Getting started

Signing up#

While EscBooks is in beta, you join with a beta code. No code yet? On the beta page, click No code yet? Request an invite, and give your name and email.

1. On the beta page, type your code in Have an invite code? and click Join. Capitals, spaces and dashes don't matter.
2. On Create your account, give your first and last name, your Business Name, your email and a password of at least 8 characters. If you work under your own name, that's your business name. It starts as the legal name on your invoices; if your registered name is different, change it later in Settings (below).
3. EscBooks emails you a confirmation link (Check your inbox). Open it to carry on. No card is asked for.
4. You're asked four things, a screen each (below), then offered a tour. After that you're on your Dashboard, with the books ready to use.

• Your business starts in your computer's time zone, and its books are kept in US dollars. A client can still be billed in their own currency (below).

The welcome, the tour and your setup list#

A new business's owner is welcomed, then asked four things before the app opens. The first two are required; Skip passes the last two. Every answer can be changed later in Settings.

• What kind of work you do: sets the words EscBooks uses (Matters for a law firm, Jobs for a contractor) and which optional features start on. After you pick one, the next screen shows exactly what it sets up: the tools and reports that come with it, each feature, and its words. Change it in Settings → Terms & Features.
• How your business files its taxes, and its accounting method, cash or accrual. Not sure yet starts you as a sole proprietor on cash basis. Change either in Settings → Business.
• Where your books are today: the tour and your setup list then point you to the guide for bringing them over.
• Whether to connect your AI assistant: say yes and the tour stops at Settings → Connected Assistants, where it's set up. It's optional: without an assistant, nothing in EscBooks uses AI.

Then your business is shown with what you chose, and Show Me Around starts the tour, or I'll explore on my own opens the app without it. In the tour, the screen dims, one part of it stays lit, and a card says what it is. It goes through the sidebar section by section, Accounts (where your bank accounts and cards go), a section's pages, the Command Menu, each button in the header (hide amounts, your AI assistant, messages, notifications), and where to turn off the features you don't use. Next and Back (or → and ←) move between stops, and Esc ends it. At the Command Menu's stop, press Esc to try the real thing; the tour carries on when you close it. Take it again any time from Help (Take the Tour) or the Command Menu. Everyone gets it once, an accountant you invite included.

On the Dashboard, Get Set Up lists the first steps, starting with your accounts. Each ticks itself once it's done: a statement brought in, a client added, an invoice sent. Dismiss puts the list away for good.

The beta and your plan#

• EscBooks is free during the beta. Billing for beta accounts begins on January 1, 2027.
• From then, a beta account pays the Solo plan's founding price, $19 a month or $189 a year, for as long as the account stays open. Switching between monthly and annual keeps it.

To add a card before January 1, 2027:

1. Open Settings → Plan & Billing.
2. Pick Monthly or Annual and add a card. Nothing is charged until January 1, 2027, and Plan & Billing shows that billing starts then.

• Your card is kept by Stripe, never on EscBooks' servers.
• A card added on December 30 or 31 is charged when you add it, at the founding price.
• With no card on January 1, 2027, the account turns read-only: you can still sign in, read, print and export, but not add or change anything. Add a card in Plan & Billing to open it again, at the founding price. Nothing is deleted.

Your business details#

Everything works from the start, but these decide what your invoices say and how dates and money read. Settings opens from the menu under your name at the foot of the sidebar, or with ⌘ , (Ctrl , on Windows).

1. Business: your Legal name (required: the person or entity being paid, on every invoice; changing it asks Confirm It's You first, if you haven't in the last 10 minutes), a Trade name (DBA) if you do business under another name (it leads in the app and on invoices, with the legal name beneath), the Billing email clients reply to, Phone, Tax ID / EIN and your Address. Here too is How Your Business Files Taxes, which Reports → Taxes and the accountant packet follow (see Business tax structure).
2. Regional: the Number & date format, your Timezone (which decides the day a late-night entry belongs to) and whether the Week starts on Monday or Sunday.
3. Branding: your Logo and Brand Colors, on invoices, estimates, PDFs and emails, and your Icon, a square image that stands in for your business's initials in the app (an image that isn't square is cropped to its middle).
4. Invoicing: the Invoice prefix and Next invoice number (a number is given when an invoice is sent, in order, with no gaps), your default payment terms (Net 30 to start), notes and fine print, Bank Details, a Pay Online link and Payment Reminders. See Invoicing and getting paid.

Business settings are the owner's to change. Your accountant can have a free sign-in of their own that reads the books (see Your accountant).

Your rates and services#

Settings/Services & Rates

Services & Rates

The kinds of work you bill for, and what they cost by default.

Default Hourly Rate

Used when nothing more specific applies. A rate set on a project wins, then the client's rate, then the service's, then this one.

Hourly rate

USD

Save Rate

Services

Add Service

ServiceRateBilling

GeneralUses defaultBillable

Step 1 of 4PauseStart over

1. 1In Settings → Services & Rates, set your default hourly rate, then click Save Rate.
2. 2Click Add Service for each kind of work you bill: Design, Consulting, Court appearance.
3. 3Name it, and give it a rate, or leave the rate blank to use the client's or your default.
4. 4Billable stays on for work you invoice. Click Add Service; you pick it when you track time.

In Services & Rates, the Default Hourly Rate is what work bills at when nothing more specific is set. Below it, Services are the kinds of work you bill for (Design, Consulting, Court appearance). Every business starts with one, General, using your default rate.

