Help
The questions people actually ask. If yours is not here, write to us and a real person answers.
Getting in
Signing in, passwords, invitations.
I cannot sign in
Almost always the email. Use the one your invitation was sent to — not a personal address, and not a different work one. If the password is the problem, ask for a new one; it takes a minute. If SPECit5 says the same thing however carefully you type, check whether SPECit5 itself is up before you try again.
Sign in → then press Sign in
I forgot my password
Ask for a link and it is emailed to you. SPECit5 gives the same answer whether or not the address is on the system, so nobody can use it to find out who is a customer — which means if no email arrives, the likely reason is that the address is not the one you signed up with.
Ask for a new password → then press Email me a link
The password email never arrived
Look in junk first — it is nearly always there. If it is not, the address you typed is probably not the one on your seat. Ask whoever invited you which address they used.
Try again → then press Email me a link
I want to change my password
From inside SPECit5, once you are signed in. Eight characters or more.
Change your password → then press Save password
I was invited but the link does not work
An invitation is single-use and belongs to one email address. If it has already been used, or you are opening it while signed in as somebody else, it will not work — sign out and open it again. If it is genuinely expired, ask for a fresh one; it costs nothing.
Sign in → then press Sign in
Two of us signed up and now there are two businesses
This happens, and the fix is to pick one and invite everybody into it. Signing up creates a NEW business; joining an existing one only ever happens through an invitation. Nothing in the spare one is lost while you decide — ask us to clear it once you have.
Invite people into the one you are keeping → then press Send invite
Is SPECit5 down, or is it me?
There is a page that says so plainly, and it does not need you to be signed in. If it says everything is working and you still cannot get in, the problem is your address or your password, not SPECit5.
Selling: the CRM
Leads, deals, quotes and the next call. Every one of these has Show me.
How do I add a lead?
From the CRM: New lead, then their name, a phone or email, the address and what they want. Save, and it is on the board at New lead.
How do I answer the leads SPEC finds?
The dial at the top of the CRM holds the businesses SPEC found near you. Open it and say yes or no to each one; yes makes it a New lead.
How do I log a call?
Call from the deal itself: your phone dials, and the call goes on the deal by itself. A New lead moves to Contacted at the same time.
How do I text or email a follow-up?
Open the deal and Send a follow-up. It is already written for where the deal is up to; change anything, then Email it or Text it opens your own app with it in.
How do I book a site visit?
Open the deal and Book visit: a day, a time and where. It goes on My Page on the day, and the confirmation is written for you to text or email.
How do I send a quote?
Open the deal, then Quote: the kind of work, the hours and materials, and your rate. Work it out shows the price; Send it gives the customer a link to accept it.
How do I mark a deal as lost?
Open the deal, tap Lost and pick the reason: price, timing, went elsewhere or no response. A note is optional; the reason is what the numbers learn from.
How do I mark a deal as won?
Open the deal and tap Won. It becomes a job in Jobs, carrying the quote with it, and pressing it twice never makes two jobs.
How do I move a lead to the next stage?
On the list of deals, the arrow on each row moves it one stage along. Lost asks for the reason first; Won makes it a job.
How do I move a lead back a stage?
Right after a move, tap Undo on the message at the bottom. Later, open the lead and tap Back: it goes one stage back. A Won pressed by mistake can be undone while its job is untouched.
How do I open a contact?
In the CRM, the Contacts tab lists everybody you deal with. Tap a name for their details, their deals and one tap to call or email them.
How do I add a contact?
On the CRM’s Contacts tab: their name, email, phone and the company they are with, then Add person. A New lead adds its contact by itself.
Where are today’s calls and visits?
The CRM’s Activities tab: everything overdue, due today and coming up, yours first. Tick one off when it is done. My Page ranks the day for you too.
Where do customer emails land?
The CRM’s Inbox tab, once your email is connected on My Page. Each email shows its deal, and a reply can be drafted for you to edit and send yourself.
