WindowBossPro Blog — Recurring Cleanings

Choosing Recurring Window Cleaning Software: What to Check Before You Switch

Plenty of software claims to handle recurring jobs. Far fewer handle recurring window cleaning the way it actually works: quarterly homes that slide a week for rain, storefronts that need every two weeks, a property manager with eight buildings on one bill, a tech who needs to know whether today includes screens. Before you move your plan customers into anything, check how it handles the things that matter for your business.

Start With Your Own Route

Moving off a spreadsheet is covered in Moving Recurring Window Cleaning Customers Off Spreadsheets and Paper. Before you do that, pick the right destination.

Grab a handful of real customers before you start a trial: a quarterly home, a twice-a-year home, a monthly storefront, an every-two-weeks restaurant, and a multi-location account if you have one. Set each of them up during the trial. If the software handles those five well, it will probably handle the rest. If it struggles with any of them, you will find out before your whole route depends on it.

How Do Plans Come Due?

This is the most important question. Generic field-service software often handles recurring work by creating a long list of future appointments on fixed dates. That looks fine until a visit slips, and then every date after it is wrong.

Look for plans that run from the last completed visit, with a minimum number of days between visits. In WindowBossPro, you set 14, 30, 90 or 180 days on the address, and the next cleaning comes due from whenever the last one was actually done. Due cleanings land on the Waiting List, a live map and list colored not due yet, due now and overdue past a 7-day grace. Ask any software you try: what happens to next quarter's visit when this one is two weeks late?

Does It Know What a Window Job Is?

A recurring visit is only easy if the tech knows exactly what to clean. Check whether the software can record, on each address:

• Number of windows and stories.
• Sides: outside only, inside and outside, inside only.
• Extras: screens, tracks, hard-water removal.
• Access notes: gate codes, dogs, ladder spots, skylights.

And check whether those details actually show up on the tech's phone. In WindowBossPro they appear under the address, like “28 windows · 2-story · Inside & Outside · Screens.”

Routing, Reminders and the Tech App

Recurring work turns into routes, so the routing has to be practical. Look for a dispatch board by day, filtering by van, auto-routing from the shop and the ability to set route order by hand. Check that the tech app shows jobs in route order with navigation, notes, Start / Skip / Complete and before-and-after photos, and that it runs on the iPhones and Android phones your crew already has.

For customers, look for automated reminders by text and email, alerts they can choose for themselves, and two-way texting from the office. Find out how texting is billed too. WindowBossPro plans include 500, 1,000 or 2,000 text segments sent and received each month on Start, Pro and Crew.

Billing That Fits Plans

Plan customers should never get a bill they have to chase. Check for:

• Card on file, charged automatically on completion or on a schedule.
• Invoices with line items and sales tax.
• Past-due follow-up for failed cards.
• A customer app where customers update their card and pay online.
• One monthly statement for accounts with several locations, labeled by address.

That last one is easy to miss in a trial and painful to live without. More on it in Monthly Statements for Recurring Window Cleaning Accounts.

Getting In and Growing

Check how your current list gets in. CSV import should bring in clients with multiple addresses, and every address should end up on the map. Then check how new plan customers get in: a website sign-up form that captures a card, a request form, estimates customers approve online, and a quick way to turn a sign-up into a client.

Finally, look at price and how it scales. Per-user pricing gets expensive as you add techs. WindowBossPro is Start at $59, Pro at $89 and Crew at $199 per month, never billed per user, with a 14-day free trial and no credit card. It works in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK and bills customers in their own currency.

Try It With Real Customers

The best test is your own route. Set up your five sample customers, complete a visit on each, and watch what comes due next. If the plans come back on their own, the tech sees the right details, the card is charged and the statement looks right, you have found the one. To see how WindowBossPro handles every part of recurring cleanings, visit the recurring window cleaning software page.