Your marine-repair yard tracks USCG and ABS certs in a binder, and the contracting officer just flagged a gap that isn't really there
A custom ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) for a Hampton Roads marine-repair yard or small defense contractor runs $95k to $190k and 5 to 8 months. You go custom once your job costing, ABS/USCG certification tracking, and DCAA-compliant indirect rate pools stop fitting NetSuite or SAP Business One without five-figure annual customization. The usual trigger in Hampton is a contracting officer questioning a certification that was filed correctly but lives in a binder no system can show on demand.
You run a 60-person repair yard off Pembroke Avenue, hauling out tugs and small naval auxiliaries, and your books live in three places. NetSuite handles the GL, a Fishbowl-style tool tracks parts, and the actual proof that a weld passed ABS survey sits in a three-ring binder in the QA manager's office. When a Norfolk-based contracting officer asks for the certification chain on a job from eight months ago, someone spends a day flipping pages.
Off-the-shelf ERP was built for distributors and manufacturers, not for a yard where every job carries a regulatory paper trail that has to survive a DCAA audit and a USCG inspection in the same week. SAP can model your inventory but has no native concept of an ABS class survey expiring, and NetSuite's project module won't enforce that a deliverable can't ship until its certification is signed. So your most valuable data, the thing that actually protects the contract, is the thing your ERP can't see.
Where the off-the-shelf tools fall short
- ABS and USCG certifications tracked in binders and spreadsheets, so a 'missing' cert triggers a three-week contract hold even when the work was compliant
- DCAA-compliant indirect rate pools don't fit NetSuite or SAP without a $200/hour partner bending the system every quarter
- Job costing on cost-plus Navy repair work can't reconcile labor floor-checks against the GL without manual spreadsheet exports
- DFARS flow-down clauses on subcontracted machining aren't tracked anywhere a single misfiled clause can void a milestone payment
Custom erp: what Hampton teams actually get
A custom ERP makes the certification the spine of the job, not an afterthought in a binder. The system refuses to mark a deliverable shippable until its ABS survey, weld procedure, and material traceability are signed and dated in one record an auditor can pull in thirty seconds. It models your DCAA indirect pools the way your CASB disclosure actually defines them, and it ties labor hours to contract line items so an incurred-cost submission stops being a three-week spreadsheet exercise.
- A contracting officer has questioned a certification you filed correctly but couldn't produce on demand
- Your incurred-cost submission takes more than two weeks of spreadsheet reconciliation
- You pay a NetSuite or SAP partner five figures a year just to keep compliance workflows alive
- You've lost or delayed a milestone payment over a misfiled DFARS flow-down
- You're under 15 people and your job mix is mostly commercial, not federal
- Your certification volume is low enough that a shared drive plus discipline still works
- You don't yet hold cost-reimbursable contracts that invite DCAA scrutiny
- Cash is tight and a NetSuite subscription gets you 80% of the way this year
- One audit-ready record per job with the full ABS/USCG certification chain, material traceability, and floor-check labor in the same place
- DCAA indirect rate pools modeled to match your CASB disclosure, so incurred-cost submissions take days not weeks
- Hard gates that block shipping or invoicing a deliverable until its certification and DFARS flow-downs are signed off
- Job costing that ties every labor hour and purchased part to a contract line item for cost-plus Navy work
- A defensible source of truth that survives both a DCAA audit and a Coast Guard inspection without a binder hunt
- You take on maintenance forever a custom ERP needs a retainer or in-house owner, not a license you forget about
- Certification logic has to be modeled correctly the first time getting an ABS survey rule wrong is worse than a binder
- Six to eight months before it replaces your current stack you keep paying for both during the build
- If your yard's processes are genuinely standard, you may be paying to rebuild what NetSuite already does well
Feature priorities for Hampton teams
Hampton ERP: the full scope
The engagements Hampton teams bring us most often: Microsoft Dynamics 365, ERP migration, cloud ERP, manufacturing ERP, distribution ERP, custom ERP modules and ERP API integration.
The honest cost picture for Hampton
| Project scope | Typical cost | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Certification + job-cost core for one yard | $95k to $130k | 5 to 6 months |
| Add DCAA indirect pools + incurred-cost reporting | $130k to $165k | 6 to 7 months |
| Multi-site yard with ITAR-segregated data | $165k to $190k | 7 to 8 months |
Timeline: what happens, and when
Exactly what you get
A working ERP where the certification is the job. Every haul-out, repair, and fabrication carries its ABS survey, USCG inspection, weld procedure, and material heat numbers in one record. Labor flows to contract line items DCAA-style, indirect pools match your CASB disclosure, and invoicing is blocked until QA and certifications are signed. When Norfolk's contracting officer asks for proof, you produce it in seconds, not a day of binder-flipping.
How to choose a developer in Hampton
Hire a team that already speaks defense-contracting and maritime, not one that learns it on your dime. Ask whether they've built to DFARS and NIST 800-171, whether their developers can legally touch ITAR data, and how they'd model an ABS survey expiring mid-contract. The Hampton Roads talent pool runs deep on cleared and compliance-aware engineers use it. Pair the ERP build with custom inventory management software and a business intelligence dashboard so cost and certification data feed one source of truth.
- !They've never heard of DCAA, CASB, or ABS class surveys ask them to explain incurred-cost submission back to you
- !They quote a fixed price before seeing your CASB disclosure walk away from anyone who skips discovery
- !They want to store ITAR-controlled data offshore ask where their servers and developers physically sit
- !They pitch a generic 'ERP template' ask to see a system they built with hard compliance gates
- !No plan for running old and new systems in parallel ask how they de-risk cutover
Most Hampton teams pricing erp end up comparing notes on internal tools, shopify, inventory management too; the systems share one data spine.
Rohan advises mid-market and enterprise teams on ERP, CRM and custom software, and has led delivery on dozens of business-software builds.
Writes for Digital Heroes, shipping business software for 2,000+ brands across 55+ countries since 2017.
Frequently asked questions
How much does custom ERP cost for a Hampton marine-repair or defense shop?
Budget $95k to $190k. A single-yard certification and job-costing core lands at $95k to $130k; adding DCAA indirect pools and incurred-cost reporting pushes it to $165k, and ITAR-segregated multi-site builds reach $190k. Timeline is 5 to 8 months.
Can't NetSuite or SAP handle our compliance?
They handle the GL and inventory well, but neither has a native concept of an ABS class survey expiring or a deliverable that can't ship until its certification is signed. You end up paying a partner $200/hour to bolt that on every quarter. Custom makes compliance the spine, not a bolt-on.
Will a custom ERP pass a DCAA audit?
That's the point of building one. It models your indirect rate pools to match your CASB disclosure and ties labor to contract line items so floor-checks and incurred-cost submissions reconcile automatically. A good team builds the audit trail in from day one.
How do we handle ITAR data in the build?
Developers must be US persons, data stays on US soil, and controlled technical data gets segregated access. Ask any vendor where their engineers physically sit and how they segregate ITAR records before you sign anything.