The fastest way to find anything in Mucka is to ask. You don't need to remember which menu it lives under. Just describe what you want.
Open Mucka
On your phone, tap Ask Mucka in the middle of the bar along the bottom. A message box slides up over whatever you were looking at, so you can ask about the job in front of you without losing it. Type your question, or tap the orange microphone to talk. Mucka's answer appears above the box, with the page still behind it. Tap the arrow at the top of the box to put it away, or drag it up and down to give the conversation more or less room.
On a computer, Mucka sits in the panel down the right-hand side of every page. Type your question in the box at the bottom of it, or press the microphone next to the box to talk. If your window is narrow the panel tucks away behind a round orange button in the bottom corner — click that to bring it back.
Answering with a tap
When Mucka asks you something with a short answer — "Shall I move them to Wednesday?" — the answers appear underneath as buttons. Tap one instead of typing it. It's the same as if you'd typed the words yourself, so Mucka carries straight on.
The buttons never replace anything. You can always type your own answer, or say something else entirely, and if you're on a call Mucka still asks out loud — so the phone can stay in your pocket. Buttons from further back in the conversation go grey once you've moved on, because "yes" means something different two questions later.
This works on WhatsApp as well, using WhatsApp's own buttons.
When you name a customer and you've got more than one by that name, Mucka asks which one you mean, and in the app it shows them underneath so you can tell them apart: the postcode, when you last did a job for them and how many you've done, and a From your old system label on any that came over when you moved to Mucka. Tap the right one and Mucka carries on with that customer. If it's none of them, tap Neither, someone new. Tapping only answers the question; nothing is booked or sent until you've said so. If there are more than three with that name, Mucka shows the three you've worked for most recently and tells you how many more there are. Engineers see the names and postcodes but not the job history.
Typing to Mucka works on every plan. Talking out loud is part of a paid plan, so on the free plan the microphone will tell you it needs an upgrade and point you at Settings → Mucka → Subscription. Everything on this page still works typed.
What Mucka is good at
Pulling up records
"What did I quote the Walkers last month?"
"Show me Brian Patel's last three jobs."
"What's the address on the Hampton job?"
"Where is everyone?"
Old work, by the date it happened
"What did Tim do on the 15th of June?"
"Pull up the job at BS40 9ZZ on 02/07."
"What was on Craig's list last Thursday?"
Name the day and Mucka goes straight to it. There's no cut-off on how far back you can ask — a job from five years ago, for a warranty claim, comes up as easily as this morning's. If you ask without naming a date, Mucka answers from your recent work, so on a busy business it's worth giving it the day.
Mucka reads you what's written against the job: the fault as it was taken down, the appliance, the reference.
Paperwork on a job
"Pull up the gas cert for that job."
"What did the engineer file on site?"
"Send me the receipt on WhatsApp."
Mucka can see everything filed against a job: gas certificates, the forms your engineer filled in on site, receipts, warranties, and the job's own quotes and invoices. Ask to see one and you get a button that opens it right there, without leaving the conversation. On WhatsApp, Mucka sends you the actual file so you can print it or forward it on.
Photos aren't listed one by one, because there's no good way to read a photo out. Mucka tells you how many there are and takes you to the job to look through them.
Renewals coming up
"What certificates are due next month?"
"Which gas safeties are coming up in November?"
Ask what's due and name the month or the dates, and Mucka lists the certificates and services coming up. In the app you also see how many fall in each week, a button for each type (so you can look at just the gas safeties), and the first few customers with their due dates. A Tenant label means there's a current tenant saved against that property; it doesn't mean they've been told about the visit. Tap a customer to open the certificate, or tap Open Certificates or Open Service Reminders for the full list.
Nothing is sent from that list. If reminder cards are already waiting on your Actions list, tap Ask Mucka to send reminders and Mucka goes through them with you one customer at a time, showing who each goes to and what it says before you approve it. A reminder card appears on its own as each renewal gets close, so for dates further ahead there may be nothing to send yet. Engineers only see the certificates they signed.
Summaries
"How was last week?"
"Which quotes are still waiting for a response?"
"How much have I invoiced this month vs last?"
Ask about more than one month and you get a chart. Ask something like "How much have I invoiced over the last six months?" and under Mucka's answer there's a bar for each month, up to six. The solid part of each bar has been paid, the paler part is still unpaid, and the month you're in is striped, because it isn't over yet. Tap a month to see what you invoiced in it and how much of that is still unpaid. The unpaid figure turns amber when it's more than a quarter of what that month invoiced. The figures come from your invoices in Mucka, counted on the date each one was sent, and drafts don't count until they're sent. Tap Open Revenue for the full page. If you've connected Xero, QuickBooks or FreeAgent, the Revenue page reads its figures from there, so the two can differ. The chart shows in the app, typing or talking; on WhatsApp or a phone call you get the figures in words. If your role can't see invoices, you won't get the chart either.
