A detailed budget will help you plan your project and also convince backers that you can credibly make it happen.
The total cost of your project will be calculated based on the items that you include in the costs section on your Spacehive page. In this section you can list the individual items that make up your project, and provide a cost for each one. It is important to be as accurate as possible – try not to round up or approximate. The better researched your budget is, the more confidence you will inspire from your potential backers that you know what you are doing (remember that your budget is visible on your Spacehive page).
During the verification process, you will be asked to provide evidence of how you arrived at these costs. Failure to do so can result in the verification process taking a lot longer than usual, and may result in your project not getting verified. We recommend that you upload any supporting evidence before you submit the project for verification.
If you are purchasing an item, you should do your research into how much it will cost and include that figure. If you are getting work done by a contractor, then call them up and ask for a quote. For work costing more than £5k, aim to get 3 quotes. If you do need to estimate costs, talk to people who have run similar projects (or check out the Spacehive project archive) to make sure that you are in the right ballpark. You are able to upload quotes and evidence backing up your costs. These will not be visible to the wider public but will be available for the Spacehive verification team to review.
There is also the opportunity when filling in your costs page to add in-kind contributions that you have already secured, as well as any funds that you have raised which are for this project. See our separate FAQ on this.