Questions about Chalkline

It works out what an hour of your labor actually costs you, then what you have to charge for it to make the money you meant to make.

The owner of a trade business in the US, from one van to about thirty people — particularly anyone whose prices were set by what felt reasonable at the time, or by what a competitor charges. The payroll taxes it works out are the US ones: FICA, FUTA and state unemployment.

No. Accounting tells you what happened last year. This tells you what to charge tomorrow. It does not replace QuickBooks and does not try to.

No. You type figures into boxes and it does the arithmetic. The trial opens in your browser with nothing to install at all.

About twenty minutes if you have a payroll summary and last year's expenses on hand. You can also guess at first and come back — it starts you off with figures for your trade so you get a number on day one.

It starts with typical figures for your trade and marks every one that is still a guess, so you can see what is yours and what is not yet. Replace them as you find the real ones.

If you are, yes. Many shops that work their numbers out properly for the first time find they have been charging less than an hour really costs them. That is the whole reason it exists.

33 of them — HVAC, plumbing, electrical, roofing, landscaping, concrete, remodeling, tree work and the rest — and an Other box where you type your own. Picking a trade only sets the starting figures; every one of them is yours to change.

One subscription is meant for one business. If you run two, email us at chalkline@jtsapps.com and we will work something out rather than you paying twice for something you use once.

Yes, two ways. Press Try it with sample numbers on the front page to use the real screens with made-up figures — no account, nothing kept. Or start the free 14 days: no card, nothing to cancel — put your own figures in and see whether the answer surprises you.

For the free trial, a web browser — there is nothing to install. The desktop version, which you can install once you subscribe, runs on Windows, or a Mac with Apple silicon (M1 or newer) and brings everything it needs with it.

Yes, in the browser: Chalkline runs in any up-to-date browser, on a Mac as well as a PC. The desktop version runs on Macs with Apple silicon (M1 or newer) as well as on Windows.

It will open on one, but it is not designed for it. This is work to sit down with for twenty minutes, not something to do between calls.

For the browser version, yes. The desktop version needs it only now and then to check the subscription — it works with no signal at all, and if it cannot reach the internet it keeps working rather than shutting you out.

Once you subscribe, sign in, open Settings and press Download the desktop version; the download page walks you through the rest. On Windows: right-click the file, choose Extract All, open the folder that appears and double-click START THE APP (Windows). It puts itself on your computer and leaves an icon on your desktop. On a Mac: double-click the file, open the folder that appears and double-click Chalkline. The first time, the Mac says it was downloaded from the internet and that Apple checked it; press Open.

The first time, Windows can show “Windows protected your PC”, because the download is new to Windows and is not yet signed with a JTS certificate. Press More info, then Run anyway; it does not ask again. Extract the zip first, too — Windows will not start a program from inside a zip, and its warning does not say so.

Yes. In your browser it is the same everywhere: sign in on any computer and your figures are there, because they are kept with your account. The desktop version is different — each computer it is installed on keeps its own figures — so put your numbers in on the one you work on rather than half on each.

No. It installs into your own user folder and never asks for a password.

No. There is no code to keep or lose: you sign in with your email and password, and the download you take while signed in already knows it is yours. If the desktop version ever asks, sign in with the same email and password.

Press Forgot your password? on the sign-in page and put in your email. We email you a link to set a new one; it works for one hour.

Sign in with your email and password and keep going — in the browser, everything is already there. If you used the desktop version on the old computer, its figures are on that computer: copy its data folder across (Settings in the desktop version shows where it is), then install it on the new one.

In the browser there is nothing to uninstall. The desktop version has a remove option inside it, which copies your figures to your desktop first, so uninstalling can never be the same thing as losing your work.

What one hour of your labor costs you once everything is counted, and the rate you have to charge to hit the profit you are aiming for. Every step is shown, so you can see how it got there and argue with it.

The hours you can actually put on an invoice. You pay for 2,080 a year; a technician might sell 1,300 of them. The rest is driving, the shop, warranty calls, holidays and waiting. Your rate has to cover all of it, and this is the single figure many shops get wrong.

Everything on top of the wage — payroll tax, workers' comp, holidays, benefits, uniforms, the phone. It often adds a large share on top of the wage, and it is the reason a tech on $25 an hour does not cost you $25 an hour.

