck rather than data entry, it is worth routing them into an approval workflow instead of a shared folder. For takeoffs and spec tables that started life in markup software, the Bluebeam PDF converter covers what Revu will not export.
The short version
The G703 is the sheet worth converting, because it holds the line items. Upload the PDF, use OCR if it was signed and scanned, and check two identities on the way out: column G equals D plus E plus F, and column H equals C minus G. Fix any dollar column that came through as text before you total it. Do that and a pay app stops being a document you retype and becomes data you can actually bill, review, and forecast from.