The job board

The job board is where a workshop sees all its work at once. Each job is a card in the column of its stage, and it moves from left to right as it is taken in, approved, worked on, made ready and collected. Above the board, each technician’s open jobs and the hours of labour they have left.

1. Received. Taken in at the front counter, with its collection ticket printed.
2. Awaiting approval. The estimate is with the customer.
3. In progress. Approved and being worked on. A job that needs a part not in stock goes to Waiting for parts.
4. Ready. The work is done and checked, and the customer is told.
5. Collected. The customer has paid and taken it away. A job only gets here by being collected.

What is on the board

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1. The counts: Open jobs, Waiting for the customer or parts, Past the promised time and Ready to invoice, with how much the ready jobs come to.
2. Board and Table. The table lists the same jobs as rows, with New job card and Show closed and cancelled.
3. Search: “Search number, item, customer”. Beside it, how many jobs are overdue and how many have no technician, such as 6 overdue and 19 not assigned.
4. Take in a job, or press N. A manager also has Job settings here (below).
5. The technicians’ load: each technician with their open jobs and the hours of labour left on them. A green dot means their clock is running.
6. The columns, one for each stage, with how many jobs are in it.
7. A job: its number, what needs doing, the item, the customer, the technician (or No technician), its value and any deposit, and when it was promised. A late promise shows as, for example, Promised 3 h ago. Under it, the job’s one next step: Record approval, the next stage such as In progress, or Collect with what is due.

Other marks a job may carry: Disputed, how many parts waiting, Back from an earlier job (with warranty when it is under warranty), its tags, Express, With the checker, Checked, how long it has waited to be collected, and Warranty to a date once it is collected.

A job’s menu

The … on a job opens everything else you can do with it. Kila shows only what fits the job and your role:

• Move to another stage, such as Move to in progress.
• Assign a technician or Change the technician (managers).
• Send the estimate for approval and Record the customer’s approval: see Get an estimate approved.
• Take a deposit: see Take a deposit on a job.
• Remind the customer to collect, on a job that is ready: see Tell the customer a job is ready.
• Photos, Print the collection ticket, Print the workshop copy and Open the job card.

Good to know

No menu moves a job to Collected: it gets there when the customer collects and pays, at the till or the front counter.

Job settings

A manager sets how the business works its jobs under Job settings on the board: “How this business works its jobs. Kila started them from the business profile.”

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Setting	What it does, in Kila’s words
Approval before work	A job with a priced estimate starts only once the customer has approved it.
Second check before collection	Someone other than the person who finished the work checks it before it is handed over.
Use parts when a job is ready	Parts still on the job are taken from stock when it is marked ready.
Text the customer when ready	An SMS tells the customer the job is ready to collect and what is due.
Deposits on jobs	Take money ahead; it is held on the customer’s account and used at collection.
Free labour on warranty returns	A job brought back inside its warranty is not charged for labour.
Suggested deposit	Share of the estimate, as a percentage.
Flag uncollected after	Days ready: after that many days the board shows how long a job has waited.
Keep intake photos	Days; 0 keeps them with the job.
Note on the collection ticket	Printed at the bottom of every ticket.

Not available yet

SMS is in test mode: with Text the customer when ready on, Kila keeps each text in its message log, but none reaches the customer’s phone until an SMS provider is connected. Call the customer: see Tell the customer a job is ready.

At the till

A business that takes jobs has the job board at the till too. It opens on Collect, with the jobs ready to hand over, and Board shows the same columns. See Hand a job over and take payment.

Good to know

The board uses your business’s own words. A laundry’s menu calls it the Orders board, a caterer’s the Events board. A technician sees only the jobs given to them, on My jobs.

Related

• Take a job in: how a job gets onto the board.
• Give a job to a technician: assign work from the board.
• Jobs and repair: how Kila works for a workshop.