ServiceSidekick Blog

Bill parent address

2009-07-01T17:21:56-07:00

We've just added support for the very highly requested "Bill parent" feature for work locations!

Before today you'd have to re-enter the parent's billing address for a work location... yuck.

Well the yuck is gone and the interface has been polished with three simple options:

Bill service address
Bill parent
Bill different address

We hope you find this new feature very useful!

Developer API

2009-06-30T17:39:07-07:00

Developers: Start your engines.

The ServiceSidekick API has just been released!

Not a developer? Wondering what the heck an API is?

API stands for Application programming interface. An API is a standard and documented way to allow third-parties to write software that integrates with your product.

What this means is that other developers, customers and partners can create products that integrate, synchronize, and work with ServiceSidekick. Example applications of the API:

You have a lead form on your web site. When a lead request comes in you could use the API to automatically import that lead data into ServiceSidekick.
You are migrating to ServiceSidekick from another software vendor and would like to import all historical customer, job, notes, and contact data in a particular way. The API is the perfect tool for this scenario.
You have a GPS device and you'd like to download your route for tomorrows jobs. Using the API a program could be written to do exactly this.

I hope these short examples provide a glimpse as to what is possible using our API. Head over to the API Documentation page for more info.

Setup page

2009-06-23T14:42:26-07:00

Today we are proud to announce the first step in making ServiceSidekick even easier to learn.

Now when a new account is created the first screen displayed will be a setup page with details on how to get setup fast.

Each section expands to show the exact steps needed to complete that portion of the setup. Once complete a check mark will be displayed so you can see your progress.

We hope new accounts find this feature very useful!

Status Update

2009-06-10T20:54:44-07:00

We work very hard everyday to improve the overall experience of using ServiceSidekick. Normally this involves things like improving existing features, adding new features, custom training, etc.

But an application is only as good as it's availability and speed.

Over the last two weeks ServiceSidekick experienced two short outages and a number of instances where the site just seemed sluggish. And that is not OK. We first want to convey that we take this downtime very seriously and deeply apologize for the disruption this caused your business. We also want to assure you that your data was safe at all times. The slowdowns and outages were caused by hardware-related events as opposed to a software problem with the site.

As of right now we have taken the first major steps to ensure this does not happen again. We are happy to report ServiceSidekick is now running on much more powerful hardware which will offer vastly improved performance and stability. We will also be making some additional adjustments in the coming days and weeks that should further increase our performance.

Again we want to thank all of you for your support and understanding as we work through these growing pains.

Tax list

2009-06-02T08:19:50-07:00

We work very hard to make it easy for customers to use ServiceSidekick in conjunction with QuickBooks. We automatically import the complete QuickBooks Item list (Products and Services List) from QuickBooks and use the exact same list for adding job charges. Customers using the desktop version of QuickBooks also have their sales tax codes imported automatically.

In order to make sure our non-QuickBooks customers don't feel left out we've been hard at work to implement non-QuickBooks item and tax lists. We blogged about the item list a couple weeks ago. Now we are excited to announce tax list support for non-QuickBooks customers!

The tax list allows you to create all the tax entities in which you do business. Customers can then be assigned a tax code and this tax will reflect on all new jobs. Of course we also support changing the tax on a job-by-job basis.

The best part is that the interface stays exactly the same for non-QuickBooks customers. So if you upgrade to QuickBooks sync support the interface is immediately familiar!

New Jobs tab

2009-05-27T20:52:35-07:00

We are excited to announce that the Jobs tab has just been made simpler, smarter, and more powerful!

Here are some highlights:

Cleaner column display
More information displayed via fullscreen view (sidebar has been removed)
More sorting options
The screen remembers the last sort when you return from another page
Ability to run specific custom job reports in the Jobs tab
Export jobs to CSV (Excel)

Old Jobs tab

New Jobs tab

Allow reports to be run on the Jobs tab

Job Charge Revamp

2009-05-24T22:25:34-07:00

We've just revamped the interface involved with adding, editing, updating, and deleting job charges.

