Before you buy the app, find out what the admin is costing you.
Whether an app is even the answer. What still has not been invoiced. Which jobs actually made money. What the evenings are costing you. Answer plain questions about your own business — an hour or two, in your own words — and get it in writing.
Stage one costs nothing and you keep the project brief, whatever you decide next.
It is invite-only while we are in beta — if you do not have a code yet, apply for a place. It takes a minute.
Most of the money is lost before anyone opens a laptop.
Not in the build. In the decision: the wrong tool bought for the wrong reason, a process nobody mapped, a rollout that stopped the job for a fortnight. The work that prevents it is unglamorous and it is the work nobody sells you, because there is no commission in telling someone to change one process and carry on.
Groundwork does that thinking with you, writes it down properly, and hands it over in a form your bank, your accountant and your team can all read.
The pack, in full
Written for the firm you actually run, not the one in the brochure.
Built to be on your side
We take nothing from the software
No commission, no referral fee, no kickback from any tool we recommend. The only money Groundwork receives is the £299 you pay for it. That is the whole business model, and it is the reason the advice can be blunt.
Doing nothing is costed like a real option
Because it often is one. If the honest answer is don't buy anything, fix one process and carry on, the pack says so — before you spend, not after.
Every assumption is labelled as an assumption
Nothing is smuggled into a confident-sounding paragraph. Where a figure or a fact has been assumed rather than known, it is marked on the page it appears.
It is analysis, not regulated advice
An AI does the work. Read the documents before you act on them, and put anything large past your own accountant. We would rather say that here than in a footnote.
What we are building next
Does this invoice carry VAT?
The construction reverse charge, answered one question at a time, with the HMRC sentence behind every answer.
What a first employee really costs
The cost per hour you can actually bill, after holiday and the on-costs — every rate read from gov.uk with the tax year it belongs to.
What the site will ask for
The paperwork that decides whether you start on Monday, with lead times and the reason each one usually gets sent back.
Can you bid for that?
Five questions to answer before a fortnight of evenings on a public tender — including the two things people wrongly believe disqualify them.
Six questions before you sign
The short list that stops a software rep bluffing, and what a dodge sounds like when you hear one.
All five are built and being tested. We are not putting dates on them yet.
Stage one is free and you keep the project brief. The rest of the pack unlocks when you decide it is worth it, and it is one payment for that project — no seats, no monthly fee, nothing that renews while you are not looking.
It is invite-only while we are in beta — if you do not have a code yet, apply for a place. It takes a minute.
Find out what this problem is actually costing you.
No card for stage one. About a dozen plain questions, and a written answer you can hold up in front of anyone.
It is invite-only while we are in beta — if you do not have a code yet, apply for a place. It takes a minute.