Consulting and general office software
DispatchMind runs a consulting and general office company from one place: calls and leads in, jobs on the schedule, the work on your team’s phones, then the invoice. Pick Consulting and general office when you sign up and it’s set up for your trade from the first screen. You can change any of it later.
A consulting practice sells time and know-how. The week is a mix of intro calls, working sessions, workshops and the odd site visit, and every hour should end up billed. DispatchMind books the meetings, keeps notes per client, tracks time against the work, and sends invoices clients pay by card.
A typical consulting and general office job in DispatchMind
- A prospect books an Intro call on your online booking page and chooses video.
- After the call you send an estimate from your price book for a Workshop and follow-up Working sessions, and they sign it.
- The sessions go on the calendar, and you log time and notes on each one as you go.
- If you need to see their operation, you book a Site visit with the address right on the job.
- The estimate turns into the invoice with your logged hours, and the client pays through your own Stripe account.
What consulting and general office owners tell us slows them down
Scheduling back-and-forth emails
Finding a time eats more email than the actual work. Your online booking page lets clients pick a slot for an intro call or consultation, and it lands on your calendar as a new job.
Notes lost between meetings
What you promised in the last session ends up in a notebook somewhere. Every meeting has notes on the job and the customer page keeps the full history, so you walk into the next one ready.
Hours that never get invoiced
Prep time and quick calls don't make it onto the bill. Time tracking per client puts it all on the invoice, and reports show which clients and job types take the most of your week.
Set up for consulting and general office from day one
Your job types
- Intro call
- Consultation
- Working session
- Workshop
- Review meeting
- Site visit
- Follow-up
The details you keep on each job
- Where
- Engagement / project
- What’s due
- Estimated hours
- PO #
A checklist for the work
New engagement: Scope agreed · Proposal or contract signed · Kickoff on the calendar · Time tracked · Deliverable sent · Invoice sent
A starter price list
Your common items are already in your price book. You set every price; nothing is filled in for you.
- Consultation
- Hourly time
- Day rate
- Project fee
- Travel
Clients come to you
- Appointments without a street address: at your office, by video or by phone.
- Your online booking page lets a client pick a time and who they want to see.
- Keep time on each appointment with a timer or by typing hours, then put the hours on the invoice at your rate.
- No map, routes or truck screens in your way.
Nellie knows the trade
Nellie is the assistant built into DispatchMind. On a consulting and general office account she knows how your customers talk and what to ask:
- What do they need help with, in a sentence?
- Is there a deadline?
- Office, video or phone, and what time works?
What she treats as urgent: A hard deadline this week; An existing client with a problem today.
What she never does: Never quote a fee the office hasn’t set; Never promise results.
Everything else
- Jobs move through four plain steps: Submitted, In progress, Pending, Done pending approval. Your trade’s own steps are color tags you can sort by.
- Estimates and invoices from your price book.
- A tech app for your team, with what each person may see set by you.
- Reports and commissions worked out from your own jobs.
- Bring your customers and jobs over from the system you use now.
Consulting and general office software: common questions
Can clients book intro calls and consultations online?
Yes. Share your online booking page and clients pick a time. It shows up on your calendar with their info, whether it's in person, by phone or by video.
Can I track time and invoice by the hour?
Yes. Log time on each session and it goes straight onto the client's invoice. You can also mix in flat-fee items from your price book.
Does it work if I don't have trucks or field staff?
Yes. Office mode drops the maps and routes. You get the calendar, client pages, time tracking, estimates and invoices, and you can still put an address on a site visit when you go out.
Can my staff use it too?
Yes. Add office logins for owner, admin, office or look-only, so an assistant can manage your calendar without seeing your reports.
Can I try DispatchMind for my consulting business before paying?
You can. Get 14 days free with every feature on and no card on file. Book some intro calls and log a few hours to see how invoices come out. After that it's month to month.
Related trades
Try DispatchMind free for 14 days
Set up for consulting and general office. No card, month to month.