Hold Queues
Jobs grouped by what they are waiting on, such as permit, HOA, locate or survey, with the age of each hold.
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- Manager oversight app for Fence installers
A Fence Business Management App for Footage, Crews and Holds
We build a fence business management app that lets a general manager see sold footage waiting to install, which jobs are held by permits, HOAs or locates, how crews are loaded and which completed jobs made or missed their margin.
01
Outside Approvals Make Fence Scheduling Unusual
Few trades depend on as many outside parties before work can begin. A sold fence job may be waiting on a permit, an HOA architectural committee, a utility locate, a survey or a pool inspector. Each hold has its own timeline, and a general manager cannot schedule crews without knowing which jobs are truly ready.
Generic task tools treat a job as open or closed. A fence company needs to see ready to dig, waiting on HOA, waiting on permit and waiting on locate as separate queues, with the age of each hold. That visibility is what lets a GM keep crews busy instead of discovering on Monday morning that half the week's jobs cannot start.
Two-day installs add another layer. Posts need time to set before panels go up, so the GM is effectively scheduling each job twice and has to keep the second visit from slipping when a new rush job comes in.
02
What Buyer Behavior Means for the GM's Dashboard
Homeowners shopping for fences collect quotes quickly and often choose the company that can install soonest. A long, invisible backlog loses jobs to competitors who quote an earlier date. The GM needs an honest view of how many feet are sold and not yet installed, so sales can promise realistic dates.
Buyers also compare materials and prices per foot closely, which keeps margins thin. The app should show which materials, styles and salespeople produce jobs that close at the quoted footage and price, and which regularly turn into unbilled extras like rock removal or extra gates.
Reviews in this trade often mention how long the customer waited after signing. Showing the average time from contract to install, by material and region, gives the GM an early warning before those reviews arrive.
03
Running the Spring Surge and Slow Winter Months
Spring and early summer bring a rush of sales, especially pool and pet fences, and the backlog can stretch quickly. The GM needs to see sold footage against crew capacity week by week and decide when to add a subcontracted crew or pause promotions.
Winter is different. In colder regions frozen ground slows post setting, and the GM shifts crews toward repairs, gate work or regions with milder weather. The app should make those moves easy and show how much backlog will carry into spring.
- Sold feet waiting to install against crew capacity by week
- Hold queues for permits, HOAs, locates and surveys with age
- Weather hold list that can be released in bulk
- Repair and gate work visible alongside new installs in slow months
What you get
Key features
Capacity Planner
Sold footage against crew output by week, so the GM knows when to add crews or adjust promised dates.
Margin by Job
Quoted against actual footage, materials and labor on completed jobs, with extras like rock or removal highlighted.
Crew Assignment Board
Move jobs between employee and subcontracted crews, with changes sent to the field and the scheduling system.
04
Data and Access We Will Need
We need access to wherever jobs are recorded now, whether that is a field service platform like Jobber, a CRM or a shared spreadsheet, plus accounting data from QuickBooks or a similar system for margin reports.
We also need your definitions. Agree on what each job stage means, what counts as a hold and who updates it. List your crews, their typical daily footage by material and whether they are employees or subcontractors. Those details make capacity planning realistic rather than guesswork.
Finally, a few sample reports you already build by hand, even rough ones, tell us which numbers the GM trusts today and how they are calculated.
- Job records and stages from your current system
- Accounting access for invoices and costs
- Agreed definitions for each stage and hold type
- Crew list with typical daily output by material
- Names of the people responsible for updating holds
05
What Shapes Cost and Schedule
Mobile apps with SIZ Group start at $4,500. A management app with capacity planning and margin reports will sit above that, mainly because of integrations and the reporting logic. The cleaner your current job data, the faster the build goes.
To keep scope controlled, start with hold queues, crew schedules and a sold footage report. Margin by salesperson, subcontractor pay and custom report builders can follow. We confirm each phase in writing so there are no surprises.
Timeline also depends on decisions from your team, such as stage definitions and who owns each update. Settling those early keeps the build moving.
Device choice matters less than people expect. The same backend serves a laptop view for the weekly review and a phone view for quick checks between site visits, so there is no need to build two separate products.
06
Bringing Sales, Office and Crews Along
Start with the office staff who update holds, since the app is only as good as their updates. Make updating a hold a one-tap action and show them how it saves the calls they currently field from salespeople.
Sales should see realistic install dates from the backlog view, which helps them close honestly. Crew leads should see their own production numbers first, privately, before those numbers appear in a team meeting. That builds trust and keeps the focus on scheduling rather than blame.
Plan a short parallel run where the old whiteboard or spreadsheet and the app are both used. Once the hold queues match reality for two straight weeks, retire the old tool so everyone works from one source.
Can the fence business management app work with Jobber?+
Yes, where your Jobber plan allows data access. We read jobs and clients and add hold queues, capacity planning and reports. We confirm the approach during the free scoping call.
How do we track holds that depend on outside parties?+
Each job carries a hold type and a date it started. Office staff update it when the permit, HOA approval or locate comes through, and the queue reorders automatically.
Can subcontracted crews be included in capacity planning?+
Yes. Each crew gets typical output by material, and subcontractors can be added or removed as the season changes.
What support is there after launch?+
Post-launch support is available for fixes, updates and new reports. Many GMs add reports after the first spring once they see which numbers matter most.
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Let's make it happen
Know Which Fence Jobs Are Ready Before Monday
Book a free scoping call and we will map your holds, crews and footage into a management app that fits your season.