• Add Service asks for a Name, a Default hourly rate (blank uses the client's or your default rate) and a Color.
• Billable is on unless you turn it off. Time on a non-billable service (admin, pro bono) is tracked but never invoiced.
• You pick the service when you track time. Archive one you no longer use: past entries keep it, new ones can't pick it.

A rate can be set in four places, and the most specific one wins. Try it:

• A client's rate comes before a service's. To bill one kind of work higher for everyone, give the service its rate and leave the clients' blank.
• A time entry takes its rate when it's added (or when you change who it's for). Changing a rate later doesn't change time already tracked, so set your rates before you start.
• Day rates and fixed fees are set on a client or project instead; see Projects.

Your first client#

Clients

Clients

Who you work for, and how each one is billed.

No clients yet

Add the people and companies you bill. Each client can have its own rate, payment terms and billing email.

Add Client

Step 1 of 4PauseStart over

1. 1On Clients, click Add Client. Only the name is required; the rest can be filled in later.
2. 2Type the client's name, who you deal with there, and the billing email their invoices go to.
3. 3Under Billing, give them an hourly rate and payment terms, or leave both on your defaults.
4. 4Click Add Client. Their page opens, with everything you set and room for their projects.

On Clients, click Add Client (the Command Menu's Add Client, under Esc, takes you there from anywhere). Only the name is required; everything else can be filled in later, with Edit on the client's page.

• Client name, as it should read on invoices.
• Tags: optional labels to group and sort clients (Referral, Agency, Nonprofit). Type one to make it.
• Contact person (shown under their name on invoices) and Phone.
• Billing email: where their invoices are sent. CC on invoices takes more addresses, separated by commas.
• Bill this client: By the hour or By the day. By the day asks for a Day rate, billed for each day with time logged. (This choice shows while Day rates is on in Terms and features.)
• Hourly rate: leave it blank to use the service's or your default rate.
• Payment terms: how long they have to pay. Use default follows your Invoicing settings; or pick Due on receipt, Net 15, Net 30, Net 60, or Custom… for any number of days up to 365. Net 15 means due 15 days after the invoice date.
• Tax ID: theirs, kept with their details.
• Invoice currency: what they're billed in. For a currency other than US dollars, their rates and invoices are in it, so set their hourly rate here (service and default rates are in dollars). When they pay, you record the dollars you received.
• Billing address, printed on their invoices.
• Payment reminders: on, so they're emailed about unpaid invoices whenever reminders are on in Invoicing settings. Turn it off for a client who shouldn't get them.
• Notes: private to you; never shown on invoices.

Click Add Client and their page opens: their details, their projects, a Statement of what they owe and a Time Report.

Your first project#

Clients/Catalina Vineyards

Catalina Vineyards

Dana Whitfield · ap@catalinavineyards.example

StatementTime ReportEdit

Details

Billing

$150.00/hr

Payment terms

Net 15

Billing email

ap@catalinavineyards.example

Projects

Projects group this client's work, and can have their own rate and budget.

Add Project

Step 1 of 4PauseStart over

1. 1On the client's page, click Add Project, and name it. The client is already chosen.
2. 2Choose how it bills: like the client, its own hourly rate, by the day, or a fixed fee.
3. 3Add a budget in hours if you like, to see your progress and your effective rate.
4. 4Click Add Project. Time you track for it now carries its billing.

Projects are optional. Use one to keep a client's pieces of work apart, give one a different rate or a fixed fee, or track hours against a budget. Add one with Add Project on the client's page, or on Projects (which asks for a client first, since every project belongs to one).

• Client and Project name.
• Billing: Like client bills at the client's terms; Hourly takes its own Hourly rate (blank uses the client's or service's); Daily takes a Day rate; Fixed fee takes a Project fee, invoiced whole or in parts (a deposit, milestones). Daily and Fixed fee show while Day rates and Fixed fees are on in Terms and features.
• Budget (hours) and Budget (money), either or both, show your progress as you track. On a fixed fee, the fee is the money budget, and an hours budget tracks your effective rate.
• Starts and Due: with both, the project shows your pace.
• Color, to tell it apart in your time, and Notes.

Your business might call clients and projects something else (customers, matters, jobs, engagements). The words can be changed in Terms and features, and these steps work the same. More on budgets, fees and milestones in Projects.

Your first time and invoice#

With a client set up, the work starts:

1. Track your time on the Time Tracker: start the timer as you work, or add time you already did. See Tracking time.
2. Unbilled time waits on Invoices → To Invoice. Turn it into an invoice, check it, and send it. See Invoicing and getting paid.

Your bank and your assistant#

• Connect your business bank and cards, and their transactions come in on their own for you to review: see Connecting a bank. Or bring statements in from a CSV: see Importing statements.
• Connect Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini or Grok to log time, add expenses and draft invoices for you, with your OK: see Connected assistants.

Finding your way around#

• The sidebar has the Dashboard, then Work, Billing, People and Spending, then Reports. It can collapse to icons for more room.
• Press Esc anywhere for the Command Menu: type to jump to any page or setting, start the timer, or add time, an expense or a client.
• The bell lists what needs a look: a timer left running, overdue invoices, renewals coming up, retainers running low and bank feeds that need you.
• Press ? for Help. The guide for the page you're on is at the top.
• Press ⌘ , (Ctrl , on Windows) for Settings.