You type them, and it lists the ones people forget — rent, insurance, the truck payments, software, the phone, the person who answers it. Then it spreads them across the hours you actually sell.

Yes. The price book turns your own hourly cost into a flat price for every job you do, so you can hand a customer a number instead of a clock.

Yes — they are not the same business and should not share a rate. Turn on Departments and each gets its own.

Yes, with markup that changes with the cost of the part — the way the trade actually prices, rather than one flat percentage on a $4 fitting and a $4,000 unit.

There is a section for what a machine costs you per hour to own and run, so it earns its keep instead of quietly eating the job.

Yes — what to mark subcontracted work up by, and why that markup is not free money.

Yes. Put a finished job in and it tells you what you actually made on it — often the moment the real numbers sink in.

Yes. Scenarios let you try a change — another technician, a rent rise, a slow month — and see what it does to the rate before you do it for real.

No, and it will not pretend to. It works out prices. Software that does everything does none of it well.

No. It uses what you pay people to work out what to charge — it does not pay them.

Both, and it is careful about the difference. Thirty percent markup is not thirty percent margin, and pricing as though it were is one of the most expensive mistakes in the trade.

Yes — there is a one-page rate sheet you can print, save as a PDF or hand over, with every figure and where it came from. Settings also has Download my figures (CSV), a spreadsheet file of every figure, if they would rather have the numbers.

Yes. You pick the parts you want when you sign up and you can turn any of them on or off later without losing anything.

$79 a month. Chalkline Pro is $119 a month and adds the full Price Book: good, better and best prices for every job, supplier price sheets, prices that wait for your OK, and a price list on your techs' phones. The 14 free days include it. One price, whether it is you on your own or you and four others — you are never charged per person.

No. Month to month. Stop whenever you like.

No. Put in your email and a password, and it is yours for 14 days. There is nothing to cancel because nothing has been taken.

It stops opening and asks for a card. Your figures are not touched — put a card in and everything is exactly where you left it.

Inside Chalkline, Settings takes you to Manage billing, where you can stop it — or email us at chalkline@jtsapps.com and we will stop it for you. There is no phone call and nobody will try to talk you out of it.

No. Nothing is deleted. It stops opening, your figures stay where they are — with your account, or on your own computer if you use the desktop version — and if you come back later, subscribing again picks it straight up where it was.

You get 7 days to sort it out and it keeps working the whole time. Cards expire and banks decline for nothing — you are not shut off the same afternoon.

Not at the moment: Chalkline is month to month, and you can stop whenever you like.

No — that is what the free 14 days are for. You use it with no card before paying anything, and after that you can cancel any time and are not charged again.

Not while you are paying. If it goes up, it goes up for new customers.

It never reaches JTS. Payment is handled by Stripe, the card payment company: you type your card on Stripe's own page, and we never see the number.

Yes, by email every month, and it is a business expense.

Nobody but you. They are never shared, sold or shown to anyone. In the browser they are kept with your account on our server; in the desktop version they are on your own computer and are not sent anywhere.

Your email address, your password (stored scrambled, never as you typed it), your business name if you gave one, and whether you have paid — plus, while you use it in your browser, the figures you enter. The privacy page has the full list.

No. Your figures are not sold, shared or used for anything except showing them back to you.

In the browser, yes — they are on our server and backed up with it. On the desktop version they are on your computer, so backing them up is yours to do: the app keeps a copy every time you save, and the whole lot is one folder you can copy to a USB stick.

Yes, any time, in the browser or in the desktop version. Settings, then Your data, has Download my figures (CSV): every figure Chalkline works out, as a spreadsheet file Excel or Google Sheets opens. Beside it is the rate sheet, one page you can print or save as a PDF. If a trial ends and you do not pay, the page that says so still has the CSV download. Nothing is held hostage.

The usual cause is opening it from inside the zip. Extract the folder first, then double-click. If it still does not open, email us at chalkline@jtsapps.com with whatever appears on screen.

In the browser, refresh the page; on the desktop version, open it again — it checks when it starts. If it is still locked, email us and we will fix it from our end.

Use Feedback at the top of Chalkline. It reaches a person at JTS with your business name on it, and every message is read.

Email chalkline@jtsapps.com, or use Feedback inside Chalkline — that one arrives with your business name attached, so there is nothing to explain twice.