We hope you enjoy this update!

Old look

New look

ServiceSidekick Labs

2009-05-24T09:24:12-07:00

Today we are excited to announce ServiceSidekick Labs!

ServiceSidekick Labs are a place to experiment with features.

You can access Labs via the Settings tab. Note that you need to login as the account owner to view or change Lab settings.

Lab features could be new screens, new reports, etc. that may not be ready for prime-time. By placing these features in Labs, we give you the option to enable or disable specific lab features on a case by case basis.

The first lab feature is one that some of you might already be familiar with - the dispatch screen. The dispatch screen is a smart way to visualize assigned work. Want to take it for a test-drive? Click on Settings tab => Labs and enable this feature.

We hope you enjoy ServiceSidekick Labs - expect more Lab features soon!

Item list

2009-05-20T15:57:56-07:00

We'd like to welcome a new configuration section to the ServiceSidekick Settings tab - the Item list!

The item list is simply the list of products and services that you charge for in your business.

If your account integrates with QuickBooks then this list is a read-only version of your QuickBooks item list.

If your account does not integrate with QuickBooks then the item list is a place where you can create, update and manage your products and services.

Update Future Jobs

2009-05-19T16:51:39-07:00

Our recurring jobs feature saves our customers a ton of time by creating repeating jobs automatically.

But one of the things this feature has lacked is the ability to bulk edit jobs in the recurrence.

Example: You create a weekly recurring job called "Weekly Landscapin Service" and mis-spell the work landscaping. Our system automatically creates the next 4 jobs which means you have to correct this mis-spelling in 4 places - yuck!

So we are proud to announce today that recurring jobs can now be updated in bulk!

The best part is it's really easy - the edit screen of a job which is part of a recurrence now shows an additional button called "Update & apply changes to future jobs".

We hope you find this new feature very useful!

New Templates

2009-05-18T10:27:09-07:00

We are excited to announce that our estimate, invoice, and work order templates have been revamped to look more professional and be more flexible.

Prior to this update viewing and printing work orders were handled differently than estimates and invoices. Also, the online view of the template did not match the printed PDF version.

With the new template system:

A job can be viewed in one of three templates: estimate, invoice, and work order
All templates are handled the same way for consistency
All templates can be printed to PDF for easy emailing and printing
The online view matches the printed PDF version (unless you have manually overridden with a custom template)
Default templates are much improved over the previous versions
Estimate and invoice template have two editable sections for terms and notes
Default terms and notes can be set for estimate and invoice templates

We are really excited about this update and we hope you find these changes very beneficial.

Templates

Invoice template

Estimate template

Work Order template

Customize template settings

Edit terms and notes on invoice and estimate templates

Custom Field Search

2009-04-21T13:52:51-07:00

Another highly requested feature has just launched - searching on custom fields!

Many of our customers make heavy use of custom fields to customize their ServiceSidekick experience. For the uninitiated custom fields can be defined on customers or jobs and can be one of three types: text, dates, and numbers. Once a custom field is defined it appears on the customer or job record and can be filled out.

But filling out the data is only half the story. Retrieving the data is the other half. That's where searching on custom fields comes into play.

Now on the Search tab there is a new link called "Search custom fields". Clicking on this link will bring up a dropdown list of all custom fields. Type in a search and pick the custom field and click the Search button. That's all there is to it!

We hope you enjoy this powerful new feature!

Custom Reports Update

2009-04-16T18:18:11-07:00

We've just added the ability to export custom reports to CSV.

This seemingly tiny addition is actually a big deal. This was a highly requested feature as many businesses owners want to further manipulate their custom report data in Excel.

Now you can Export to CSV, open in Excel and sort, filter, order, and group.

We hope you find this feature useful!

Historical Insight

2009-04-16T10:21:09-07:00

Have you ever wanted to view your entire work history currently stuck in QuickBooks in ServiceSidekick? Well now you can!

Before today any invoices in QuickBooks created before starting your ServiceSidekick account were trapped and would not flow over.

