Software help

[jeane]

Hi everyone,

Hoping someone may be able to point me in the right direction.

My fella runs a small garage with a few employees.

He's decided to finally enter the 21st century and get some software to manage his customers, invoices and diary. I've been tasked with finding the best software but i have no idea and a google search just results in pages and pages of companies selling their programmes. To be honest, in can't really tell them apart and it's not clear which makes one better than another.

Is anyone here in the business? What do you use? We are only small so not looking to spend a huge amount each month on anything particularly fancy. I tried to search the forums but the best thread was from 2013 and I imagine a lot has moved on since then.

thanks very much for your advice.

[paul.deitch]

There are a few open source billing etc programs which you can try out and also pay for help if you need it.

[Dave.]

Office 365?

Excel for invoices.

Outlook for calendar & contacts.

He can set annual reminders for services/mots in Outlook & send out reminders to customers.

[hopeydaze]

I’d look at a cost effective Cloud solution such as Xero combined with an integrated garage workshop app. Do a Google search.

I Cannot believe I’m recommending Xero as I work for a larger competitor. Anyway they have a good product for small businesses.

[jeane]

paul.deitch said:

There are a few open source billing etc programs which you can try out and also pay for help if you need it.

Yeah I peered down that road. Surprisingly a lot of open source comes with a price tag. I ended up with the same question....but which one is any good??

[jeane]

Dave. said:

Office 365?

Excel for invoices.

Outlook for calendar & contacts.

He can set annual reminders for services/mots in Outlook & send out reminders to customers.

From what he is saying he is looking for something fairly integrated. Eg look up a customer's details and see the repair history along with invoices and warranties. It helps when people come back and say "you looked at my car a month a go...possibly, 3 months...or could it be last year...oh yeah, it wasn't this car at all."

[jeane]

hopeydaze said:

I’d look at a cost effective Cloud solution such as Xero combined with an integrated garage workshop app. Do a Google search.

I Cannot believe I’m recommending Xero as I work for a larger competitor. Anyway they have a good product for small businesses.

I saw them. I had a quick look. Thanks very much. I'll take a better look at them.

[deckster]

Work out what you want to achieve first. People can't really help until they know that.

What do you find hard at the moment?
What problems are you trying to fix? Be specific.
What you want to be able to do in the future that you can't do right now?
What experience do you want your customers to have?

"I want my VAT to add up at the end of the month" is a very different problem to "I want my customers to be able to access and pay their invoices online".

[randlemarcus]

jeane said:

paul.deitch said:

There are a few open source billing etc programs which you can try out and also pay for help if you need it.

Yeah I peered down that road. Surprisingly a lot of open source comes with a price tag. I ended up with the same question....but which one is any good??

Open source has never meant its was free from price If you can compile the source code, debug, and figure it out maybe, but you do garage things instead. If a manufacturer publishes the workshop manual, does that mean yer man does what it says for free?

[Dracoro]

randlemarcus said:

Open source has never meant its was free from price

Yes, the code is "free" 'as is' but not the applications using it if the author wants/needs to charge.

Think of it as car parts being given out free, a garage will still want to charge labour to fit/assemble said parts to a car.

Code isn't tangible as such, so when when pay for software it's for the developers time (using/amending their own code as well as open source code), company overheads, support, etc.

[Dave.]

jeane said:

Dave. said:

Office 365?

Excel for invoices.

Outlook for calendar & contacts.

He can set annual reminders for services/mots in Outlook & send out reminders to customers.

From what he is saying he is looking for something fairly integrated. Eg look up a customer's details and see the repair history along with invoices and warranties. It helps when people come back and say "you looked at my car a month a go...possibly, 3 months...or could it be last year...oh yeah, it wasn't this car at all."

All doable in Excel, but maybe a little complex.

Less than a fiver a month though, no idea what other dedicated software will cost, or what your/his budget is.

[998420]

From what you are saying, I think that CRM* systems will probably be the thing to help you

Below the skin, it is a relational database, as is pretty much anything useful in the it world, but with a lot of useful features that make customer tracking an absolute doodle

• CRM = customer relationship management

https://www.capterra.com/sem/customer-relationship...

[Audicab]

deckster said:

Work out what you want to achieve first. People can't really help until they know that.

What do you find hard at the moment?
What problems are you trying to fix? Be specific.
What you want to be able to do in the future that you can't do right now?
What experience do you want your customers to have?

"I want my VAT to add up at the end of the month" is a very different problem to "I want my customers to be able to access and pay their invoices online".

This is the best advice you will get at this point.

As you've seen, there are hundreds of options available to you. It's only by knowing exactly what you want that you will be able to identify the right solution.

I've been involved in software implementations and sales for 20 + years and the best way of wasting money, effort and time is not getting your requirements right.

