The quote says what you planned to do. The job card says what actually happened. For most tradesmen the gap between the two is where the money leaks: the extra 6 metres of cable, the second visit nobody wrote down, the "your guy never finished" phone call a month later. Here is what a job card needs, a layout you can copy, and how to run job cards from your phone.
What a job card should record
- The site address. Often not the billing address: a landlord pays from an office while the work happens at a flat.
- Time on and time off site, so the hours are not a guess at the end of the week.
- Who was on site.
- What was actually used, as opposed to what was quoted. This is the important one.
- The customer's signature and the date, confirming the work was done.
Why the signature matters more than it looks. "Your guy never did the work" and "your guy broke that" are the two arguments that cost tradesmen money. A signed, dated job card ends both of them.
A simple job card layout
If you are still on paper, this is the layout to copy into Word or print as a book.
Paper job cards vs a job card app
A carbon-copy job card book works until the book is in the other bakkie, the page is covered in grease, or the figures never make it back to whoever writes the invoice. That last one is the expensive one: materials used on site that never reach the invoice are money you paid for and never charged.
A job card app keeps the card on the phone that is already in your pocket, attached to the quote it came from, and hands the numbers straight to the invoice.
How job cards work in BlitzBooks
Job cards are optional. Switch them on under Settings → Branding → Jobs & Scheduling; if you leave them off, nothing about the app changes.
- Quote to job in one tap. An accepted quote gets a Convert to Job button, so the customer, site and line items carry across without retyping.
- Record the real job. Site address, time on and off site (the hours are worked out for you, even past midnight), who was there, and what was actually used.
- Signature on the phone. The customer signs on your screen, and the signature is dated and printed on the job card.
- Share it as a PDF. Print it, save it, or send it to the customer on WhatsApp.
- Invoice from what was used. When the job is done, Create Invoice builds the invoice from the job card, not from the original quote.
- Plan the week. Jobs → Schedule shows a week at a time, and Auto-plan drafts the days so jobs near each other land on the same day. Nothing is booked until you confirm it.
Quote, job card and invoice in one app on your phone.
Try it freeJob cards for a team
Job cards come with every BlitzBooks plan. If you have a crew, the Team plan (R499/month) adds up to 5 field-tech logins. Techs sign in with their own account and see only job cards and the schedule, never your quotes, invoices, money or clients.
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