We heard over and over again that being able to have this complete work history in ServiceSidekick was very important.

In the past we've done scores of custom imports which achieved the desired result but where expensive for the customer and tedious for us.

Today we can offer this historical import of past invoices "out-of-the-box" for a very reasonable one-time fee.

In the future this will be enabled via you account's Settings page. But we wanted to get the news out right away. If you want complete historical job history in ServiceSidekick right away give us a call at (800) 530-3156 or send an email to support@servicesidekick.com.

Contact reporting

2009-04-09T10:27:28-07:00

We've just added the ability to include contact information on custom customer and job reports.

Customer reports

If a customer has more than one contact the customer will appear as multiple rows (one row for each contact). Combined with a grouping by customer name, this gives a nice view of a customer's contacts.

To narrow down customer rows you can add the following filter:

Contact Primary is not blank

This will filter out any contact that is not marked as the primary contact.

Of course if there are multiple primary contacts then multiple customer rows will still appear.

Job reports

Job reports only return one row regardless of the number of customer contacts. The contact displayed is the first primary contact for the customer.

We hope you enjoy these new reporting enhancements!

New CEO

2009-03-31T20:45:51-07:00

Editor's note (April 2nd): April Fools!

Today we have some really great news to announce.

Since last May we have been grooming executives from all levels of the organization to take on the head role here at ServiceSidekick.

In the past few months a true front-runner has emerged with the knowledge and passion for the business that will allow us to grow to the next level.

Today we are extremely excited to announce that Nathan Walker Chandler will be taking over as CEO of ServiceSidekick - effective April 1st.

Welcome Nathan! We look forward to following your strategic vision into the future!

Pricing visibility

2009-03-30T15:46:03-07:00

ServiceSidekick now offers the ability to set estimate and job pricing visibility for each employee.

Many of our customers have subcontractors or technicians who need to know the estimate or job details, but not how much the company is charging for the work. This is especially true when the employee or subcontractor is paid hourly and the company charges a higher rate for that work.

To hide pricing simply use the "Hide pricing?" checkbox when creating or editing an employee.

Here are the differences on the estimate or job record.

With pricing

Without pricing

To fully hide pricing information the employee permissions which control whether the employee can print estimate and invoices must also be correctly set. Otherwise an employee could print an invoice PDF and see pricing that way.

These permissions can be found under the Employee Management section.

We hope you find this new feature helpful!

Upcoming API

2009-03-27T15:33:51-07:00

Exciting news for companies and customers looking to integrate with ServiceSidekick - our API is on track to be released sometime in April.

Not familar with the "API" acroymn? Don't worry - it's just a fancy geek way to make other software systems work with ServiceSidekick.

Examples:

A customer could build a custom time tracking desktop widget and have timecards attached to ServiceSidekick jobs automatically
A GPS navigation provider could offer an integration through which ServiceSidekick jobs could be shown through their GPS displays
A customer/developer could integrate ServiceSidekick with other accounting systems

The possibilities are endless and we are excited to be providing a simple and effective way to integrate with ServiceSidekick - stay tuned for more API updates!

Have a great idea for an integration? Contact us for early access to the API at developer@servicesidekick.com

Contacts

2009-03-20T18:29:07-07:00

One of the most widely requested features ever has just launched - Contacts.

That's right - no more messing around with custom fields to support basic contact management.

Now each customer can have one or more contacts each with their own phone numbers, email addresses, address, etc.

Features

Manage multiple contacts for each customer
Contact import from QuickBooks
Contact export to QuickBooks
Smart importing of customers and contacts via Outlook CSV files
Ability to add primary contact at the same time you create a new customer
Contact report
Contact search

Frankly we can't imagine ServiceSidekick without contacts and we hope you love this new feature!

Time tracking improvements

2009-02-18T15:16:49-08:00

We've just updated our time tracking feature with the following new features:

The ability to edit previous entries. Before you needed to delete an entry and re-add it - yuck!
Time entries now have a note field - very useful for tracking how time was spent, etc.