How do I find a customer?
The search box at the top of the CRM finds deals, contacts and companies by any part of a name, address, email or phone number.
How do I set the daily targets?
On the CRM’s Activities tab, open Targets: calls and quotes a day, and how fast a new lead is answered. My Page measures the day against them.
How do I bring in my customer list?
On the CRM’s Organisations tab, Upload your customer list: a spreadsheet saved as CSV, or rows pasted in. You see what it found before anything is saved, and the lead finder never offers those customers back.
How do I start the lead finder, or change where it looks?
Beside the lead dial at the top of the CRM: the towns you work in, the kind of work you want and, if you like, your best customer. SPEC looks every week and puts what it finds on the dial.
How do I stop the lead finder?
Beside the lead dial at the top of the CRM, open where SPEC looks and tap Stop looking. The leads already on the dial stay there; Start looking turns it back on.
How do I get calls for customers who have gone quiet?
Open where SPEC looks and tap Internal, then switch it on. Customers nobody has spoken to in over two weeks come up on the dial as calls; Yes puts the call on today’s list.
Where do I set the towns and kinds of work to look for?
Open where SPEC looks and tap External: the towns, the kinds of work, your best customer, and whether roofs with no panels come first. Save, and it looks again.
How do I add a business I want to work for?
Open where SPEC looks, type the business under Businesses you want and tap Find. Add makes it a New lead for your BD lead straight away.
How do I put my own list of businesses on the dial?
Open where SPEC looks and tap Upload your own list: a CSV or rows pasted in. You see what it read first; each business then waits on the dial for a yes or no.
How do I set the email header?
On the CRM’s Activities tab: what you do, the office phone, the website and the ABN. It sits on top of every email the CRM drafts, with each sender’s own signature.
How do I connect my email?
On My Page, the Win the work card: Connect your email, and sign in with your email provider. A price request that lands there then waits on the lead dial for your yes.
Your people, day to day
Invites, leave, and the org chart.
How do I send someone their invite?
People, then Set everybody up. Open their card, check the email and role, and Save and email their invite: they pick their own password and land on their own card.
How do I invite everyone at once?
People, then Set everybody up, then Invite everyone. Everybody with an email and a role who is not in yet gets their invite in one press.
How do I book someone’s leave?
On People: who is away, what kind of leave, from and to, then Book it. SPEC holds no balances; this is who is not here, and whether the job is covered.
Where is the org chart?
On My Page, the Org chart card opens it, and People has it as a tab too. It is the shape of the business: who does what, and who reports to whom.
Safety, jobs and compliance
Reporting it, the week’s hours, and keeping everything current.
How do I report a hazard?
On Safety, the box at the top: pick Hazard, say what you saw in your own words, and send it. It goes on the register with an owner.
How do I log an incident?
On Safety, the box at the top: pick Someone got hurt and say what happened. Anything a regulator must hear about is flagged for you.
How do I raise something privately?
On Safety, pick Not coping / pressure. It stays anonymous unless you tick the box to put your name to it; nobody, not the GM and not SPEC, can see who sent it.
How do I put in timesheet hours?
Jobs, then Timesheets: who, which job, the day, start and finish, and any break or travel. Add time, and it is ready to reconcile at the end of the week.
Where is the schedule?
Jobs, then Schedule: who is booked on what, day by day, and the weeks ahead. A crew is booked from each job’s own card.
How do I add an insurance policy?
Compliance, then Insurance: what it is, who it covers and when it expires. SPEC warns well before it lapses, and anything lapsed stops the work it covers.
How do I add a certificate or an audit?
Compliance, then Certificates or Audits: what it is, who or what it covers, and when it is due again. Each one shows how long it has left.
Your people
Adding somebody, taking somebody off, and what they can see.
How do I add a person?
On your business page, put their name against the role they do. That is all it takes and it costs nothing — the name sits on the chart straight away.
