What we automate
We build systems that integrate with the operational reality of Australian businesses in this sector. Common workflows we automate end to end:
- Quote preparation from site photos, measurements and a rate library
- Job scheduling and dispatch against crew availability and skill tickets
- Timesheet and materials capture from the van, not from memory at 6pm
- Variation capture on site, priced and issued before the work is buried
- Progress claim preparation under the state security-of-payment regime
- Supplier invoice coding to the right job and cost code
- Licence, insurance and induction expiry tracking across the crew
- Retention release tracking and defect callback scheduling
The realities we build around
The person who holds the information is in a van, on a roof, or in a ceiling space. Anything that needs a desktop at 5pm does not get done.
Margin lives in variations that were done and never claimed. The gap between the work happening and the paperwork existing is where the money goes.
The head contractor sets the compliance bar. Insurances, licences, inductions and safety documents have to be current on demand or the crew is off site.
Cash is tighter than in almost any other sector, so a progress claim that goes out late or gets rejected on a technicality is a real problem, not an administrative one.
Why work with us
Trade and contracting work that reflects how Australian trade businesses actually run: the office is small, the field is where the value is created, and the compliance load is set by whoever is above you in the contract chain. We build against that, not against an idealised process.
Where most AI in this sector goes wrong
Most AI sold to trade businesses is office software with a chat box added. It assumes someone will sit down and enter the data, which is exactly the step that never happens. The fragmented patterns: quoting AI that does not know your rates or your supplier pricing; scheduling tools that ignore which tickets and licences each person actually holds; "AI for invoices" that codes to a GL account but not to a job, so job costing stays wrong; site apps that require signal in a basement; and compliance registers that are a spreadsheet nobody updates until the head contractor asks. The test for anything in a trade business is whether it works with one hand, on a phone, in bad light.
Systems we integrate against
Trade engagements integrate against whatever you run: your job management system, your accounting platform, your rostering and time system, and the head contractor platforms you are made to use. We do not publish a supported-vendor list: line of business applications, online software, on premise or in the cloud, current or long abandoned by its vendor. If it holds the data, we integrate with it, and if it is not named here that is not a limitation. Most AU trade businesses run one job management system, one accounting system, and a great deal of email, photos and text messages that carry information no system ever sees. Integration is the value: capturing what happens on site and landing it in the systems that already exist beats replacing them.
If your stack isn’t listed above, reach out anyway. The systems vary by industry but the integration patterns don’t. We can usually work with whatever you’re running. Tell us your stack.
Regulatory and compliance landscape
Trade work in Australia operates under state-based occupational licensing, the QBCC in Queensland, the VBA in Victoria, NSW Fair Trading and the equivalents elsewhere, with separate electrical and plumbing licensing regimes. The security-of-payment act in each state governs progress claims and the timing of payment schedules, and the deadlines are strict. Work health and safety duties flow through the PCBU structure to every contractor on site. The ATO requires a Taxable Payments Annual Report for building and construction services. Award coverage and site allowances affect labour cost. We design workflows so the documentation obligations that decide a payment dispute are produced as a by-product of the work, not reconstructed afterwards.
Operational outcomes we move
Defensible outcomes on trade engagements: variations captured and claimed at the time the work happens rather than lost; quote turnaround compressed so fewer jobs are lost to whoever answered first; job costing accurate because supplier invoices land against the right job automatically; progress claims issued on time under the statutory deadlines; and licence, insurance and induction currency provable in minutes when the head contractor asks. The metric is recovered margin and claims that survive scrutiny.
Common deployment patterns
Common deployment patterns for AU trade businesses: a quoting agent grounded in your own rate library and recent supplier pricing; site capture that turns photos, voice notes and measurements into a priced variation; supplier invoice coding straight to job and cost code; a compliance register that watches every expiry across the crew and chases before it lapses; and progress-claim preparation that assembles the claim, the supporting evidence and the statutory declaration from work already recorded.
Related Bedstone services
Trade businesses typically pair this with AI accounts for supplier invoice coding and progress claim invoicing, field and job management software, and our construction work where you sit under a head contractor. Or look at Bedstone OS for one workspace across jobs, people, suppliers and documents.
How we engage
Five-step delivery, scoped to fit. Audit, scope sprint, proof of concept, verification, rollout. Wrapped as a fixed-scope sprint, monthly retainer, fractional engagement, or one-off audit. See services for the full process and commercial structures.
Common questions
Will this work if my team is not technical?
That is the design constraint, not an afterthought. If it needs training beyond showing someone once, it will not be used, and we treat that as our problem to solve rather than yours to endure. Field capture has to work on a phone, one-handed, with poor signal.
Will it connect to our job management software?
Yes. We integrate against the major AU job management platforms, and where the API is weak we work with exports or an intermediate layer. We do not publish a supported-vendor list, because in practice the answer is the same either way: tell us what you run and we will tell you plainly how it connects. The integration approach is scoped in the audit phase before anything is quoted.
We already have job management software. What does this add?
Job management software records what someone tells it. The gap is everything that happens on site and never gets entered: the variation, the extra hour, the material substitution, the defect. We build the capture layer that closes that gap and feeds the system you already run.
Does it help with progress claims and security of payment?
Yes. The claim, the supporting evidence and the statutory declaration are assembled from work already recorded, so the claim goes out inside the statutory window with the backup attached. A person reviews and issues it. We do not give legal advice on your contract.
Across Australia
We work with operators in this sector across the country. See city-specific context: AI agency Australia, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Perth.