Quotes on site visits

The best time to write the quote is right after the site visit, while you remember everything. The problem is you're sitting in the van. Tredco solves that with your voice.

From voice to quote

You speak in what you saw:

"Met Hansen today — bathroom, eighty hours plus tiles and plumbing."

The agent writes the quote: work lines with hours and rates, materials, and VAT calculated correctly. You get a finished document with the customer's name and address, a quote number and the total — ready for review.

You review before anything is sent

The quote is a proposal to you, not a message to the customer. Adjust lines and prices if you like, and send when you're happy — as a PDF and email in one click. Nothing leaves the house without your sign-off.

How the total is built up

The total sits at the bottom of the quote. Collapsed, it shows Total with excl. VAT beneath it — tap it to unfold the whole calculation:

• Subtotal — hours and materials added up, quantity times price, before any discount.
• The discount is subtracted as its own amount. If you gave a discount both on a single line and on the quote as a whole, it splits into Discount on line items and Discount on quote, so you see where the cut sits. If there is only one kind, it shows as a single Discount line.
• Total excl. VAT, VAT and Total incl. VAT at the end. If you're not VAT registered, the VAT lines fall away and you just see Total.

A discount you put on a single line — say five percent off the plumbing — counts in the breakdown the same way a discount on the whole quote does, rather than hiding inside the subtotal. The customer sees the same breakdown on the PDF, so the numbers on screen and on the quote match.

Optional items — priced, but outside the total

Sometimes you want to price something the customer can choose to add, without folding it into the quote: an extra upgrade, an option for more work. That's an optional item. It carries a full price on the quote and the PDF, but stays out of the subtotal, VAT, total, payment plan and invoice.

You add it as an ordinary line in the line editor and tap Make optional under the line's total. The seal Optional item then stands in the total, and the button becomes Include in the total. Change your mind and tap it, and the line falls back into the calculation.

Optional items gather on their own under the priced lines, under Optional items, numbered on from them. The ⓘ mark by the heading explains what they are. The total at the bottom counts them apart — "one optional item" or the count — so you can see they aren't in the total.

The customer sees them in their own section after the total and the payment plan on the PDF, each on its own card with the price including VAT — even when you've otherwise hidden the line prices. Above them it says they aren't in the total: "Not in the total. Tell your company if you want it included." If the customer approves the quote, it holds as it stands, without the optional items — if they want any of them, they say so.

See the quote the way the customer gets it

The open quote is split into four tabs at the top:

• Quote — the lines, the hours and the prices.
• Customize — settings such as discount, payment plan and attachments.
• Preview — the document itself, the way the customer gets it.
• Send — recipients and sending.

The header and the customer row scroll away as you move down, while the total and the tabs stay put — so you never lose your place, and switching tabs keeps you where you were.

Under Preview you see the whole quote as a finished document. Tap Generate PDF to build the file; the button moves from Generating PDF… to Show PDF once it's ready. The pages lay themselves out to the width you have, and you can go in close with Zoom in and Zoom out or go back to Fit to width to see the whole page. On the phone that means you can read the fine print yourself before you send — not just trust that it came out right.

When the quote is long — many line items or a full job description — the document runs across several pages. The page number sits at the top of each page, Page 2 of 5, so the customer sees how much is left. If the line items carry onto a new page, the heading Items repeats with No over the number column, so the columns come along; a note block that runs on repeats under Notes. A long description flows on page by page instead of being cut off, and the section headings repeat with nothing added — the page number says the rest. That way a multi-page quote reads tidily at the customer's end, not as loose sheets.

Choose how the quote looks

In Preview, Layout sits in a row of its own above the document. Folded, the button names the layout the quote has now — for example «Layout With cover» — and the chevron says there's more. Tap it to fold out the choices; they lay themselves on a surface of their own under the button, so the pages are left in peace while you're not switching. The content is the same in all of them; it's the form that changes, so you can pick the one that suits the company and the job:

• With cover — today's document, a cover page with a photo.
• Compact — one table, few pages.
• Minimal — text only, no colour fills.
• Letter — fits a window envelope.
• Summary first — price and dates on page 1.
• Sidebar — a colour band down the side.
• Practical — numbered sections, black and grey.

New quotes start in the company's layout. In the same folded-out surface the company's choice sits at the bottom: if the quote has the company's layout, the star seal Default for new quotes shows; otherwise you tap Use as default to make today's layout the standing one (that needs control of the company settings). The ⓘ mark About the default layout explains what it means. You can also set it under Settings › Quote layout › PDF layout for new quotes. Quotes you have already made keep theirs — a change here applies only to new ones. You can reach the layout from Customize and Send too; both jump to Preview.

Download the quote as a Word file

Next to Generate PDF in Preview sits Download Word. It makes the quote as a .docx file you can edit — all the text and every table can be changed, so you can adjust the wording in your own tool if you need to. The file always follows the Practical layout, whichever layout the PDF uses. The figures are the ones in the quote at the moment you download: the totals are not recalculated in Word, and what you change in the file does not go back to the quote. The logo and the line photos don't come along as images — photos and video sit as links under their line. On the phone the file opens in the browser, the way the PDF does.

Write a description at the top of the quote

On the Quote tab, above the lines, you can add a description. It sits in the quote before the items — a couple of sentences about the job, so the customer understands what the quote covers before seeing the numbers.

If the field is empty, tap Add description. The ⓘ mark by the button says where the text lands: "Appears in the quote before the items." You write straight in the field, which grows with the text, and the description saves itself when you move on — tap Done, switch tabs, or press Esc. If a save fails, the text stays put and it reads Not saved; tap Done to try again. Nothing is lost.

Once the description is written, the quote shows the first three lines. Tap Show all to read the rest and Show less to fold it back up, and the pencil Edit description to rewrite.

If you need help with the words, there's Writing help in the corner of the field. It opens a small Polish panel that works on the text you have: Grammar fixes spelling, Clarify makes it plainer, Formalize tightens the tone, and Structure tidies it up. You can also write your own instruction. The suggestion comes up beside your text; tap Accept, and it drops in and saves as the description.

Follow up until the customer answers

A sent quote is rarely finished — the customer needs a reminder, or replies with a question. The quotes list keeps track of whose turn it is, in two tabs:

• Sent — quotes waiting for an answer from the customer. Tap Follow up here once a few days have passed.
• Inbox — customers who have replied and are waiting on you. Tap Reply to customer here.

The All tab shows both. Each row shows the wait — Awaiting reply with the number of days — so you see what has sat the longest.

When the customer replies, the whole conversation gathers under Correspondence on the quote. Write the answer straight in the field, or let the agent do the legwork: tap Draft for me, it reads the reply and puts a proposal in the reply box — you review it and tap Send reply. You also see when the customer has Opened the quote, so you know whether it has been read before you chase.

From approved quote to project

When the customer approves, the agent follows up: it proposes creating the project and setting up time tracking, so everything that happens next — hours, photos, receipts, the work diary — lands on the right job from day one.

Templates and your customer register make the next quote even faster: the agent already knows your prices and your phrasing.

Next in the journey: hours, work diary and documentation.