Your business on one page → then press Add
How do I give someone a login?
Putting a name on the chart does not send anything. Inviting them does — open "Invite them in" beside their name. That is also the moment a seat starts being billed, so it is deliberately a separate press from adding the name.
Your business on one page → then press Send invite
How do I change what someone can see?
There is no switch, on purpose. What somebody can see follows where they sit on the chart — move them to a different role and it moves with them, both ways, the same minute. For covering somebody else’s crew while they are away, press that role on the chart and ask the administrator for rights over it. They decide in Approvals, and it is taken back from Company settings when the cover ends.
Move them, or ask on the chart →
There is no button for this, and that is deliberate
Somebody has left — what do I do?
Take their name off the role. The role stays, and so does everything they scored — their history belongs to the business, not to their login. That is also what stops the seat being billed.
Your business on one page → then press Remove
Someone is in the wrong role
Put their name against the right role and SPECit5 will ask whether you meant to move them or to merge the two roles. Say which; it does not guess.
Your business on one page → then press Move them
Roles and the chart
The shape of the business — who does what, and who reports to whom.
How do I add a role?
On the chart, under whoever it reports to. A role is a JOB, not a person — "Site Supervisor", not "Dave". That distinction is the one thing worth getting right, because everything else in SPECit5 hangs off it: two people can do one role, and one person can do three.
Org chart → then press Add it
How do I delete a role?
On your business page. SPECit5 will refuse while somebody is in it or something reports to it — move those first. The top role cannot be deleted at all; a business has to have a top.
Your business on one page → then press delete role
I have my org chart in a spreadsheet already
Paste it in and SPECit5 will build the chart from it, rather than you typing thirty roles by hand.
Org chart → then press Build the chart
It will not let me change the chart
You can see the whole chart — the shape of a business is not a secret — but changing it belongs to whoever manages your part of it. You can never change a role above you or beside you, only your own and the ones beneath it.
KPIs
The handful of things each role is measured on, two per pillar.
How do I add a KPI?
Two per pillar per role, which is twelve for the whole role and is deliberately not more. If you are adding the thirteenth, something else should come off.
KPIs per role → then press Save
How do I delete a KPI?
Clear its text and save. There is no delete button — an empty row is how a KPI goes, which catches people out, so: empty the words, press save, it is gone. Months already marked against it keep their marks.
KPIs per role → then press Save
It says the weights must add up to 100%
Within each pillar, the KPIs have to share out 100% between them — otherwise a score cannot mean anything. The message names the pillar that does not add up. Nothing is saved until it does, so nothing is lost.
What makes a good KPI?
One you can answer at the end of a month without arguing: met, not met, or not applicable. "Improve safety" is not one. "Every crew did a toolbox talk on Monday" is. If two honest people would answer it differently, it needs rewording, not a better scoring system.
Marking the month
The rhythm — marking, submitting, signing, and what happens after.
How do I mark the month?
Go down your KPIs and say how each one went. You mark your own role and the ones beneath you — never above, never sideways.
The month → then press Save
I marked something wrong — can I change it?
Yes, right up until the month is locked. Mark it again and save. Once a month is locked it stays locked: that is the point of locking it, and a record you can quietly edit afterwards is not a record.
The month → then press Save
Nobody has marked anything and the month is nearly over
Mark it anyway, honestly, with what you know. A month marked roughly is worth more than a month left blank, because the blank one teaches the business that SPECit5 is optional. The second month is easier than the first and the third is easier again.
Everything is green and I do not believe it
Then it is being marked kindly rather than honestly, and that is the one thing that makes the whole thing worthless. A month with nothing amber in it is a month nobody looked at. The fix is not in SPECit5 — it is saying out loud, once, that amber is the normal colour of a working business.
How do I close the month?
Four steps, in order, and only whoever is at the top of the chart can do them: submit it, sign it, then lock it. Locking generates the board pack and opens the next month. Between submitting and signing you can still reopen it; after locking you cannot.
