Master your practice, step by step.

1. Start your trial. Go to practice.smartcabuddy.com/practice/signup — firm name, your name, email, mobile and a password. You get 14 days free with up to 5 users, no card needed.
2. Confirm your email. Click the link we send you (check spam once — Outlook can take a few minutes). Your firm code (like ABC-001) appears on screen and in your welcome email — you'll use it at every sign-in.
3. Sign in. Firm code + email + password at the sign-in page.
4. Add your firm identity. Firm details (sidebar, Owner only) → name, address, PAN/GST/FRN — this prints on client statements and exports.
5. Bring your clients in. Clients → Import — upload your existing Excel/CSV and your whole client master lands in minutes. (Add single clients with New client anytime.)
6. Invite your team. Team → Invite member — name, email, mobile (for WhatsApp alerts) and a role. New members set their own password on first sign-in.
7. Create your first engagement. Engagements → New engagement — pick the client, category (GST, Income Tax, Audit…), service, assessment year, fee and assignee, and confirm the priority. The assignee gets a WhatsApp alert instantly.

The dashboard — your morning screen

1. Read the top cards: active work, overdue, collections — real-time and consistent with every other screen.
2. Tap a category flashcard (GST, Income Tax, …) to jump straight to that slice of work, including a single card for office/internal tasks.
3. Watch the deadlines widget — overdue and upcoming statutory dates, counted job-wise so nothing hides.

Engagements — track every job

1. Filter and sort: by category, stage, assignee, priority, overdue-only, due-this-week, unassigned, office-only — the list defaults to priority order.
2. Change stage as work progresses (each category has its own stage flow). Completed/cancelled work drops out of active counts automatically.
3. Reassign in two clicks — open the job → Reassign. The new assignee gets a WhatsApp alert; ownership is never ambiguous.
4. Add notes for instructions — the assignee is notified. Notes build the job's history trail.
5. Office tasks: for internal work (admin, HR, IT) use Office task — same tracking, no client needed.

My Tasks — each person's own tray

1. Every team member sees their own assigned work with the same flashcards, scoped to them.
2. Trainees see only their tray — never the client master or fees.

Deadlines

1. Statutory and target dates live on each engagement; the Deadlines page shows them firm-wide.
2. Overdue means: an unfinished deadline, past midnight, on a live job — the same rule on every screen, so all counts reconcile.

Recording money

1. Set the fee on each engagement (or mark it Complimentary). Who can see or edit fees is controlled by you — owner-only by default.
2. Record payments from the Payments page or right on the engagement — mode (cash/UPI/bank), date, reference.
3. Fee-check (Payments → Fee check, with search) lists every job created without a fee — your leak detector.
4. Owner corrections: edit a payment's mode/amount/date or void it entirely (Payments → Collections → Edit).
5. Discounts (permission-gated) ride on any payment; Outstanding = Fee − (collected + discounts) everywhere.

Client account statements

1. Open a client → Account statement — a running-balance ledger of fees billed vs payments received, for any financial year or custom range.
2. Export as PDF or Excel, or send on WhatsApp in one tap via a secure 7-day link.
3. A pre-flight lists any of that client's jobs still missing a fee, so the statement is complete before it goes out.

Subscribing after the trial

1. Owner → Subscribe — pick plan, users and tenure; the exact amount with GST break-up is computed for you.
2. Pay by UPI (amount-prefilled QR) or bank transfer, tell us, and we activate — usually within hours. A GST tax invoice follows.

Roles & the permission matrix

1. Five roles: Owner, Admin, Manager, Team Member, Trainee.
2. Owner → Settings → a tick-box matrix of ~15 abilities (see fees, export, create clients, approve claims…) per role. Defaults are sensible; change anything, anytime.
3. The server enforces the matrix — hiding a button also blocks the action itself.

WhatsApp alerts

1. Assign or reassign a job → the team member gets a WhatsApp with the task, client, service and target date. No follow-up calls.
2. Client-facing WhatsApp (due-date reminders, thank-you notes) is rolling out — buttons appear on each engagement as it activates for your firm.

Team chat

1. Chat (sidebar) or the floating bubble on every page: private 1-to-1 DMs plus an All team channel.
2. Unread counts follow you across pages; conversations stay inside the workspace — not on personal phones.

TA/DA expense claims

1. Anyone files a claim (TA / DA in the sidebar): itemised travel/allowance lines + receipt uploads.
2. Submit → your manager recommends → admin/owner approves → then it's marked reimbursed. Small firm? The owner can approve directly.
3. Everyone sees their claim's live status and full timeline; approvers get email nudges.

Celebrations

1. Add birthdays/joining dates on the Team page — the dashboard greets the firm on the day. Small thing, big smiles.

1. Upload documents on any engagement or client — they stay organised by the work they belong to.
2. Share externally with an expiring link (7 days) — no email attachments, access dies automatically.
3. Trainees can view/upload documents only on their own engagements.

1. Workload — who's carrying what, live. Balance the load with data, not guesswork.
2. Ageing — how long work has been pending, flagged before it becomes a problem.
3. Revenue — billed vs collected across periods.
4. Every report exports to Excel in one click; on mobile the reports switch with simple tabs.

1. Forgot password? Sign-in page → a 6-digit code lands in your email. Owners/admins can also reset any member's password from the Team page.
2. Forgot your firm code? Sign-in page → "Email it to me".
3. Change password anytime from My Profile.
4. Your data: hosted in India, isolated per firm, backed up daily, exportable to Excel whenever you want. See Data Security.