Can you switch trade software without losing customer data?

Yes. In the vast majority of cases customers, sites, items and jobs can be migrated in full. The critical part is not the data itself but the links between it: which job belongs to which site, which piece of equipment sits with which customer. That is where we focus, because without those links a technically complete migration is functionally worthless.

How long does switching trade software take?

Two to six weeks for a business with 5 to 25 employees. The cut-over itself happens over a weekend. The rest is preparation that runs alongside day-to-day operations.

Which trade software is the best?

There is no best, there is a fitting one. What decides it is company size, trade, job type and how mobile your team works. A service business with many small maintenance jobs needs something different from a construction firm with few large projects. We assess systems against your actual workflows, not against feature lists.

What does trade software cost?

Cloud solutions for small and mid-sized businesses usually start in the low double digits per user per month, often with a base package and modules on top. Traditional systems with a licence purchase and maintenance contract work out differently and only become comparable over a longer period of use. Always calculate total cost over three years, including rollout, training and migration.

We still work with Excel and paper. Is a migration worth it at all?

Especially then. Excel lists are often the most rewarding starting point for a migration because the data is openly accessible. The effort lies in cleansing and structuring, not in the export. We have a fixed approach that turns organically grown spreadsheets into clean master data.

Does every employee need training?

Separately, yes. The office needs the workflows for quote, job and invoice. Technicians need the app and as little else as possible. In our experience a rollout does not fail on the technology, it fails because the people on site were never brought on board.

Can we trial new software before migrating everything?

Yes, and we strongly recommend it. Almost all vendors provide trial access. We are happy to load a small, real slice of your data there, say 20 customers with sites and jobs. With real data you know within an hour whether a system fits you. With demo data you never do.

Switching trade software

New software,
same customers

Switching trade software rarely fails because of the new solution. It fails because nobody knows how customers, sites and jobs get out of the old program. That is exactly the part we take on, from selection through to going live.

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The software switch in detail

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When switching pays off

Not every system needs replacing. These points, however, speak clearly in favour of it.

Your technicians work on paper while the office enters the same data a second time
The program only runs on one office PC, not on your colleagues' phones
The vendor is discontinuing support or development
You manage maintenance contracts and equipment in Excel next to the actual software
You have to call support for every report you need
Electronic invoicing requirements cannot be handled cleanly by the system
There is no interface to accounting, everything is retyped
Licence and maintenance costs no longer bear any relation to the benefit

If you recognise two or more of these, a comparison is at least worthwhile. Migrating the data is far less work today than most businesses fear.

Comparing trade software: what actually matters

Online vendor comparisons mostly rate feature lists. For a switch, other questions decide the outcome. Clarify these points with every vendor before you sign.

Data export

Can you get your data back later without the vendor's help? Have them show you the available export formats before you sign. It is the most important criterion and the one least often asked about.

Data import

Which data types can the system take on at launch, and in what format? Plain CSV imports for customers are rarely enough when sites, jobs and documents need to come along.

Mobile use

Can your technicians capture jobs, hours, photos and signatures straight on their phone, even without reception on site?

Trade specifics

Does the system reflect your particulars: equipment and maintenance contracts in plumbing and heating, inspection records in electrical work, measurements for painters?

Accounting

Is there a real connection to your accounting, or just an export your tax advisor then reworks by hand?

Electronic invoicing

Does the system handle the required e-invoicing formats, both incoming and outgoing?

Pricing model

What does it cost per user per month, which modules cost extra, and what happens when you grow from 5 to 12 employees?

Contract term

Cancellable monthly or locked in for a year? A vendor confident in their product does not need a long commitment.

Support and onboarding

Support in your language during your working hours, and real guidance at launch rather than just a knowledge base?

We fill in this table together during the consultation, for the systems on your shortlist. We deliberately do not publish a public rating of individual vendors, because feature sets and prices change faster than a table on the web can stay honest.

What is specific to your trade

A plain customer list looks the same everywhere. The difference lies in what is attached to it.

Plumbing, heating, air conditioning

Equipment, boiler types, serial numbers and maintenance contracts with intervals and due dates. If that link to the site is lost, you lose your maintenance business.

Electrical and photovoltaics

Inspection records, measurements, meter numbers and system documentation. These records have retention periods and must stay attached to the right site.

Painting, plastering, drywall

Service catalogues, measurement chains and text blocks for quotes. This is often years of costing work that nobody should have to retype.

Roofing and carpentry

Site photos, measurements and material lists per project, often with very large image files attached to the job.

Joinery and metalwork

Production orders, bills of materials, drawings and supplier items with purchasing terms.

Tiling and flooring

Costing templates per square metre, material master data and remaining stock management.

Facility, cleaning, pest control

Recurring visits, site lists with access information and service records for invoicing.

These links are the actual value of your data set. A migration that transfers only customer addresses is technically complete and functionally worthless.

Read on

Concrete routes into a new system and the details of the migration process.

Moving to Meisterwerk

Setup, data migration and training for the switch to the trade software Meisterwerk. To the Meisterwerk switch

Moving away from TAIFUN

The classic switch from a locally installed office system: how your data gets out. To the TAIFUN migration

The migration process

Assessment, mapping, test migration, sign-off and cut-over in detail, including packages and price ranges. To data migration

Software selection

Still undecided? We assess requirements, vendors and follow-up costs neutrally before you commit. To software consulting

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The switch on a timeline

This is what a typical switch looks like when it is planned rather than improvised. This timeline applies to a typical business with 5 to 25 employees. Larger data sets or a legacy system without an export function mainly stretch weeks 1 to 3.

01.

Confirm the choice

Week 1

If the decision is still open, we review the shortlisted systems against the criteria above, including trial access and a concrete question to the vendor about data import.

02.

Open up the legacy system

Weeks 1 to 3

We establish how your data gets out of the existing program, pull a first complete export and tidy up: duplicates and dead records out, fields mapped to the new structure.

03.

Test tenant and sign-off

Weeks 3 to 4

The full data set lands in the test system. You verify it against your own regular customers and approve the migration.

04.

Cut-over and training

Weeks 5 to 6

Live migration over the weekend, start in the new system on Monday morning. Then separate sessions for office and field staff plus an open Q&A session two weeks in.

Frequently asked questions about switching trade software

Get in touch

Migration check for your business

Tell us your program and the size of your business. Afterwards you know whether customers, sites and maintenance contracts carry over in full and how long the switch takes. At no cost.

kontakt@ivis.media

Request a quote +49 30 343 490 42

Monday to Friday, 10:00 to 18:00 (German time)

Product and company names mentioned are trademarks of their respective owners. We name them descriptively only, to identify the systems we migrate from or to. No business relationship or certification is implied.

Anatoli Wolf, owner and managing director of IVIS MEDIA — Anatoli WolfOwner, Managing Director

References

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COACHDAY: coaching marketplace platform development – project image

Switching trade software

New software,
same customers