Job type and status

2009-02-11T11:41:43-08:00

We've just rolled out a nice update that allows managing custom (and colored) job type and statuses.

Take 2 minutes and watch the video to learn more.

Tip: Click the icon on the bottom right of the player to watch in full-screen mode.

U.K. support

2009-02-06T14:51:28-08:00

Pop the champagne - ServiceSidekick is going international!

Truthfully we have been "international" for some time if you count our Canadian customers. But now we are moving beyond the continent by adding support for U.K. businesses!

We now support QuickBooks integration with the U.K. edition and handle locale changes like showing the pound sign (£) in place of the dollar ($) sign.

Are you a U.K. service business looking to optimize your business? Request a demo now to see our system in action!

More custom fields

2009-02-02T09:25:26-08:00

Some of the most frequent feedback we get is - We love your custom fields... now give us some more!

No problem. Starting today all plans at $149/month or higher receive 10 more custom customer and job text fields.

Enjoy!

Mobile estimates

2009-02-02T18:49:29-08:00

Another frequent feature request has just been enabled - the ability to edit the estimate status from the mobile site.

Enjoy!

iPhone icons

2009-01-06T20:38:33-08:00

Thanks to a recent customer request we whipped up some handy-dandy iPhone icons.

Note that the difference in the mobile site icon vs. the full site icon.

Thankfully the iPhone can handle even the full-fledged ServiceSidekick site with ease.

So now when you browse to your ServiceSidekick page on your iPhone (or iPod Touch) and click "Add to Home Screen" you will be presented with one of these nice icons.

Enjoy!

Recurring jobs

2008-12-17T17:10:30-08:00

We've just enabled another big feature - recurring jobs!

A number of our accounts have been beta-testing this feature for a few months and it's ready to go.

Get up to speed by watching a quick demo of this feature:

Tip: Click the icon on the bottom right of the player to watch in full-screen mode.

Custom reporting

2008-11-17T16:42:12-08:00

Drum roll please.... we've just released a very powerful new feature to ServiceSidekick - custom reporting!

This great new feature allows sorting and visualizing your business data like never before.

Get a quick rundown by watching a quick demo of this feature:

Tip: Click the icon on the bottom right of the player to watch in full-screen mode.

Calendar integration

2008-10-23T16:07:03-07:00

A great new feature we are officially launching today is the ability to see your ServiceSidekick jobs and tasks via your current calendar program such as Outlook, iCal or Google calendar.

Get a quick rundown by watching a quick 2 minute demo of this feature:

Tip: Click the icon on the bottom right of the player to watch in full-screen mode.

Why is this a big deal?

You now have offline access to ServiceSidekick job and task data
Your desktop calendar will popup a reminder alarm for jobs and tasks

How can I try it out?

Click on the Employees link in the upper right sidebar
Click on the appropriate employee
Click on the appropriate feed url under the iCalendar Feeds section
Your calendar program should take over from here and add the new calendar

What calendars support this integration?

Any calendar that supports the industry-standard iCalendar format including:

Outlook 2007
iCal
Google Calendar

Is Outlook 2003 supported?

Outlook 2003 does not support the iCalendar format. However there is a third-party plugin to enable iCalendar support called RemoteCalendars.

Have additional questions?

Twittering

2008-09-05T14:01:17-07:00

Follow ServiceSidekick on Twitter for daily happenings and micro thoughts regarding all things ServiceSidekick.

Assign multiple techs to jobs

2008-08-16T23:17:16-07:00

We've just added support for a very highly requested feature: the ability to assign multiple techs to a job.

Before today, one tech could be assigned to a job. Now, you can assign one, two, three, or more techs!

Assign multiple techs to a job

Multiple techs on a job

Mobile additions

2008-07-09T21:16:51-07:00

We've just rolled out a couple great new additions to our mobile site.

First, now the whole customer list is accessible with filtering.

Also, the widely requested feature of allowing new jobs to be created through the mobile site is now in!

Enjoy!

