Five questions to ask before you sign up to any garage management system

You will run the garage on this for years. You judge it on a demo and, at best, a fortnight's trial, which is nowhere near long enough for a system the whole business runs on. So the questions you ask carry the weight. Most owners ask about the features and nothing about the contract, the price for the whole garage, who trains the team, or what happens to their data if they leave. Those are the things that decide whether the move was a good one.

These five questions work on any vendor, GarageRevs included. Ask them on the demo, get the answers in writing, and you will know which systems are as good as they look and which are selling you a plan.

On a demo, most systems look much the same. What separates them turns up later: the bill that climbs when you take on another tech, the contract you cannot get out of, the team who would rather have the old system back. None of that is on the feature list.

You do not need to be a software expert. You need five straight questions, and to keep asking until you get a straight answer. If a vendor gets cagey on any of them, that tells you something on its own. Here they are, with what a good answer sounds like and the warning signs to listen for.

1. What is the real monthly cost?

Ask for one number: what the whole garage pays a month, all in. Not the headline on the website, the figure for your garage with everyone on it. Then ask it straight: if I add more of my staff to the system, does my monthly cost go up? Some systems charge per login, so the bill climbs every time you take on another tech. Some charge for the training, the set-up and the move from your old system on top. A serious vendor can tell you the figure for your garage on the spot and put it in writing.

What a good answer sounds like

• A price you can read on the website without booking a call.
• One number for the whole garage, staff logins included, not a charge per login.
• Training, set-up and the move from your old system included, or priced in writing before you sign.

Warning signs

• “It depends on your setup”, with no number to follow.
• Per-login pricing that climbs every time you take on another tech.
• Set-up or training fees, or a charge for bringing your data across, that only turn up once you are reading the contract.

For how the per-login and whole-garage models work out over a year, see the 2026 UK garage management software pricing guide.

2. How long am I tied in?

This is where the worst surprises live, and they turn up after the demo, not on it. Owners in the trade groups tell the same story: signed up on the day, found out later it was a three-year term, and got a four-figure bill for wanting to leave. Some were days in, knew it was not right, and were told it would cost thousands to walk away.

A vendor should be able to say why its terms are fair, and what happens if the system is not right for you. The question is simple: if this is not working in three months, what does it cost me to leave?

What a good answer sounds like

• Month to month, so you can leave it the way you would leave any other monthly bill.
• Long enough on it to judge it properly: a trial, or a money-back guarantee that covers a real run at it, month-end and all.
• Cancellation in plain English, with no exit fee and no notice period measured in months.

Warning signs

• A multi-year term, especially one that auto-renews and quietly resets the clock.
• A notice period of months, so the bill keeps coming after you have decided to go.
• No trial and no refund window, so once you have paid there is no way back if it does not work on real jobs.

If you are already on a long contract and weighing up your options, our guide to leaving TechMan walks through exit fees, the clock-reset trap, and how to get out cleanly.

3. Can I take my data with me?

Years of customers, cars, MOT dates, jobs done and notes. That history is one of the most valuable things the garage owns. If you cannot take it with you, you do not own it. You are renting access to your own records, and the vendor holds the key.

Ask while you are buying, not while you are leaving. If the answer is no, you want to find that out while you can still walk away, not with years of records stuck on their system. “We will sort it” and “it is in the contract” are not the same thing, and owners have had to get solicitors involved to get their own records back.

What a good answer sounds like

• Yes, and here is how: customers, cars, history and invoices, the lot, not a partial slice.
• No charge to get your own records out, and no waiting weeks for them.
• A vendor who treats it as your right, not a favour they are doing you.

Warning signs

• “We can do a partial export”, or notes and attachments that will not come across.
• A fee to release your data, or a delay measured in weeks.
• Any hesitation about handing over a full copy of records your team typed in.

4. Will my team actually use it, and who trains them?

You might log in for ten minutes a day. Your front desk and your techs live in it: every booking, every phone call, every “is it ready?”. If they would rather have the old system back, the garage drifts back to how it was inside a fortnight, whatever you paid. So the question is not whether you like it on the demo. It is whether your team will, on a Monday morning with the phone ringing non-stop and a tech at the door saying the part that came in is wrong.

The other half of the question is who gets them there. Some vendors charge for training on top, by the day or as a course, and some leave your team to work it out from the manual. Ask who trains them, where, and whether it is in the price. The right answer is someone at your garage, showing your team the system on your own customers and cars.

Do not judge it on the polished demo. Ask them to do what your desk does on a normal day: book a car in, answer “is it ready?”, send an estimate, take a payment. Better still, bring whoever runs your front desk to the demo and let them drive.

What a good answer sounds like

• Your front desk drives the demo, not the salesperson.
• Your team trained in person, at your counter, before the day you go live, and it is in the price.
• The front desk answers “is it ready?” in one glance, not three screens deep.

Warning signs

• “Steep learning curve, but worth it”, or “a lot of pain before the pleasure”.
• A paid course before your team can use it properly.
• Support that is a ticket, not someone at the end of the phone, when the desk is stuck with a customer waiting.

GarageRevs is built so that the desk runs the day without you: bookings, approvals, parts and invoices on one job card, and your front desk and techs trained in person on your own customers and cars before the day you go live.

5. Can you show the Xero link working live today?

“Links to Xero” is the easiest thing to say on a demo and the hardest to check. Every serious system says “yes”. The difference is in how. Some send each invoice and payment across the moment it happens. Some mean a file export that someone runs at month-end, by date range, after mapping every account and payment method themselves. And some put the real link on a dearer plan than the one you were quoted.

So ask three things. Is it on the plan I am being quoted? Does every invoice and payment go across on its own, or does someone have to run an export? And can you show me one landing in Xero, right now, on a live account? “On the roadmap” and “coming soon” mean double work at month-end for as long as it takes them.

What a good answer sounds like

• It is on your plan, and connecting it is signing in to Xero and allowing access. Nothing to build or map yourself.
• Every invoice and payment goes across on its own, and you can see what went across and what did not.
• They log into a live account and you watch the invoice land in your accounts package.

Warning signs

• The link is on the next plan up, or the “integration” turns out to be a file export you run yourself.
• Setting it up means creating things in Xero yourself, mapping accounts and VAT codes, and re-authorising it now and then before it will export.
• “On the roadmap”, “coming soon”, or “it is in beta”.

How GarageRevs answers the five

This guide is meant to be useful even if you never choose us. But it is only fair to put our own answers on the table, so you can hold us to the same five questions you put to everyone else.

• Real cost. Public pricing you can read without booking a call. Off the tools £499 a month, Out of the building £799 a month, for the whole garage, staff logins included. Training, set-up and the move from your old system are in the price.
• The contract. Month to month, no contract, no exit fee. You get 90 days to judge it properly, month-end and all, and every penny back if it is not right. Coming off another system, the move is done inside 14 days, with the date agreed before you commit.
• Your data. Yours, always. Leave whenever you like and we help you export your customers, cars, history and invoices, the lot. No fee to get it, no waiting weeks for it, and no questions asked.
• Your team. Your front desk and your techs trained in person, at your counter, on your own customers and cars, before the day you go live. After that, someone at the end of the phone seven days a week, with most questions answered within five minutes.
• Live links. Xero and QuickBooks, on both plans, live today. You sign in to Xero and allow access, and from then on every invoice and payment goes across on its own, so nobody types it in twice. Ask on the demo and we will show you one going across on a real account.

GarageRevs is built for the owner running an independent garage as a business: off the tools or heading there, with a team who run the day. See how the work chases itself, the desk runs the day and the numbers find you, or how we line up against Garage Hive and TechMan.