Overview
MotionOps has a lot of settings. You do not need all of them in week one.
This checklist puts the setup in the order that matters, so you can send a real proposal by the end of day two and run a full job by the end of the week. Everything else can wait.
Most of these steps live in Business Settings, which you reach from the settings icon in the top right. You need admin permissions to change them.
Day 1: Make Your Documents Look Right
Nothing you send to a customer should go out before this is done. Your company details and logo appear on every proposal and invoice.
Fill in your company information. Go to Settings then Information. Enter your company name, phone, email, contractor's license number, and address.
Set your regional settings. On the same page, set your time zone, currency, date format, and first day of the week. These affect every date and dollar amount in your account, so get them right before data starts accumulating.
Upload your logos. Go to Settings then Visual Identity. There are two separate uploads: the main company logo for proposals and invoices, and an email logo. Use a simpler version for email.
Add your social media links if you want them on outbound communications.
Full details on every field are in How to Set Up Your Company Profile and Settings.
Day 2: Build Your PriceBook and Add Your Team
The PriceBook is what makes quoting fast. Without it, you are typing prices from scratch on every proposal.
Add your top 20 PriceBook items. Go to Settings then PriceBook. Items are split across multiple tabs: Fixed, Hourly, Materials. Start with the services you quote most often, not your whole catalog.
Review your roles. Go to Settings then Roles and Permissions. Four roles come built in: Business Admin, Account Manager, Technician, and Limited User. Check whether they match how your business works before you invite anyone.
Invite your team. Add your office staff and technicians and assign each one a role.
Have your field crew install the mobile app and log in on day one, not the morning of their first job.
If you need tighter control over what field staff can see, read Limited User Roles before assigning anyone.
Day 3: Set Your Money Rules
These settings decide how your numbers behave. Changing them later does not always update past records, so set them before you start invoicing.
Set up sales tax. Create your tax rates and set a default. Tax is applied per line item, so the default saves you time on every proposal.
Set your profitability basis. Go to Settings then Business Configuration then Configuration. Choose Margin or Markup, enter your percentage, and set your company hourly rate. These drive every profit number you will see later.
Set proposal validity and invoice due periods. On the same page, set how many days a proposal stays valid and how many days a customer has to pay.
Set your work order closing rules. Decide what must be true before a job can be closed - all materials invoiced, all timesheets invoiced, full amount collected, no open change orders, no open invoices. Turn on only the ones you actually want enforced.
Configure overtime. Go to Business Configuration then Time and Payroll. Set weekly, daily, and double overtime thresholds before your first payroll run.
Day 4: Set Up What the Customer Sees
Configure your templates. Go to Settings then Templates. Set up your proposal, change order, and invoice layouts. The proposal template has a live preview - use it to check how the document looks to a customer before saving.
Upload your service agreements. Go to Settings then Service Agreements and assign a default agreement for each rate type: fixed, hourly, on site, blended, and change order.
Review your customer notifications. Go to Settings then Notifications then Customer. Click View Message on each one and read what your customer will actually receive. Turn off anything that does not fit how you work.
Build your first checklist if your crews follow a standard process on site.
Day 5: Bring In Your Customers and Turn On Payments
Import your customer list from your old system or spreadsheet, rather than typing accounts in as jobs come up.
Start your payment processing application. Go to Settings then Payment Settings and click Setup Now. The application goes to underwriting for review, so starting it early matters - you do not want to be waiting on approval when your first invoice is ready.
Decide on the service fee. While you are in Payment Settings, decide whether to pass the 2.9% card cost to your customers or absorb it.
See Importing Customer Database into MotionOps and How to Set Up Payment Processing Within MotionOps.
Run One Job End to End
Before you move your whole business over, put one real job all the way through. It surfaces gaps faster than reading any guide.
Create an account, build a proposal, send it for approval, schedule the work order, have a tech clock in on the mobile app, log materials, invoice the customer, and collect payment.
Whole Work Order Flow walks through exactly that sequence.
What Can Wait
These are worth setting up, but none of them block you from running jobs:
Business Units and Job Types - organize jobs by division and service type, and break down revenue in reports. Set these up before you care about reporting, not before your first job.
Service Areas - geographic regions for scheduling and routing.
Skills and Grades - match technicians to the work they are qualified for.
Lead Sources - track where your work comes from. Add these before you want attribution reporting, because they only apply going forward.
Tags and Filter Presets - useful once you have enough records that finding things gets slow.
QuickBooks Online - connect once your MotionOps data is clean, not on day one.
SMS texting - registration takes time to approve, so start it when you know you want it.
Customer Portal - give customers a view-only window into their jobs and invoices.
Tips & Best Practices
Do not build your entire PriceBook first. Twenty items you use every week beats four hundred you enter once and never touch. You can bulk-update prices later.
Set lead sources before you import customers if attribution matters to you. Assigning them retroactively across hundreds of accounts is tedious.
Send your first proposal to yourself. Approve it as the customer would. It is the fastest way to catch a wrong logo or a missing license number.
Start the payments application on day one if you can. Underwriting review takes time and it is the one step you cannot speed up.
Turn on closing rules gradually. Enabling all five at once on day one tends to leave your team unable to close anything.
Things to Know
Only users with admin permissions can access Business Settings. If you cannot see the settings icon, ask your account administrator.
Service Areas and Skills and Grades are plan-gated. A lock icon in the sidebar means the feature is not on your current plan.
Regional settings apply account-wide, including for your team and on customer-facing documents.
Overtime rules do not apply retroactively to timesheets already logged.
Each template editor has its own Save button. Saving one does not save the others.
The main company logo and the email logo are separate uploads.
Online payment processing is available to United States businesses only.
Troubleshooting
I can't see Business Settings.
Settings require admin permissions. Ask whoever set up your account to check your role.
There's a lock icon next to a settings menu item.
That feature is not included in your current plan. Contact support about upgrading.
My logo isn't showing on proposals.
Check that you uploaded the main company logo and not only the email logo. They are separate, and proposals use the main one.
Dates or dollar amounts are displaying wrong.
Check your regional settings under Settings then Information. Time zone, date format, and currency format are all set there and apply account-wide.
I can't close a work order.
One of your work order closing rules is blocking it. Go to Business Configuration then Configuration to see which rules are on. See Guided Work Order Closing.
My team can see things they shouldn't.
Review the role assigned to each team member. See Standard User Roles.
Have questions? Reach out via the support chat or email support@motionops.com.