Customer-furnished material (CFM) sounds like a win: the client buys the stock, you just run the job. In practice, CFM introduces inspection burden, liability exposure, scheduling uncertainty, and hidden labor that can erase margin if you don’t account for them upfront.
Below is a practical framework for quoting CFM work so your shop stays protected and profitable.
Why CFM Quoting Is Different
With shop-sourced material, you control spec, certification, lead time, and replacement cost. With CFM, every variable moves outside your control — but the customer still expects you to hit tolerance, finish, and delivery date.
The quote must reflect that risk transfer. If you price CFM the same as shop-sourced work, you’re subsidizing the customer’s supply chain.
1. Inspect and Verify Before You Commit
Build a receiving inspection step into every CFM quote. At minimum:
- Verify material certs match the print (heat lot, mill cert, RoHS/REACH, DFARS).
- Check dimensions: bar diameter, plate thickness, sheet size, filament diameter tolerance.
- Look for damage: dings, corrosion, warping, moisture in hygroscopic polymers.
- Confirm quantity plus a realistic drop allowance (typically 5–10% for machining, 3–5% for additive).
Charge for this inspection time. A flat “CFM receiving fee” per lot or per SKU makes it visible on the quote and non-negotiable.
2. Define Liability and Replacement Terms
Spell out what happens when — not if — material fails inspection or gets scrapped mid-job:
- Failed receiving inspection: Customer replaces at their cost and lead time; your schedule slides accordingly.
- Scrap during production: Who pays for replacement material and expedited shipping? Standard term: customer covers material; shop covers rework labor only if the scrap was process-related.
- Material shortage: Customer supplies short? Quote includes a “stop-clock” clause — your lead time pauses until conforming material arrives.
Attach these terms to the quote as a CFM addendum. Solvi’s quoting engine lets you save standard CFM terms as a template so they’re applied consistently.
3. Price the Hidden Labor
CFM often arrives in non-standard forms: odd-length bar remnants, partial spools, sheets with protective film that must be removed, parts nested on a build plate the customer designed. Each adds labor:
- Material handling and staging for non-standard stock sizes.
- Film removal, cleaning, or drying cycles.
- Custom workholding or fixturing for irregular blanks.
- Extra setup time to locate features on imprecise stock.
Quote these as separate line items (“CFM prep,” “Custom workholding,” “Filament drying”) so the customer sees the cost drivers and you capture the time.
4. Protect the Schedule
Customer material lead times are the #1 cause of CFM schedule slips. Build two dates into the quote:
- Material-in-date: The last day material can arrive without delaying ship.
- Ship date: Calculated from material-in-date plus your standard throughput.
If material arrives late, the ship date moves automatically — no awkward conversations. Communicate this clearly at quote acceptance.
5. Handle Certification and Traceability
Aerospace, medical, and defense jobs require full traceability. If the customer furnishes material but you’re responsible for the finished part’s paperwork, you need:
- Original mill certs linked to each heat lot used.
- Certificate of conformance from the customer for any secondary processing they did (heat treat, coating).
- A chain-of-custody log from receiving through ship.
Quote a “traceability admin” fee for the documentation labor. It’s real work and often overlooked.
6. When to Decline CFM
Not every CFM job is worth it. Decline or push back when:
- Material is single-source with no fallback and the customer refuses liability terms.
- Spec is exotic or obsolete (e.g., discontinued alloy, custom filament blend) and replacement lead time exceeds your quoted lead time.
- Customer insists on using recycled/regrind material without a qualified process spec.
- The job value is too low to absorb the fixed CFM overhead (receiving, inspection, admin).
Putting It Together in Your Quote
A clean CFM quote structure looks like:
- Line 1: Manufacturing operations (your standard rates)
- Line 2: CFM receiving & inspection fee
- Line 3: CFM prep / custom workholding / drying (as applicable)
- Line 4: Traceability admin fee (if required)
- Line 5: CFM terms addendum (reference, not a charge)
This keeps your core manufacturing rates clean while making CFM-specific costs visible and defensible.
Final Thought
Customer-furnished material isn’t free material — it’s transferred supply-chain risk. Quote the inspection, the liability protection, the hidden labor, and the schedule guardrails. Your margin will thank you.
Want to standardize CFM quotes across your team? Solvi lets you build CFM templates with receiving fees, terms addendums, and schedule logic so every estimator prices it right the first time.
Solvi
Quote it in seconds with Solvi
Instant quoting on your own site, with pricing rules your team controls and a preview before anything goes live. Built inside a working 3D printing bureau.