Recommended software & services

Repair Shop runs entirely on your own computer and needs nothing else to book jobs, sell, invoice and keep stock. A few optional accounts unlock the extras - card payments, automatic messages, and off-site backups.

Do you need any of it?

No - everyday work is fully offline and self-contained. Set up only the pieces below that you actually want. Each one uses your own account, so the money and the messages go straight to and from you, and nothing routes through us.

Card payments - Stripe

To take card payments you need a free Stripe account. Stripe handles the card details on a secure page it hosts, so card numbers never touch this app, and payouts land in your own bank account. You paste your secret key into Settings → Card payments once - use a test key (sk_test_…) to trial it without charging real cards. See Point of Sale & payments for the full walkthrough, including texting or emailing a payment link.

Automatic email - an SMTP mailbox

To email customers automatically (for example when a repair is ready) you need an email mailbox that supports SMTP - which nearly all do, including Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, and mailboxes from your own web host. Repair Shop sends from your address so replies come back to you.

The exact host, port, username and security settings come from whoever runs your email. If you’re unsure, ask your email provider or your IT service - they can supply the correct values. With two-factor sign-in you may need an app password made specifically for Repair Shop.

Enter the details under Settings → Customer notifications - see Customer notifications.

Text messages - Twilio

Text (SMS) messages are sent through Twilio, a pay-as-you-go SMS provider. Create a Twilio account, buy a phone number, and paste your Account SID, Auth token and From number into Settings → Customer notifications. You only pay Twilio for the messages you send. See Customer notifications.

Printing & labels

Tickets, invoices, quotes and receipts print through your computer’s normal print dialog, and can be saved as a PDF - every modern Windows, macOS and Linux desktop can do this with no extra software. For sticky repair labels, any label printer your operating system supports (for example a Brother or Dymo) works through the same print dialog; a roughly 50×25 mm label suits the printed label best.

Somewhere to keep backups

Your data lives in one encrypted file on this computer. Take regular encrypted backups from Settings → Data & backups and keep a copy off this computer - a USB stick, or a cloud folder such as Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive or iCloud. A backup is protected by a passphrase you choose, so it’s safe to store in the cloud. See Settings → Data & backups.