Who's free on a day
"Who's free on Friday?"
In the app, Mucka shows the day as a bar for each person, coloured for what's booked, what's pencilled in and what's free, with your business hours along the top. Tap someone's name and it tells you in a sentence when they're free, like "Free 11:00 to 13:30 and after 15:00". Free time is worked out from your business hours, because Mucka doesn't know each person's own working hours, so someone who doesn't work Fridays will still show as free; it means nothing is booked, not that they're on. Ask Mucka to fit someone in and it offers up to three times with a reason for each, and a button to pencil one in (Find a time to fit someone in).
What to pick up for the week
"What do I need to pick up this week?"
Mucka lists the parts under each of the week's jobs, with how many. It takes them from the accepted quote's lines, and, with the Parts & Van Stock skill switched on, the parts you've written down on the job (Keep track of the parts a job needs). Labour, call-outs and discounts on a quote are left out, and Mucka says how many lines it left out. Deliveries and parts already on the van aren't on it, because there's nothing to pick up. There are no prices on it, so your engineers can use it too, and they only see the jobs they're on. Tick a part off as you pick it up: the tick saves straight away, so the rest of the team sees it, with who ticked it. A job with no parts written down and no accepted quote has nothing to list, and Mucka tells you how many of those there are. Ticking a line off the quote adds it to the job's parts as collected, so with Parts & Van Stock switched on you'll see it on the job too. If a quote is changed after it's accepted, anything already ticked stays ticked, even if you change its price, its quantity or where it sits on the quote. Change what a line says, though, and Mucka treats it as a different part: it's listed again unticked, and with Parts & Van Stock on, the one already ticked stays on the job's parts as collected.
With the Parts & Van Stock skill, you don't need to ask for today's pick-up: it's on your home screen and in your morning briefing.
What you usually charge
"What do I usually charge for a powerflush?"
Mucka gives you the price off your price list, and underneath it every price you've put on a quote for the same thing in the last year, as dots along a line. Tap a dot to see which quote it was: the date, the quote number, what you wrote on the line and the price. All the prices are without VAT, and it only counts quotes that went to a customer, not drafts. At the bottom it tells you where it looked. If it can't find anything, tell it what the item is called on your screen and it'll look again. A price from an old quote is never put on a new one unless you say so.
Quick actions
"Schedule the Walker boiler install for Tuesday morning."
"Text Sarah to say I'm running 20 minutes late."
"Send the Hampton invoice."
Directions to a job
"Give me directions to my next job."
"Navigate to the Hampton job."
Ask to be taken somewhere and Mucka works out the address — the property the job is at, not the customer's billing address — then gives you a Directions button. Tap it and your own maps app opens straight into driving directions. No typing the postcode into the sat-nav. On Android that's whichever maps app your phone is set to use; on iPhone you pick once between Apple Maps, Google Maps and Waze. See choosing your maps app.
How Mucka answers
Mucka will either tell you the answer directly, or prepare an action for you to approve. Nothing gets sent, scheduled or invoiced without you confirming first, even when Mucka is confident. One tap to approve, one tap to dismiss.
That's the trust model. You stay in charge.
On a computer, you can see Mucka working. The moment you send, a short line appears under your question: what you asked about if that's clear ("Checking your invoices…"), or just "One sec…" if it isn't. Once Mucka knows what it's looking up, the line changes to say so, and then the answer starts to appear as it's written. A sentence where Mucka says it has done or sent something, or gives a figure it hasn't just read from your records, waits until it has been checked, so it may arrive a moment after the rest.
Say morning. The first time you say hello to Mucka in the app each day ("morning", "alright", "hiya"), the reply shows your day at a glance: how many jobs are on today and who's on them, what's been paid since 6pm last night, what's overdue and how old the oldest is, how many things are waiting for you to decide, and the next job still to start, with its address. Say it late in the day and there's no next job on it, so the reply tells you how today went instead. Tap any of them to go straight to that page, or tap a question underneath to ask it. Your engineers get the same, but with only their own jobs and no money or cards on it. It only appears for a plain hello: if you say "morning, can you book Dave in for Tuesday", Mucka just books Dave. It doesn't happen on WhatsApp, where you already get your morning message.
