Lawn care estimates and invoices, visit by visit and season by season.

Say exactly what a visit includes.

A lawn care invoice app is only as good as the scope behind it, and "weekly mow" is how scope creeps. Spell out what one visit includes: the cut height for the grass type, what happens to the clippings (mulched in place, or bagged and hauled for an upcharge), edging and string trimming every visit, and blowing off the drive, walks and patio at the end of every visit.

Then say what the season is. In temperate areas a season is often around 28 to 32 weekly visits; in the south it can run past 40. A one-time cleanup, a seasonal package and a full-season contract are three different prices, and the estimate should say which one the customer is buying.

In Jobkore every line has its own unit, so mowing can be per visit, fertilizer and aeration by the square foot and hedge trimming by the hour. Load the Outdoor & Grounds trade pack and your catalog starts with mowing, fertilizer, aeration, sod, mulch, hedge trimming and snow plowing lines. Change the prices to yours and every estimate starts from your numbers.

Price cleanups and leaf season on their own.

The customer's real question is whether somebody will actually show up every week, and whether the lawn will look better than the neighbor's. Keep that promise priced right. A spring cleanup, with leaves, debris, bed edges re-cut and the first cut, can take several times a normal visit. Fall leaf season can take two to three times the mowing labor. Fold either into the weekly rate and you work October for free.

Put them on the estimate as their own lines: spring cleanup, fall cleanup with the number of leaf passes, and aeration and overseeding if you offer them. The customer sees what the season costs, not just the weekly number.

Write the weather policy down too: what happens when it rains on the visit day, and how the visit gets made up. It saves a phone call every wet week.

Fertilizer, weed control and the license it takes.

A fertilizer and weed program is usually several applications a year, timed to the season and matched to the grass type: pre-emergent in spring, slow-release in summer, a fall feeding. Put each application on the estimate, and say whether broadleaf weeds, crabgrass and nutsedge are treated in the base price or as add-ons. A soil test before liming tells you what the lawn actually needs.

Applying herbicides and pesticides for hire usually requires a state applicator license, and restricted use pesticides require certification under EPA's applicator standards. Check your state before you sell a weed control program, because operating without the license can mean a fine and a cease-and-desist.

Put your license number in Jobkore once and it prints on every estimate and invoice.

Bill a season month by month from one invoice.

Jobkore does not run automatic recurring billing, so here is how lawn businesses use it. For a season contract, put the whole season on one invoice with a payment schedule: a row for each month, each with its own due date. The customer's Pay button offers the next month due first (they can also pay ahead), so they pay each month from the same link, and payments fill the rows in order. A schedule holds up to six rows, so a season longer than six months goes on two invoices.

If a month runs late, Jobkore sends reminders at 1, 7 and 14 days, then stops. For customers you bill per visit, send an invoice after the visit; it takes a minute and the customer pays by card or bank transfer on their phone. Stripe charges its standard rate and Jobkore adds nothing on top.

Invoices and payments sync one way to QuickBooks Online. More on getting through the slow season.

Add-ons and changes, signed.

Mid-season, the customer asks you to add the side yard, trim the hedges or haul away a pile of brush. Write it as a change order on the invoice with its own price. The customer signs it online and the invoice total moves to include it, so the extra work is agreed before you do it.

Photos help settle the rest: up to 20 on the document and 6 on a single line. A photo of the overgrown fence line beside the cleanup line shows why it costs what it does.

Put the contract terms on the estimate as well: how the customer cancels, how much notice, and what happens to a prepaid month.

Hank knows the lawn care traps.

Jobkore includes Hank AI™, an assistant that knows the trade you picked at signup. Tell him the job by typing or with a voice memo: quarter-acre cool-season lawn, weekly mowing April to October, bag clippings in spring, five-step fertilizer program, spring and fall cleanups, aeration in September. He drafts the estimate with each service as a line, priced from your catalog first.

Turn on a review before sending and he checks it against a lawn care list: weekly mowing with no clipping policy or edging, cleanups folded into the weekly rate, leaf season underpriced, a weed program with no license noted. He can add the missing line and never changes your prices in a review.

Jobkore does not do route planning, crew scheduling or GPS. It does estimates, change orders, invoices and payments, on your phone, in English or Spanish. Related trades: landscaping, irrigation and snow removal. See the pricing page.