Filter customers by first letter

Create a new job

Custom Fields

2008-06-28T18:12:30-07:00

Need to track customer and job information that doesn't map to existing fields in ServiceSidekick?

Well then you're going to love the new custom field support we are rolling out.

To activate this feature click on the "Settings" tab and then the "Custom Fields" link.

Check out these screenshots to see how easy it is to define and use custom fields!

Create some custom fields

Edit a record and set some custom fields

Custom fields now appear on the record

New job reports added

2008-06-24T11:45:48-07:00

Two new reports were recently added to ServiceSidekick.

Job snapshots by scheduled date
Job snapshots by completed date

Enjoy!

IT Services case study

2008-04-21T14:29:17-07:00

Vista Information Systems is a leading IT company specializing in systems integration, internet solutions, and telephony.

Read the case study on how Vista Information Systems saves time and money and organizes for growth by using ServiceSidekick.

Case Study

Also: Don't forget to read the Anchor Tree Service case study.

ServiceSidekick goes gold!

2008-04-10T13:13:26-07:00

Pop the champagne - ServiceSidekick has just been certified as a QuickBooks Gold Developer - the highest level within the QuickBooks certification program!

We are extremely proud to be recognized for our current achievements in offering simple and compatible QuickBooks software for service businesses. It's likely that our customers save more time with our QuickBooks integration features than with any other part of ServiceSidekick. So rather than rest on our laurels, we are looking forward to rolling out many new features in 2008 to further our goal of offering the best software package for service businesses.

Export reports to Excel

2008-03-24T22:26:32-07:00

Microsoft's Excel is a great tool for slicing and dicing information.

As such, we've added support to export reports directly into a format that Excel can read.

Here are a few screenshots:

Export options

View report to screen (default)

Export to Excel

Filter by customer name

2008-03-19T20:28:09-07:00

Filtering by the first letter of a customer name is now available on the customer board.

Here is a screenshots of the new functionality - hope you enjoy!

Duplicate jobs and estimates

2008-03-14T18:30:32-07:00

Another hot new feature has just been added to ServiceSidekick - the ability to duplicate jobs and estimates.

How can this help your business?

Do you ever have recurring jobs or work that is very similar at the same location?

If so, now you can simply click "Duplicate job", set a scheduled time and a new job (or estimate) will be automatically created. Even job charges are copied over.

Here is a screenshot of the new functionality - enjoy!

Custom estimate and invoice templates

2008-03-12T21:01:12-07:00

Today we are pleased to announce that one of our most highly requested features has been introduced - totally customizable estimate and invoice templates!

Many of our customers have already spent some time customizing estimate and invoice templates from QuickBooks and obviously didn't want to settle for our former pre-canned options.

Thankfully we now can support nearly any template style, color, or format that can be imagined!

The best part is that custom templates in ServiceSidekick are created using HTML & CSS - the building blocks of every web site on the Internet. Using basic HTML & CSS, you can design your template in any one of the thousands of html editors and then copy and paste the template into ServiceSidekick.

If you need help translating an existing template from QuickBooks into HTML or need some pointers to get started feel free to contact us and we'll help straight-away.

The Details

Let's walk through building a custom template by first looking at a very simple example.

Example 1 - Simple template (without formatting)

<html>
    <body>
        Estimate #
        <span class="estimate_number"></span>
        <div class="job_charges"></div>
    </body>
</html>

Example 1

Now this template is not very pretty but it serves as a good starting point to begin explaining the process of designing a custom template.

Enclosed in the standard HTML opening tags of html and body are the following lines:

Estimate # Just plain text and will print out as shown in the estimate.
span class="estimate_number" A span HTML tag with a special class of estimate_number. This class instructs ServiceSidekick to replace this tag with the actual estimate number.
div class="job_charges" A div HTML tag with a special class of job_charges. This class instructs ServiceSidekick to replace this tag with all the estimate line items.

The reason this template looks jumbled is because it contains no formatting at all.

But before we add formatting, let's take a look at the basic format of a custom template that can be used as a starting point for any template.