The month → then press Submit for sign-off
I submitted it too early
Reopen it — that works right up until it is signed and locked. After locking it is final, and the answer is a note against next month rather than a rewrite of last one.
The month → then press Reopen the month
Something is waiting for me to approve
Everything waiting on a decision from you is in one place, with what it is for.
Paying for it
Seats, cards, and what happens if a payment stops.
What does it cost?
The first seat is free, for good — one person can run a whole business in SPECit5 without paying anything. Seats are counted from the second, and only people you have actually invited count. A name on the chart with no login is free.
SPECit5 says read-only and will not save anything
The payment has stopped — an expired card, nearly always. Nothing has been deleted and nothing is lost; everything comes back the moment the card is sorted, including anything you tried to type while it was read-only. A one-person business is never locked, because it owes nothing.
Sort the payment → then press Update card
How do I change the card?
Through the Pricing page, which is where invoices and receipts live too.
Billing → then press Billing
If I stop paying, do I lose everything?
No. The business goes read-only — you can see all of it and change none of it — and it stays that way. Nothing is deleted because a card expired. If you genuinely want it gone, ask us and say so out loud; it is deliberately not a button.
Mirrors, and the improvement register
The artifacts your team runs projects through, and the running list of problems.
Something is wrong and I want it written down
Type it on your page, in your own words, and it goes on the improvement register with an owner and a place to be signed off. Anybody with a login can log one — that is the point of it.
My page → then press Log it
How do I make a mirror?
A mirror is a thing your team pins and argues over — a rate you are working out, a plan with an owner against each step. Anybody with a login can make one and anybody can comment.
Mirrors → then press + New mirror
A mirror says it is not live
It names which feed is not connected. SPECit5 will not call a mirror live while any of its inputs are missing, because "partly current" reads as "current" on the screen where somebody is about to change a price.
What is the difference between the Board and a mirror?
The Board is the governing group — its charter, its pack, its meeting. A mirror is an artifact a team makes and works through. They used to share the word "board", which is exactly why one of them was renamed.
I want to tell you SPECit5 should do something differently
There is a box for exactly that, and it is read by the people who build SPECit5. If somebody has already asked for the same thing, SPECit5 tells you so and your saying it again pushes it up the list — which is how the thing most customers want gets built before the thing one customer asked loudest for.
What would you change? → then press Send it
Getting set up the first time
What to do on day one, and what can wait.
Where do I start?
Six steps, and SPECit5 works out which are done from your actual data rather than from ticked boxes — so you can leave and come back and it knows where you were. Do them in any order.
This is going to take days
The first useful month needs three things: the roles, two KPIs per pillar on the ones that matter, and the people in them. Everything else — the board, the charter, the systems — can wait, and SPECit5 will not block you on any of it.
Do I have to connect my accounting or job system?
No. SPECit5 works entirely on numbers people type in, and that is a complete way to run it. Connecting systems means some numbers arrive by themselves instead — useful, never required, and not the thing to do first.
I was just looking around and want to keep what I built
Sign up and the business you were looking at becomes yours — the chart, the marks, all of it. That is the whole point of the look-around: it is the house you then buy, not a showroom copy of it.
Set up your business → then press Create my business
When something looks wrong
Before you assume it is broken.
A page says something went wrong
That is our end, not yours, and it should be rare. Check whether SPECit5 is up, then tell us what you were doing. If a page gave you a reference number, send that — it points straight at what happened.
A number looks wrong
Every score in SPECit5 shows its working — open the scorecard and you can see each KPI, its weight and what it contributed. Nine times in ten the working explains it. If it does not, tell us, and quote the month.
My question is not here
Write to us and say what you were trying to do. A real person answers.
Still stuck
Write to manager@specbizhq.com and say what you were trying to do and what happened instead. If a page gave you a reference number, send that too — it points straight at what went wrong.