Setting up your agency
The first afternoon: your region and rates, your team, your clients, and your first booking.
Everything below takes an afternoon. You do not have to finish it in one sitting, and nothing is locked in: every answer here can be changed later in Settings.
1. Answer the six setup questions
When you first sign in you are asked six things: where you work, how you charge, what your rates are, which parts of the system you want, who else is in the office, and your first client. This is the onboarding wizard and it sets the defaults everything else uses.
You can skip it and come back. It is not a wall, and the dashboard will keep nudging you until it is done.
The one worth thinking about is how you charge. If you have a single flat rate, say so, because otherwise evening and weekend uplifts are switched on and your quotes will quietly include a surcharge you never agreed with anybody.
2. Turn off what you do not need
Settings → Modules. Every optional area starts switched on. If you never recruit, switch Recruiting off and the menu gets shorter. If you do not place people permanently, switch Placements off.
This is worth two minutes on day one. A menu full of things you do not use is the main reason people decide software is complicated.
3. Add your team
Your people → Add. Each person gets their own login to a separate app: they see their own shifts and nothing else, never your clients list or your money.
They are free. You are charged per office seat, which means you and your coordinators. However many nannies, carers, cleaners or candidates you have, they cost nothing.
4. Add your clients
Clients → Add. Add who is being looked after too, with the things somebody arriving for the first time needs to know: allergies, medical notes, the school run, who may collect.
That detail is shown to the person assigned to the booking, on their phone, which is the entire point of writing it down once.
5. Take your first booking
Bookings → New. Pick the client, the date, the time and who is going. If somebody is already busy, or does not have the hours free, you are told before you save it rather than after.
From there the shape is always the same: the booking is confirmed, the person clocks in and out on their phone, the hours become an invoice, and the invoice becomes money.
What next
If you would rather not do any of this yourself, send us whatever you have, even a spreadsheet, and we will set it up with you. That offer is real and it is free: hello@rostavo.com.