I'm a carpenter who built a quoting app for South African tradespeople

I run a small carpentry business in South Africa. Every quote I sent followed the same sad routine: copy a client's WhatsApp message, retype it into a Word template at night, export a PDF, and then chase the deposit for a week.

So I built the tool I wanted. It's called Yebo Invoices, and it's live and being used on real jobs.

What it does

• Speak a quote. Say who it's for, what the job is and the prices. Yebo fills in the quote and you check it before sending.
• Send it on WhatsApp or email. The client opens a clean page on their phone and taps Accept, which needs their typed name, or asks for a change, or declines with a reason.
• Follows up for you. Friendly deposit reminders, a nudge to send the invoice after a yes, and a note to the owner when a "no" was about price.
• Request-a-quote link and QR code. Put it on your van or poster. Clients describe the job and add photos, and you turn it into a quote in one tap.
• Site visits. Propose a day, the client confirms or picks another, and a calendar file goes with it.
• One-page PDF that tightens its layout until it fits.

Lessons from real use

People lose what they type. I'd leave the quote form to copy a number from WhatsApp, come back, and find it empty. Now the form saves on the device as you type, saves a draft in the background, and tidies pasted phone numbers and AI-written text. Then I split it into three short screens: who, what and price, review.

Bank transfers are slow on weekends. A client paid me on a Saturday and it only showed on Tuesday. In South Africa a normal EFT sent after the Saturday cut-off can take until Tuesday to reach another bank. Instant payments (PayShap) arrive in minutes, any day. So Yebo now shows the instant option first, with normal EFT below it and a note about why it matters to a small business.

The stack

Next.js 15 and React 19 on Vercel, Supabase (Postgres, row-level security, private storage), Tailwind, and pdf-lib for the PDFs. A daily cron job runs the reminders and follow-ups. I built most of it with AI help (hence the disclosure on this post), and I read and tested what it wrote.

Where it is now

It's early. I'm using it on my own jobs and a friend's, and card payments are still waiting on paperwork. I'd love feedback from anyone who quotes jobs for a living, or from developers who've built for tradespeople. What would you want from a tool like this?

You can try it at [yeboinvoices.com]().