How farm app can save you time and money

• Reduces paperwork

• Easy to set up and use

• Suitable for all farms

A farmer who invented an app to reduce paperwork has been nominated for the LAMMA event’s young engineer of the year award.

The Ag-drive app replaces time-consuming paperwork with digital timesheets, field mapping, job recording for teams of any size, health and safety checks, and integrations with common accounting software for easy invoicing.

Will Dunn devised the app during the coronavirus lockdown. Launched last summer, the latest version is now even easier to use thanks to a significant number of updates to the desktop dashboard and app in response to user feedback.

“We knew that there were parts of the app that could work better, but we needed to hear from our customers to ensure we made the right changes to meet the needs of their businesses,” says Mr Dunn.

The most significant change has removed the need for users to enter their credit card details to start a 14-day free trial. This makes it easier for farmers to see how much time they can save by before committing themselves.

After the free trial ends, users can choose one of four pricing plans depending on the size of their team. Plans start from £10 per month.

 The screens on desktop and app versions have also been re-designed to make them simpler and faster to use. Bulk actions can now be processed, saving farmers and contractors even more time, says Mr Dunn.

 Other changes make it easier to manage customer information and invoicing. Users can  add customers without having to specify an email address and the platform supports bulk imports of customer data to save time when setting up accounts.

“As contractors and farmers, we knew there was a better way than operators manually completing timesheets, and then trawling through paperwork to send invoices to our customers,” says Mr Dunn.

“With Ag-drive we’re taking the pain and hassle away from running a busy contracting or farming business, by putting everything on your phone, on a cloud based system.”

All actions can be done on the Ag-drive app, although the desktop version is mainly used for Invoicing and processing time/job sheet information. Each job sheet can be attached to the invoice for complete transparency.

The platform connects with accounting software QuickBooks and Xero for simplified invoicing and record keeping, ensuring customers know exactly what work has been completed and when. Sage integration will be enabled soon.