Orvia vs Spreadsheets and WhatsApp
Spreadsheets and WhatsApp is a how most trades run today. Compared as at 2026-09-11.
This is Orvia's real competition. Most UK trade businesses run on a phone, a notebook, a spreadsheet and WhatsApp, and for a while that is genuinely the right answer. The question is only where the ceiling is.
What Spreadsheets and WhatsApp is genuinely good at
- Free, familiar and already working
- No setup, no learning, no subscription
- Total flexibility — no system telling you how to work
- Perfectly adequate at low job volume
Choose Spreadsheets and WhatsApp if…
Someone doing a handful of jobs a week for people they mostly already know, who is not trying to grow.
Choose Orvia if…
Anyone at the point where jobs are being forgotten, invoices are going out late, and the evening admin has become a real part of the week.
Side by side
| Orvia | Spreadsheets and WhatsApp | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost | £0 to £79/month | Free |
| Enquiries when you are busy | Captured and alerted | Whatever you remember |
| Job history for a customer | One screen | Scroll back through chats |
| Quotes | Branded document, accepted with a record | A number in a message |
| Invoice numbering and VAT | Automatic and sequential | Manual, error-prone |
| Knowing who has not paid | A list | Memory and a spreadsheet |
| Being found online | Website and town pages | Word of mouth only |
| If your phone is lost or stolen | Everything is still there | Potentially gone |
Prices for other products are described as published on their own websites at the date checked, and are typically charged per user. Always check their current pricing before deciding.
Our take
Look for four specific symptoms. You have forgotten to ring someone back. You have finished a job and not invoiced it for a fortnight. Someone has asked what you did for them last year and you could not say. You spend more than an hour a week on paperwork you resent. Two or more of those means the current system has hit its ceiling.
The strongest argument is not tidiness, it is the enquiries you never knew you missed. A notebook cannot capture the call you did not answer, and word of mouth cannot reach the person two towns over who searched for your trade this morning.
The honest counter-argument: if you are booked out for eight weeks on referrals alone and turning work away, a system will not make you richer. Start with the free plan, get the website up, and add the CRM when the admin genuinely starts costing you money.
This is also why the Free plan exists with no card required. It should be possible to test whether the ceiling is real before spending anything.
The verdict
Stay as you are if the volume is low and nothing is being dropped. Move to Orvia when jobs, callbacks or invoices start slipping — that is the point where free stops being cheap.
Other comparisons
Last reviewed 2026-09-11.