Business software for construction and skilled trades

Trade work has a money shape most accounting tools get wrong. You buy materials up front, sometimes thousands of pounds worth, then you do the labour, then you invoice, then you wait. The cash goes out weeks before it comes back in. A busy month can feel terrible in the bank and a quiet month can feel fine, which makes it very hard to tell whether you are actually making money.

The other problem is that jobs blur together. You know the Henderson job went badly, but you cannot say by how much, because the materials for it were bought on three different trips mixed in with stock for two other jobs. Without splitting that out, the only number you ever see is the whole business, and the whole business is an average that hides the jobs quietly losing you money.

Then there is the personal side. Most trades run one account for a long time, so fuel for the van and fuel for the school run come out of the same card. That is fine until you try to work out your real margin and every number is polluted.