Buying guides · Guide · 3 min read

Powered Now alternatives for UK trades in 2026: an honest look

When Powered Now's certificate focus is exactly right, when your needs have outgrown it, and how Trade PA, Tradify and ServiceM8 compare for switchers.

By Trade PA · Published 1 October 2026 · Reviewed 15 September 2026

Disclosure first: we build Trade PA, one of the alternatives below, so read accordingly and test everything against your own jobs. And credit where it is due: Powered Now is UK-first, built around the paperwork British trades actually face rather than localised from somewhere else, and its certificate work, the CP12s, the EICRs, the compliance-heavy stuff, is the reason it has the reputation it has.

When Powered Now is still the right answer

If certificates are central to your week, test Powered Now’s Professional tier and your exact forms before moving. Do not use the lower Business price as a certificate-inclusive comparison. The app also offers broader job management and, on higher tiers, AI and automated chasing. Use its current feature matrix.

Trade PA contains gas and electrical certificate tools too, so the older claim that it has no certificate generation is outdated. That does not establish equivalence between the products. Have the qualified person who issues your records inspect the complete form, required readings, signature handling and exported document. Keep the system that meets the job’s requirements.

When it stops fitting

The centre of gravity moves. Businesses change shape. If your week is now more quoting, chasing and juggling than certificate runs, if the pain has moved from "producing the CP12" to "everything around it", then a certificate-first tool is solving yesterday's problem. Audit where your evenings actually go before you renew anything.

Paying subbies changes the game. The moment you regularly pay subcontractors, you inherit contractor-side CIS: verification, deductions, statements, the monthly CIS300. Whatever system you use, test that side hard with one real subbie payment before trusting it, and check the numbers against our CIS calculator.

Compare specific automation. Powered Now advertises AI text writing, receipt scanning and automatic chasing, with a separate receptionist service. Compare the plans and exact tasks. A fair decision needs a test of the workflow, not a claim that only one supplier uses AI.

The alternatives, honestly

Trade PA is our option for voice and typed admin with Eve, alongside customer, quote, invoice and CIS tools. Solo starts at £39 monthly with AI allowances, and Business Phone costs extra. For certificate-heavy work, evaluate the complete record before changing your process. See the product comparison.

Tradify offers a broader job-management shortlist option. Compare the tier that includes your required certificates, progress invoices and reminders; AI SmartTools are offered on Plus. Check its current features rather than assuming everything is included in the entry price.

ServiceM8 brings the category's most interesting pricing, tiered by monthly job count rather than users, which suits low-volume operators, alongside a famously slick Apple-centric field workflow. The trade-offs and the UK-tax caveats are covered honestly in our ServiceM8 alternatives guide and the vs ServiceM8 comparison.

Prices move. Check current pricing on their sites; it changes, and the sources note below records what we found and when.

Switching without losing your history

One extra rule for certificate-heavy trades: before you cancel anything, download your certificate history. Past CP12s and EICRs are legal records your customers may need years from now, and access tends to end with the subscription. Then the usual discipline: export customers, jobs and invoices, run old and new in parallel for a week, and apply the only test that matters, one real job, quote to paid, through the new system on a normal working day. The full framework is in our guide to choosing job management software.

And if the switch you actually want is from doing the admin to checking it, that is the lane Trade PA was built in: you talk between jobs, Eve does the paperwork, you press send.