GarageDoorBossPro Blog — Estimates & Quotes

Garage Door Estimate Software: The Complete Guide to Quoting Repairs, Springs, Openers and New Doors

Every garage door company quotes all day long. A homeowner calls about a door that will not open, a property manager emails about a dented commercial door, a customer asks what a new insulated door would run. Some of those quotes are a single number. Others are three options with a new opener on the side. Either way, the quote is where the job starts, and a sloppy quote makes a sloppy job.

This guide walks through how estimates work in GarageDoorBossPro, from the service list you price once to the approved estimate that lands on the dispatch board as a scheduled job.

Why Garage Door Quotes Need Their Own System

This guide is the starting point for the GarageDoorBossPro garage door estimate software page, which covers the quoting side of the platform at a glance. Here we go deeper.

Most garage door companies quote in a mix of ways: a number said over the phone, a carbon pad in the van, a text message with a price and a thumbs up. That works until a customer calls back two weeks later and says, “You told me $295,” and nobody can find what was actually quoted. Was that one spring or the pair? Did it include rollers? Was the old opener being hauled away?

A written estimate, tied to the client and the address, answers those questions before they get asked. It also gives you a list of open quotes to follow up on, which is where a lot of lost work is hiding.

Start With Your Service List

Every estimate in GarageDoorBossPro is built from your own service list. You set up the services you sell and the prices you charge. A typical list for a residential garage door company might look like this:

• Service call / diagnostic
• Torsion spring replacement and extension spring replacement
• Cable replacement, roller replacement and off-track repair
• Opener repair and opener install
• New door install and panel or section replacement
• Safety sensors, keypads and remotes
• Weatherstripping and bottom seal
• Yearly tune-up
• Commercial door repair and after-hours emergency call

The names and prices are yours. If you charge an $89 service call, a $295 torsion spring replacement and a $129 tune-up, those are the numbers that show up when someone in the office builds a quote. Setting up the list is covered in Building Garage Door Estimates From Your Own Service List, and deciding what to charge is covered in the pricing guide right after it.

Building the Estimate

Building an estimate is short: pick the client and the address, add line items from the service list, adjust quantities or prices where the job calls for it, and add notes. A two-car garage with a broken spring might get a service call, a spring replacement and a set of rollers. A homeowner thinking about a new door might get a new door install with the size and material written in the details.

If you write the same quote every week, save it as an estimate template and start the next one from there. A spring pair with rollers and a tune-up, or an opener swap with haul-away, becomes a couple of clicks instead of a fresh build.

Door and Opener Details on the Estimate

Garage door work depends on the hardware. A quote for a new opener needs the horsepower and the drive type. A new door quote needs the size, material and insulation. A spring quote needs to know which bay the problem door is in.

In GarageDoorBossPro, equipment details can be filled in right on the estimate: garage door, opener, torsion or extension springs, cables and drums, keypad, remotes, safety sensors, commercial rolling or sectional doors and gate openers, each with brand, model number, serial number, year installed, size and drive or material, plus the bay and access notes. When the estimate is approved, those details carry onto the job. The tech sees something like “Garage Door · 16x7 · Insulated Steel · Bay 1” on the job card, and the details are saved on the house for every visit after.

Options, Not Ultimatums

A lot of garage door quotes are really a choice. Repair the old door or replace it. A basic opener, a quieter belt-drive opener, or a wall-mount jackshaft unit. Springs only, or springs plus rollers and a tune-up.

Put each option on its own line item so the customer can see them side by side. GarageDoorBossPro does not have a special “tiers” feature; it does not need one. Separate lines with clear names and prices do the job, and the customer can read them at the kitchen table instead of deciding in the driveway.

Online Approval and Follow-Up

Once the estimate is ready, send it. The customer reviews it and approves online, whenever they get around to it. That approval is on record, attached to the estimate, so there is no arguing later about what was agreed.

Not every customer answers right away. Estimate follow-up emails go to the ones who have not responded, so the quote stays in front of them without someone in the office making a dozen reminder calls a week.

Approved Estimate Becomes the Job

When a customer approves, the estimate becomes the scheduled job. The line items, the door and opener details and the notes all come with it. The office puts it on a day and a van on the dispatch board, the tech sees it on their phone in route order, and when the job is completed the invoice is built from the same line items, with sales tax. The card on file can be charged on completion.

The quote, the job and the invoice are one chain. Nobody retypes a quote into a work order, and nobody invoices for something different than what was approved.

Where Quotes Come From

Quotes start in a few places, and each has its own guide in this series:

• Phone calls. The most common start. Write down what the caller says and quote what you can stand behind.
• Photos customers text you. Helpful for a first look, but not a replacement for a tech looking at the door.
• Website requests. Your website request form drops into Form Responses, ready for a quote.
• The door safety inspection. When a tune-up turns up worn rollers or a door out of balance, the checklist and the tech's recommendations give the office what it needs to quote the repair.
• Commercial and property manager accounts. Many addresses, one client, and usually a monthly statement.

Safety Comes Before the Sale

A note that runs through every guide here: springs and cables are under serious tension and are work for trained technicians. A quote is never a set of instructions, and nothing in an estimate should suggest a homeowner try the repair themselves. If a customer asks what they can do in the meantime, the honest answer is to leave the door alone and wait for the tech.

Getting Started

The best way to see estimates in action is to open the live demo, a fully stocked sample garage door company you can click around with no signup, at my.garagedoorbosspro.com/demo.html. Look at an estimate, see how the line items come from the service list, and follow one through to a scheduled job.

For the rest of the quoting picture, including online approval, templates and commercial quotes, go back to the GarageDoorBossPro garage door estimate software page.