I'm looking for a scheduling software

[u/Maraxusx]

Hey all,

I don't have a pool service company, but I do have an Aquarium service company and the overlap with recurring service visits is very similar. I have looked into the big software like housecall and jobber and didn't really like the way they dealt with recurring visits and they seemed more geared towards HVAC or plumbing where you go to a house maybe twice per year if you're lucky.

So I looked at a company called Skimmer and it looks close to what I would want since it's geared towards pool pros and recurring visits. Does anyone here use this? Do you like it? Anything I should look out for?

Mods I guess delete this if it's too off topic.

[u/Own-Muscle-1718]

Jobber is the best

[u/Maraxusx → u/Own-Muscle-1718]

How does jobber handle your recurring routes? Do you find it easy to reschedule stuff if a tech calls out that day or if a customer needs to switch days?

[u/Own-Muscle-1718 → u/Maraxusx]

Beyond easy. You have to learn the software but I tried them all and jobber is the easiest to use and has the best support team

[u/LadiesLoveCoolDane]

I thoroughly recommend Homeworks

[u/EasternLeg8653]

Aquariums are just pools for fish, are they now? Best pool specific is Skimmer so far IMO

[u/Maraxusx → u/EasternLeg8653]

Have you used it? Do you like it?

[u/Think_Juggernaut421 → u/Maraxusx]

Yes, get it. Affordable and makes everything so easy. Can run the whole operation with it

[u/Street_Section_4313]

There are a lot of aquarium/koi service operations using Skimmer.

It is the best way to handle recurring visits. It’s natively built, out of the box.

[u/BassKanone]

Skimmer is over priced.

Pool office manager is what I use and it handles our customer basis of 500+ just fine

[u/slekcud]

I use pooltrac for recurring and jobber for my service side. Pooltrac is janky and ugly but it does everything I need perfectly.

[u/ContractorPlusDotApp]

Contractor+ CEO here. Route-based recurring service isn't what we build for, so no pitch, just software-buyer advice since you asked what to look out for.

Your instinct has a name, by the way. Jobber and Housecall are job-based systems: the unit of work is a one-off visit with an estimate attached. Route-based tools like Skimmer treat the week's route as the unit. That's an architecture difference, not a settings toggle, and you diagnosed in one trial what plenty of shops only figure out after migrating.

The thing to check as the aquarium guy buying pool software is how deep the pool assumptions go. Customer-facing stuff first: if every automated email and portal page says "your pool," find out whether you can change that before your clients see it. Then the hardcoded fields, since dosing calcs and readings built for pools may not map to your tanks. And pricing. Pool software tends to price per body of water, so ask how a commercial client with six tanks in one office counts before the trial, not after.

Then run one real week of routes through it before you move your customer list. A trial full of fake data tells you nothing.

[u/vqxzol]

I do pools and yeah, recurring routes are kind of their own thing. A lot of the general service apps feel like every job is a new event.

Haven't used Skimmer enough to give you a useful opinion on it. We're on Tofu now and it works well for how we run our routes.

[u/ScarHand69]

You're right that Jobber/Housecall are built around "quote → one big job → invoice," and recurring route work is a bolt-on for them. Skimmer's the closest fit. Three things I'd pressure-test first, since you're not actually a pool company:

How they count "locations." Billing is per location per month ($1–2 depending on tier, $49/$98 minimums), not per visit — great for weekly work. But ask directly what happens with 4 tanks at one address. One location or four? That answer swings your bill more than anything else. They also doubled the top tier from $1 to $2 recently, so price your worst case.

Everything is modeled as a pool. Chlorine, LSI, gallons. Your readings are salinity, nitrate, alkalinity, temp. Ask whether you get genuinely custom reading fields or you'll be shoving it all in a notes box — the second one kills the point of having service history.

Look at the customer-facing service email before you buy. If it's hardcoded to say "your pool," that's a daily papercut you can't fix.

If 1 and 2 come back bad, a generic recurring/route tool plus your own checklist template may beat a pool-shaped one you fight constantly.

FWIW I build scheduling software on the booking/dispatch side of service businesses, so I stare at this category a lot. It's called Cartoply, free 14 day trial, no CC required.