Why I built Trade PA

For a few years I ran a small building firm. Sole-director setup, a few subbies on the books, work coming in from word-of-mouth and a couple of agency referrals. Nothing glamorous. Decent enough business.

But every night, the same thing. Tools down by six, home by seven, dinner with the family, then back to the laptop until ten. Sometimes later. Invoices to raise from the day's jobs. Quotes to write up from yesterday's site visits. Email back to the lady from no. 17 who wanted the bathroom done. A subbie chasing payment. Material order for tomorrow's first job. The CIS deduction confused me half the time.

It wasn't the work that was hard. The work I knew. It was everything around the work that ate the evenings.

I tried a few of the apps that say they're for trades. Some of them are good at one thing. Quoting, or job tracking, or invoicing. But none of them quite fit how a small trade business actually runs. They all wanted me to sit at a desk and click through screens. By the time I'd done that, I could've just written the invoice in Word and emailed it myself.

What I wanted was something I could just talk to. While driving between jobs. While loading the van. While brushing my teeth at half-ten at night.

"Invoice Mrs Patel £640 for today, mark it sent."

"Quote the loft conversion at Beech Road, materials around two grand, labour twelve days at £350."

"Chase the deposit from Wilson, he was meant to pay last Friday."

That kind of thing. Tools that worked at the speed I think, not the speed I type.

Around late 2024, AI voice got properly good. Not the joke version. Actually good. Good enough that you could talk to it like a real assistant and it'd understand what you meant, even with a bit of background noise and a strong accent. That was the moment.

I started building Trade PA at evenings and weekends. Built it for me first. Then I let a few of the lads I knew try it. Now there's people other than me using it, which still feels a bit mad to write.

So that's why this exists. It's a tool I needed, and apparently a few others needed it too. It's voice-first because that's how trades actually work. Hands full, on the move, not at a desk. It does CIS and RAMS and mileage because those are the bits everyone hates. And it's still being built. There's plenty I want to add.

If you're a sole trader or running a small firm and you're sick of losing your evenings to a laptop, give it a go.

Trade PA