Custom productivity tools
A productivity tool is software you use yourself, every day, to work faster on one specific task without ever giving up control. FastSolve builds it around your method, not the other way round.
You can see the result before discussing it: the link below is available online, with no sign-up required.
The spreadsheet that grew too fast
Most of the enquiries we receive open with the same story.
- The calculation file started out simple. It now has twelve tabs, three formulas nobody dares touch, and one person who genuinely knows how it works.
- Every quote means digging out the right coefficients, checking a discount, recalculating a margin. It takes twenty minutes and happens ten times a week.
- A new arrival needs three weeks to fill the sheet in properly, because nothing says what each column expects.
- A typing error goes unnoticed until the invoice, and it is the client who finds it.
None of this belongs to automation: you have to stay in control, because it is your judgement that settles the matter. What you need is a tool that makes you faster without taking the decision away from you.
Four shapes a tool can take
Most of the requests we handle take one of these shapes.
1. Calculating without redoing the reasoning
Your calculation already exists, it is simply expensive to replay. The tool sets it down once and for all: you enter the few values that change, it returns the result, the margin and the assumptions used. The reasoning stays yours, you just stop rebuilding it by hand.
Typical case. A tradesman priced quotes in a ten-tab spreadsheet. The work items are now recorded once, materials and labour per unit sold, the measurements are typed as they are taken on site, and the margin of every line shows while typing, without ever appearing on the document the client receives. This is the tool in the online demonstration.
2. Entering data without slipping up
A spreadsheet accepts anything: a date in an amount cell, a comma instead of a full stop, a forgotten row. A screen designed for the task checks as it is being filled, and refuses what makes no sense.
Typical case. A practice used to copy a paper form into a spreadsheet. The entry screen now validates each field as it is filled, and after-the-fact corrections have disappeared.
3. Retrieving instead of searching
Manual filing holds up while the volume stays small. Past a few hundred items, the file name is no longer enough. A filing tool queries your own criteria rather than your folders.
Typical case. An engineering office kept its references in hand-named folders. A search by material, by client or by year now returns the right document in seconds.
4. The tool that exists nowhere
Some tasks are too specific for off-the-shelf software to cover, and too frequent to stay manual. This is the most common case of all: it is not that software is missing, it is that none of it was designed around the way you work.
Typical case. A merchant had to compare the rates of six suppliers, each with its own terms and price bands. No product on the market did that calculation. A three-screen tool handles it today.
What a productivity tool will not do
The tool speeds up your method. It does not replace it.
- It does not decide for you. It applies your method faster, it invents none of its own.
- It does not replace a full business suite. Bringing accounting, payroll and stock together in a single product is a different service, one FastSolve also delivers: a larger project, scoped and quoted separately.
- It does not guess a rule nobody ever wrote down. The first job is often to pin down a calculation that only ever existed in someone's head.
- It does not remove the need for training. A clear screen cuts mistakes, it does not teach the trade to whoever uses it.
The gain is in speed and reliability, not in the share of the work that calls for your judgement.
Frequently asked questions
What does the demonstration tool show?
A quoting tool for trades, as it would be delivered: a catalogue of composite work items, materials and labour per unit with the selling price derived from a coefficient, measurements typed as they are and turned into a quantity, the margin visible line by line and for the whole quote, sections with subtotals, options the client ticks themselves, online acceptance from their link without creating an account, the deposit and the Belgian reduced-rate legal notice added on its own, then a dashboard: amount awaiting a reply, amount signed over three months, acceptance rate and quotes to follow up. In French, Dutch and English. Adapting it to your trade or connecting it to your invoicing is priced at the scoping stage.
How is this different from a spreadsheet?
A spreadsheet mixes the data, the calculations and the interface in one grid, which makes it flexible at first and fragile later: anyone can overwrite a formula without noticing. A tool separates the three. You see a screen that asks the right questions, the calculation is protected, and the history stays available. A spreadsheet is still excellent for exploring an idea, less so for running it every day across a team.
How does this differ from an automation?
An automation works without you, following rules set in advance. A productivity tool waits for you to use it, because the decision is yours. The two often go together: the tool helps you decide, the automation handles what follows.
How much does a productivity tool cost?
The amount depends on the number of screens, how complex the calculation rules are, and whether several people have to use it at the same time. A single-screen calculator and a five-screen management tool with separate accounts are in no way comparable. The price is set after scoping, once the method has been described precisely. As a guide, excluding VAT, most productivity tools fall between 800 and 4,000 euros. A management tool with several screens and separate accounts can reach 8,000 euros.
Can we start from my existing spreadsheet?
It is the best possible starting point. It already holds your rules, your coefficients and your edge cases, in a form we can read. Scoping then mostly consists of telling apart what is a rule and what is a patch.
Will my team need training?
The aim is for anyone to pick it up in a few minutes, with nothing to read first. That is a scoping requirement, not a happy accident: a tool nobody uses because it is obscure has saved nothing.
Will the tool be able to change later?
The values that move, such as a rate, a coefficient or a threshold, are built so you can change them yourself, with no intervention. Adding a screen or altering the logic of the calculation is a new piece of work.
Show us your spreadsheet and we will tell you what it becomes
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