Custom template skeleton

<html>
    <head>
        <style type="text/css">
            FORMATTING GOES HERE...
        </style>
    </head>
    <body>
        TEMPLATE GOES HERE...
    </body>
</html>

Again, those familiar with HTML & CSS will recognize this as the basic skeleton of a web page.

So now we are ready to give our example template a much-needed makeover...

Example 2 - Simple template (with formatting)

<html>
    <head>
        <style type="text/css">
            body { margin: 20px 50px; }
            table { width: 100%; margin-bottom: 20px; border-collapse: collapse; }
            table td { vertical-align: top; }

            table#charges { margin: 25px 0; border: 1px solid #555; }
            table#charges th, table#charges td { text-align: left; padding: 3px 10px; }
            table#charges td { border-top: 1px solid #dcdcdc; }
        </style>
    </head>
    <body>
        <h1>
            Estimate #
            <span class="estimate_number"></span>
        </h1>
        <div class="job_charges"></div>
    </body>
</html>

Example 2

Now our template is starting to look a lot better. Let's break down what is going on here:

body { margin: 20px 50px; } Setting up our margins (px = pixels).
table { width: 100%; margin-bottom: 20px; border-collapse: collapse; } Set tables to fill the width of the page and streamline the border.
table td { vertical-align: top; } Align text in table rows to top.
table#charges { margin: 25px 0; border: 1px solid #555; } Set margin on line items table and draw border.
table#charges th, table#charges td { text-align: left; padding: 3px 10px; } Align text to the left and pad (make margins) in the line item text sections.
table#charges td { border-top: 1px solid #dcdcdc; } Separate line items with a line.

This example should serve as a good starting point for your own custom templates.

Special CSS classes

The following special classes can be used to instruct ServiceSidekick to replace it with the actual account, customer, estimate, or job data at the time the template is processed.

Account information

logo
company_name
company_billing_address
company_billing_city
company_billing_state
company_billing_zip_code
company_billing_phone_number

Customer information

customer_name
customer_number
customer_service_address
customer_service_city
customer_service_state
customer_service_zip_code
customer_billing_address
customer_billing_city
customer_billing_state
customer_billing_zip_code
customer_email_address
customer_phone_number
customer_fax
customer_alt_phone_number

Job information

job_name
job_number
job_created_on
job_scheduled_on
job_completed_on

Estimate information

estimate_name
estimate_number
estimate_created_on
estimate_scheduled_on
estimate_completed_on

Job or estimate job charges (line items)

job_charges

Examples

Add company logo (must be uploaded first)

<div class="logo"></div>

Insert company name

<div class="company_name"></div>

Insert customer email address

<div class="customer_email_address"></div>

Insert date job was completed

<div class="job_completed_on"></div>

Conclusion

We hope you really like this new feature. Again, feel free to contact us with any questions regarding custom templates at support@servicesidekick.com

Multiple location support

2008-02-07T21:41:38-08:00

You spoke and we listened. One of the most requested features of our customer base has just gone live.

ServiceSidekick now supports managing multiple work locations for a customer!

This is great for businesses that do:

sub-contract work
maintenance work at multiple locations for a management company
any work where the customer to bill is different from the customer/person/business at the service location

Here are few screenshots of the new functionality - enjoy!

We have a blog!

2008-02-04T19:19:44-08:00

Welcome to the first post of the ServiceSidekick blog!

No, up until now we haven't tried to be secretive. We've just been busy adding great new features to the product. But great features aren't so useful if new and existing customers don't know about them.

So here we'll be posting product updates and other happenings in the world of ServiceSidekick.

You can follow this blog a number of different ways:

Subscribe to our email updates. This means when we post a new article, you'll be notified via email.
Subscribe to our RSS feed. This is a bit more advanced as it requires an RSS reader. There are many great free readers out there:
- Google reader (web-based)
- FeedDemon (Windows)
- NetNewsWire (Mac)
Just go to our blog and read it!

We have an exciting lineup of new changes coming in 2008 so stay tuned!