Could you and your company benefit from business management software? We hear from one recent convert who is reaping the rewards on offer from Powered Now.
Powered Now is UK produced software that is designed to help tradespeople such as plumbers, electricians and builders keep on top of managing projects, quoting, invoicing, tracking payments and accounts, as well as the assignment of work to their engineers.
There are plenty of software accounting solutions on the market but the one offered by Powered Now approaches the task in a different manner. Gone are ledger, nominal accounts, trail balances and an invoicing module tacked onto the sales ledger. Instead, users are able to either start with a project containing multiple quotes, jobs and purchases or you can skip this stage and just produce an invoice for those small on-off jobs.
Job focused applications
Once a document is produced it can be emailed to the customer and the system will monitor to see if it is read and accepted. It will then prompt you if the customer has not opened the message so you can chase things. The application is very job focused and removes a lot of the puzzling terminology associated with keeping the books.
Powered Now is also different in the way it has been built. It runs from the company’s own AWS-based servers. You either use an iOS or an Android mobile App or go via a web-based browser for use on the desktop or laptop. All your data is held on Powered Now’s servers so backups are automatically dealt with. You can, of course, output your data from the App if you want.
One of the issues with online software is what happens if you don’t have a connection? In the office this is rarely a problem but when you’re out on the road, working at a job, this can be a major issue, particularly if you work in a rural area.
Powered Now has solved this issue by using a synchronising process that runs in the background. So, you can always fill in the details about a particular job and when your device connects to the internet all is updated. There are a few things that can’t be carried out offline such as the postcode look up, but this shouldn’t be too much of an issue in a real life scenario.
A powerful feature of Powered Now is its ability to produce a very broad range of industry specific certificates and forms. The electrical forms have recently been enhanced to calculate Max Zs, a critical capability. In our world of ever-increasing paperwork, the need to produce these is ever more important.
Broad range of certificates and forms
The feature auto fills data whenever it can and prompts for information it needs to help this tedious but necessary task. In fact by using this method it prompts the person undertaking the work to gather the measurements required and so might save a return call. The certificates and forms are continually being added to and Powered Now claims to have the broadest range of any product on the market.
I tested this first as an anonymous user, on a free 14-day trial, to get a feeling of the level of support, which was excellent. Powered Now also offers free hand-holding sessions, helping you to setup and configure the system to suit your needs. There’s a lot of customisation available should you need it and this is something you can do for yourself. If you do require help, however, then a one-on-one session is available. The easily digestible online videos are a great source to get you started before asking for specialist help.
When you decide to go ahead you can either pay monthly with no commitment or pay annually and save the cost of a couple of months. The Business package is only £15/month although it omits the forms and certificates. It is really the Professional package at £25/month/user that will give you the most benefits with VAT, forms and certificates as well as the ability to manage a team of workers with live tracking and chat with your engineers. The top tier at £37/month/user provides advanced staff scheduling, a customer portal where customers can look at previous quotes, invoices, forms and certificates, as well as the ability to see all communications together across all channels.
Get more information on Powered Now and its business management solutions here
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