Guides

Switching a workshop from paper and spreadsheets in a week

The reason most workshops never switch is the switch itself. Break it into five days and it is not a project — it is a week with slightly different evenings.

6 min read · Updated 7 September 2026

Day one: the list

Get your customers into one spreadsheet: name, mobile, email, rego, make, model, year, last service date if you have it. From an old system, export whatever it offers. From an invoice book, start with the last twelve months — that is who is due next.

Import it. Up to 5,000 rows a file; a preview shows how columns matched before anything is saved. Vehicles link to owners automatically by phone and name.

Day two: the menu and the rates

Open the Service Menu and set your prices on the standard services. Open Settings and set your labour rates. Add the ten parts you fit most with cost and sell price. Thirty minutes, and every future quote is faster.

Day three: one real job, end to end

Pick a car that is coming in anyway. Book it, quote it and send the quote link, take a before photo, invoice it with the odometer, take the after photo, send the invoice link, record the payment. Every step you would do on paper, once, in the app.

Day four: the team

Invite everyone. Decide who sees the money. Get the app on their phones so photos happen at the car, not at the desk. Show them today's board — it replaces the whiteboard, and it is the thing they will use most.

Day five: switch on reminders and publish the page

Set the reminder interval and lead time, switch on SMS if you want it, and publish your workshop page with the booking form. From here the system starts bringing cars in without you.

Keep the invoice book in the drawer for a fortnight. You will not open it.

What to expect in the first month

Week one is slower, because every customer is being found or typed for the first time. By week two the regulars are in and a booking takes ten seconds. By week four the first reminders have gone out for cars you serviced in week one — and the first of them has replied.

Two habits make or break it: photograph every job at the car, and invoice from the menu so the next service is scheduled. Everything else is optional; those two are the system.

Free for a month

Put one real car through it.

Set-up takes about two minutes. Book a car, quote it, photograph it, invoice it and let the reminder bring it back. The first month is free, so it costs nothing to find out.

1 month free · No credit card · $49.99/month after · Cancel any time

What's in the box

  • Bookings and today's board
  • Vehicles, rego search and history
  • Service reminders by SMS and email
  • Quotes approved online, invoices with photos
  • Inspection reports
  • Unlimited team logins