Ask about one job, "What do I need for my 8 o'clock?" or "Tell me about the job at Acacia Avenue", and the answer comes with a short brief underneath: the boiler or other appliance on the property's record, whether anybody has been asked about getting in (and the door pin, if the property has one), what was on the quote with how many of each, and anything written in the property's notes, such as where to park or where the key safe is. Tap Earlier visits to see the last few jobs at the same address, and Open the job to go straight to it. If you can see invoices, it also shows what has been paid so far. Engineers' briefs never show money, and only list visits they were on themselves. Mucka only shows the brief when the question comes down to one job; asked about a day with four jobs on it, it answers with the list as before.
Photos on a job. Ask Mucka to show you the photos from a job and they appear in the chat, each marked with when it was added. Mucka can't see what's in a photo, so it won't tell you what one shows. If the job has a report being filled in, tap the photos you want on it, choose Before or After, and press Add photos to the report. They go on the report and nowhere else: the report isn't sent until you or your engineer send it from the job. A report takes up to 12 photos. If there's no report on the job yet, Mucka says so and offers to open the job instead.
Send Mucka photos and files. Tap + in the chat and pick Photos, Camera, Document or Location. You can pick several photos at once, and add more with + again. They wait above the box you type in, so nothing is sent yet: type what you want doing with them ("book this in as an emergency") and press send, and the words and every photo go to Mucka together. Tap the × on one to take it back out. If you just want to send the photos, press send without typing and Mucka asks what they're for. Up to 10 at a time.
Talking vs typing
- Voice is fastest if you're on a job site or driving. Mucka understands plain English ("the Sarah I quoted yesterday").
- Typing is better if you're in a quiet office or want to paste in an address.
Both work the same way. Same memory, same answers, same approvals.
Deleting something
If you're typing, Mucka shows you a confirm button. Read what it says first — it tells you what else is attached, because invoices, quotes and certificates stay on file but stop being linked to the job.
On a call, just say so. Ask Mucka to delete a job and it'll read back exactly what's going, say plainly that it can't be undone, and wait for you to say yes. Nothing is deleted until you do.
Jobs only, for now. Clients, quotes, invoices and projects still have to be deleted in the app — open the record and tap the bin icon at the bottom of the edit screen. And a job that's in progress can't be deleted at all: finish it or cancel it first.
A quote can only be deleted while it's still a draft. Once it's been sent — and certainly once it's accepted — your customer has seen it, so there's no bin: change its status to Rejected instead, and Mucka stops treating it as live work.
If you can't see a bin icon, either the record has gone too far to delete (a sent quote, or an invoice with a payment against it) or your role doesn't have permission to delete. The second one is a setting, not a fault.
Moving around while you're talking
The call stays up while you move around Mucka. Tap through to the diary, open a client, go to your invoices — Mucka can still hear you, and knows which page you've landed on, so you can carry on talking about what's now in front of you.
You can also just say where you want to go, rather than finding it yourself:
"Open the diary."
"Take me to my invoices."
"Pull up Mr Hampton."
"Show me the Walker job."
Mucka takes you straight there and stays on the line, so you can ask about what you're now looking at. That works for any page in your menu and for individual customers, jobs, quotes and invoices.
One thing it won't do is move you when you've asked it a question. Ask "can I see the preview before I send it?" and you get a button to tap instead, because you're waiting on an answer and having the screen change under you isn't one.
You can end the call whenever you are finished. It also closes after a period of silence or near its session limit, with a warning before that limit. Standard in-app calls allow up to thirty minutes. Test versions can have a different limit. A Maps handoff may end a standard call; if the call stays open, say “End the call” when you no longer need it.
Ending a voice chat
When you're finished, just say so. "That's all", "cheers, that's it", or a simple "no" when Mucka asks if there's anything else. Mucka gives you a quick goodbye and closes the mic on its own.
If you go quiet for a while, Mucka closes the mic for you anyway, so it's not left listening when you don't need it. Tap the dot to start again whenever you like.
When Mucka doesn't know something
If the answer isn't in your business, say a quote you mentioned over the phone but never put in the system, Mucka will say so, plainly. Nothing gets made up. If something looks wrong, say so, and Mucka will correct it.
That's the rule we built Mucka on: say what you don't know, never invent.
What your engineers get
Your engineers have Mucka too, on their phones and on the computer. It is a smaller Mucka than yours, on purpose.
They can:
- mark a job they're on as started or finished
- message the office: running late, can't get access, the job's bigger than quoted, needs a part
- look something up in the help
- set their own reminders and their phone PIN
- ask what Mucka can do
They can't ask Mucka about the business. Customers, quotes, invoices, what anyone owes, what anyone else is working on — none of it. That isn't a setting you have to remember to turn off: the tool that reads those records is never given to an engineer in the first place, so there's nothing to leak.
Subcontractors don't get the assistant at all.
If you'd rather an engineer didn't have it, turn Use chat off for the Engineer role in Settings → Team → People → Roles.