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# How is the cost price of my hours on a work order determined?

As soon as you add an hour line to a work order, Robaws fills in the **cost price** automatically. That amount ends up in your recalculation, so it is important that you know where it comes from. A time operation is an item with the [item type](https://support.robaws.com/en/article/item-types-r92ipg/) 'Hour code - employee'.

Robaws always goes through the same order and stops at the first price it finds:

1. The **purchase price of the employer** on the item record of the time operation
2. The **wage cost** of the employee
3. The **cost price of the time operation**

## 1. Purchase price of the employer

Robaws uses this step when you work with external people. There are three conditions:

* The employee has **engagement type** subcontractor (OA) or independent.
* An **employer** is filled in on the [employee record](https://support.robaws.com/en/article/employees-general-4h4p3y/).
* That employer is listed as a **supplier** on the item record of the time operation on the line, with a purchase price.

If that is the case, Robaws copies the purchase price of that supplier as the cost price of the line.

The time operation on the line is copied automatically from the **default time operation** on the employee record. So fill that in, otherwise there is no time operation yet when the line is added and Robaws cannot look up the supplier price.

||| The **employer** field appears on the employee record for the engagement types independent, interim and OA. But the purchase price of the employer is **not** used for interim: there Robaws falls back on the wage cost of the employee.

|| If the employer is listed as a supplier on the item record but without a purchase price, the cost price becomes 0.00. If Robaws does not find the employer on the item record at all, it falls back on the wage cost of the employee.

## 2. Wage cost of the employee

If an employee is attached to the hour line and step 1 does not apply, Robaws copies the **wage cost (per hour)** field from the employee record.

## 3. Cost price of the time operation

If **no** employee is attached to the hour line, Robaws copies the **cost price** from the item record of the time operation.

|| Robaws fills in the cost price as a suggestion. You can always overwrite the amount on the line manually.