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Because the three numbers that matter live apart. What was sold is in the proposal, what it is costing is in timesheets, and what has been billed is in accounting.
Nobody assembles them until the project closes, and by then the overrun is history rather than a decision.
The project opens from the won deal with its contracted lines and rates. Hours log against those phases; approved billable time and completed milestones assemble the invoice in Books.
Margin is live: contracted value against real cost at real rates, drillable to the specific hours.
It will not allocate overhead. Direct cost and direct revenue are shown; how much of the office a project should carry is an accounting policy in Books.
It also cannot value work you decided not to bill — written-off time shows as cost with no revenue, which is the honest presentation.
A job drifting shows in week three, while there is still a scope conversation to be had.
Estimating improves because quoted and actual hours sit on the same phases, so the gap is readable per kind of work rather than as a firm-wide average.
Products, not integrations. Each one reads the same record, so a join is a permission rather than a sync job with a mapping screen behind it.
Both, on one project, billing differently.
Yes, across projects and periods.
Logged with a reason, counted as cost, kept out of billable value.
Half an hour on your own numbers is usually enough to say whether Loop is the right place to start.