A new POS pool and spa software system can help reduce or eliminate stressors inhibiting business development or your company’s ability to handle another big summer. Implementing new POS software can improve efficiency and accuracy while saving company expenses in the long run. In particular, pool service billing software helps automate the work done by your service department to automate your billing and maximize the profits on each of your service contracts and renovation projects.

Top Pool Service Billing Software Features

Progress Billing

Pool service billing software becomes especially valuable during the busy summer season because it helps you ensure progress billing is completed quickly for optimal cash flow. Progress billing is particularly important for service departments doing bigger service jobs such as changing pool liners, painting pools, renovating decks, or adding new heaters, filters, salt chlorine generators, and automatic pool covers. When looking at service billing software features, be sure managers can calculate progress billing payments based on the project’s state of completion and send the totals directly to the accounts receivable (AR) department so they can bill clients.

Mobile technology has profoundly affected a pool service company’s ability to fluidly adapt to their clients’ needs and expectations by giving them instant access to customer contact info, equipment history, purchase history and more. In a world that is becoming increasingly data mobile, consumers expect that companies, regardless of size, can access their records and communicate back quickly.

This is where mobile service features are essential within any pool service billing. Mobile service modules help pool service companies provide a high level of service by ensuring techs can instantaneously send detailed information back to the office and directly into the customer’s service order. This includes information such as job status, job materials, chemical readings before and after, time spent, and any special notes for the customer. And more importantly, service techs can initiate the steps necessary to ensure fast, efficient, and accurate service billing.

Saving time means saving money. Using mobile service eliminates paper and duplicate entry back at the office. Field techs can look up their schedule, access customer profile information to save a return trip, add items directly to an order, and generate the AR so office staff won’t have to add items back at the office.

Lastly, don’t forget about new mobile technology options that allow in-field personnel to take payments on the job site. By using a mobile device, the project team can accept payments that will immediately be listed on the payment screen. This allows payments to be made but only up to the amount of the main job minus any outstanding costs and previous billings.

Online Bill Pay

To ensure the most optimal cash flow, having an online bill pay feature is a crucial component necessary in today’s pool service billing software. With an online bill pay feature, service invoices become a part of a reliable billing process to make it easier and more convenient for customers to pay for their pool services. Pool and spa service companies are investing in online bill pay systems that allow them to send invoices via email and eliminate the cost of envelopes, stamps, labels, paper, and printer ink. It can also reduce labor costs by eliminating the time it takes to bill and collect payments. Additionally, by providing an electronic payment option, you provide your clients with the convenience of streamlined, touch-free business transactions.

As with many technology trends, service professionals can now obtain industry-specific software designed to help them manage their service contracts for additional profitability. This component saves service professionals hours of valuable time by allowing them to set up tasks just once. The program creates service orders and schedules tasks for the duration of the maintenance contract. This eliminates the need to create a service order for each weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly visit.

The program also allows you to run a report to show when contracts are expiring so you can quickly renew a contract. Save time by mass-invoicing weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly – simply highlight multiple invoices to quickly print or email hundreds of invoices simultaneously. The system even allows service professionals to determine the profitability of a job by displaying revenue earned to date, percentage completed, total completed tasks, balance due, and overdue balance.

Setting up revolving service will populate on the schedule and send invoices to AR, saving hours of billing work. By having an integrated pool service billing software system, users can point and click to create picking tickets for the merchandise and supplies to be taken to the job site and deduct them from inventory. Additionally, you can enter your expenses and subcontractors as you use them and send the invoices to your QuickBooks® accounts payable. Tracking the labor and labor expenses for each stage of the job is also critical to the success of any service job, especially for regular contracts and bigger service and renovation projects.

It’s also important that your pool industry software includes a service job contract option that instantly creates a professional contract for the job that can be provided easily to your client. These are especially important on larger pool renovation service jobs as the job contract becomes the primary document that allows you to automatically set up and manage the progress of the job and track job costs. Additionally, the pool service billing software allows you to add hidden items to the contract that will not appear on the customer’s sales order, for things like special order items used for creating purchase orders. Though hidden from your client, these special orders can be tracked as they are completely integrated with the RB Pool & Spa business management software.

Automated Billing

Stop spending countless hours sifting through paperwork and setting manual billing reminders. In today’s fast-paced pool and spa industry, it’s imperative to use integrated business software that brings every process of the business, including pool service billing, together into a single system, so all relevant data is in one place.

Features like real-time data syncs and fully-automated billing workflows will keep your team organized, improving efficiency on the backend while enhancing your customer experience. They also prevent costly billing errors like missed contract renewals and incorrectly calculated invoices – all of which have a huge effect on your company’s bottom line. Additionally, real-time reporting allows managers to instantly obtain service billing on all open or completed service jobs and projects to guard against errors and oversights. This feature keeps service department managers informed on the status of all service jobs with a record of who, what, where, and when for each one.

Think you don’t have any operating or billing inefficiencies? Think again. Automating even just one billing process could save a few minutes on every service job, resulting in thousands of dollars of savings over a busy summer season. Automating your pool service billing will improve your cash flow and enhance business profitability with the added bonus of reducing in-season stress. Don’t wait – automate your pool service billing for the 2022 season. Contact RB today to schedule a demo.