It doesn't have to be complicated, as said above, just figure out your priorities and what you want to achieve from the software implementation.

[Fady]

Audicab said:

This is the best advice you will get at this point.

As you've seen, there are hundreds of options available to you. It's only by knowing exactly what you want that you will be able to identify the right solution.

I've been involved in software implementations and sales for 20 + years and the best way of wasting money, effort and time is not getting your requirements right.

It doesn't have to be complicated, as said above, just figure out your priorities and what you want to achieve from the software implementation.

The Ops general requirement seems pretty clear to me from the initial post.

[Limpet]

Audicab said:

deckster said:

Work out what you want to achieve first. People can't really help until they know that.

What do you find hard at the moment?
What problems are you trying to fix? Be specific.
What you want to be able to do in the future that you can't do right now?
What experience do you want your customers to have?

"I want my VAT to add up at the end of the month" is a very different problem to "I want my customers to be able to access and pay their invoices online".

This is the best advice you will get at this point.

As you've seen, there are hundreds of options available to you. It's only by knowing exactly what you want that you will be able to identify the right solution.

I've been involved in software implementations and sales for 20 + years and the best way of wasting money, effort and time is not getting your requirements right.

It doesn't have to be complicated, as said above, just figure out your priorities and what you want to achieve from the software implementation.

Fully agree with both these points. You need to understand exactly what you want to achieve before you can decide the best way to get there. Nail down the why before you look at the how.

For example, what are your biggest headaches, what is taking up a lot of time, or just a pain in the backside to do? You can assign a direct cost to time which then makes it easier to judge the value of any investment, and the return on it (ROI). If it’s costing you the equivalent of £50 a week doing something manually, and the software is going to cost you £500, you’re in profit in 10 weeks. Arbitrary numbers, but you get the idea.

I also do this for a living, but not in this sector unfortunately. Same rules apply though. Start with understanding exactly what you want, identify what is giving you the biggest headaches, and go from there. Then not only will you get more accurate recommendations, but you will be able to better assess the value of them.

[deckster]

Fady said:

The Ops general requirement seems pretty clear to me from the initial post.

No, the OP has told us what they're looking for ("software to manage his customers, invoices and diary").

They haven't told us what problems they're trying to solve. Classic case of putting the solution before the problem.

They don't need to go into huge amounts of detail but 30 minutes spent jotting down the answers to a few basic questions will be immensely valuable and will, more than likely, clarify in their own mind exactly why they're thinking of spending money.

[NMNeil]

Dave. said:

Office 365?

Excel for invoices.

Outlook for calendar & contacts.

He can set annual reminders for services/mots in Outlook & send out reminders to customers.

He's running a business so would need something secure and reliable. That rules out anything Microsoft.
Linux OS, Then pick one.
https://www.ubuntupit.com/top-30-best-accounting-a...

[Krikkit]

NMNeil said:

He's running a business so would need something secure and reliable. That rules out anything Microsoft.
Linux OS, Then pick one.
https://www.ubuntupit.com/top-30-best-accounting-a...

Recommending Linux for a tech luddite is really special Remember they're usually going to end up using some local small tech guy to sort their IT out, who likely won't know linux properly.

Honestly I'd be looking at bespoke garage solutions - they can help with all kinds of different needs too.

I work for a company that sells software for a different sector, but the same type, and the amount of time it saves over a generic accounting package is huge, never mind a set of office bits bodged together. In time alone it saves more in the first couple of years than its total cost.

[jeane]

deckster said:

Work out what you want to achieve first. People can't really help until they know that.

What do you find hard at the moment?
What problems are you trying to fix? Be specific.
What you want to be able to do in the future that you can't do right now?
What experience do you want your customers to have?

"I want my VAT to add up at the end of the month" is a very different problem to "I want my customers to be able to access and pay their invoices online".

It's more a customer management system/database we are primarily looking for. Like I said initially, the very basic. Our customers pay when they collect their cars so something like accessing and paying invoices online would be superfluous for us.

We would like to be able to keep a record of our customer's history when dealing with us. Something that would allow us to attach invoices to their entry and as well as dates they visited and the work that was completed. If the option was there to flag when customers are due their MOT that would also be great.

We don't expect this will be the only and final software that we will ever use more just a starting point to get us on our way.

Edited by jeane on Thursday 25th June 16:45

[jeane]

randlemarcus said:

Open source has never meant its was free from price If you can compile the source code, debug, and figure it out maybe, but you do garage things instead. If a manufacturer publishes the workshop manual, does that mean yer man does what it says for free?

Well freeware does exist, especially when it comes to CRM software. Unfortunately I haven't been able to find any specifically for the auto trade otherwise we would be all over it! Our margins are tight and so I am trying to find savings where possible. I imagine that's how you run your business too?