Hire only what you need and see who has what

Build your backline list straight from the riders

Book your acts with their set times and add their technical riders in Advancing, and Backline hire fills in for you. Each item sits on the right stage and day, with each act's need quoted from its own rider. If an act brings its own gear, that line stays off your list. Lines too unclear to count are listed for you to check on the rider. When a rider changes, your list changes with it.

Fai checks each rider when it arrives and again when it changes. She also suggests items she finds in the production documents you upload. If a rider changes a figure your team set by hand, the item says Rider changed: review. You then choose the rider's figure or keep yours. A rider never overrides a decision your team made.

• Needs from each rider: each act's need quoted from its own rider
• Unclear lines flagged: with a shortcut to the rider so you can check
• Rider changed: review: use the rider or keep your team's figure

• Advance your acts without chasing email threads
• Work out the backline and production to hire for your event

Hire each item once, for your busiest day

Acts on the same stage and day share gear, so the busiest act's need sets the count. An act that needs its own adds on top. You hire reusable gear once for the busiest day on each stage. Things that get used up, such as drumheads, strings and tape, add up day by day. What the stage already has, or what you own, comes off first. You stop paying for a third set of CDJs that sits in a flight case all weekend.

How we worked this out shows each day and stage behind the number on an item. When the promoter asks why you hired four and not six, you have the answer. Add the stage's technical specs and the kit you own just like a rider. A house PA or your own mixers then come off the count.

Production hire sits beside backline and works out the same way. Add the PA, lighting, staging, power and anything else you hire. Say where each item goes, the days you need it and whether it can be reused. A matching item joins the line already there. Set your load-in days before and load-out days after, and each hire period and per-day price follows. At a conference, add each room's kit the same way.

• Reuse across days: gear hired once, used-up items counted daily
• Your kit first: the stage's specs and your own kit come off
• Production hire: PA, lighting, staging, power and more
• Hire period: load-in and load-out days on each line

Send each supplier only what changed

Fai drafts the email to each supplier with its items, hire dates, and delivery and collection times, for you to check and send. Each time you send, you keep a copy of the list as it was. Items that change afterwards say so, and your next email lists only those changes. Your backline company never builds your show from last month's version.

See each line move from To order through Quoted, Ordered, Confirmed, Delivered and Returned. Items you mark ordered count as committed costs in your event budget. Turn a supplier's priced items into a draft purchase order in one step. Print a clean sheet for any supplier with each item, how many and the hire dates, with delivery and collection at the top.

Need a supplier near a venue you have not worked at before? Describe what you need, and Fai lists local suppliers with their website and contact details.

• Email drafted by Fai: items, dates, delivery and collection
• Send the changes: a short email with only what is new
• Purchase order: a supplier's priced items in one step
• Budget: ordered items counted as committed costs

• Send your event hire lists to suppliers
• Spot an overspend before the invoices arrive

Get orders confirmed and quote prices filled in for you

Give each hire supplier its own page, with no sign-in, and email them the link. On What we ordered from you, the supplier sees each line with its dates, stages and price, and confirms them all at once. If they can only supply fewer, something else or at another price, they ask for a change. They can also ask to move delivery and collection times. You accept or decline each request.

The supplier uploads their quote as a PDF or a photo, or you add one they emailed. Fai checks it against your lines and puts a suggestion on Today with the quoted prices and any substitutes. She also names the lines the quote leaves out or has fewer of. Approve it and the prices fill in on your lines, so nobody types a quote in by hand.

Your supplier always sees each line as it is now. Each new link you send replaces the one before, so only your latest email works. Ask Fai what your suppliers have asked for and where each quote stands.

• Please confirm: each ordered line confirmed by the supplier
• Ask for a change: fewer, something else, another price or other times
• Quotes checked by Fai: prices, substitutes and gaps, for you to approve

• Get hire suppliers to confirm orders and count deliveries for your event

Pay suppliers only for what actually arrived

When a delivery arrives at the dock, your crew counts in how many came and how many are damaged, with a note. When the supplier collects, your crew counts out what went back. Each line then shows how many are short, extra or damaged, and who did the latest count and when.

Open the supplier's purchase order, and What arrived compares each line you ordered with what your crew counted in and back. You see any shortfall or damage in plain words. You query the invoice with the facts in front of you and pay only for what you received. If someone makes a slip at the dock, you undo it in one step.

• Count in: how many arrived and how many are damaged
• Count out: what went back and in what condition
• What arrived: ordered against counted, line by line

• Pay on time and settle each show line by line

Scan kit out and back, and see who has what

Put all your kit on one list. A single tagged item can be a golf buggy or a set of keys. A numbered set can be your radios, and a batch you count can be hi-vis vests. At the kit desk, your team scans the tag with a barcode scanner and the right step opens. Hand kit to a crew member, a volunteer or anyone by name, with a deposit note and a due-back time, as fast as the queue moves.

Take each piece back with its condition. Damaged kit is flagged on the kit list, so nobody hands a faulty radio straight back out. Who has what shows everything that is out, by person or by item, with what is overdue. When a team's shift ends, take all their kit back at once. After the event, ask Fai to draft one reminder to each person who still has kit and approve them on Today. Mark anything lost, and its history stays.

Keep your radio plan beside your kit. It holds each channel as it shows on the radio, who uses it, and each call sign with the person who answers. Print a radio sheet to pin up, and each team's day sheet shows its own channels.

• Scan or search: scan the tag and the right step opens
• Who has what: by person or by item, with what is overdue
• Reminders from Fai: one email each, approved by you
• Radio plan: channels, call signs and who answers

• Hand out radios and kit to your event crew

Rent your spare kit to outside teams at your prices

Press teams, contractors and exhibitors all need radios, buggies and tables. Offer the kit on your list at the price you set for each team. Each team orders from its own page with no sign-in, choosing the dates and where the kit goes. Availability always comes from your kit list, so you never promise a team what your own crew needs.

Add your own cost to see your margin on each order. Set the most one team can order and a last day to order. Choose which kinds of team can order each item, so stand furniture goes to exhibitors and radios to the press. Approve an order and the kit is held for that team straight away, with an invoice the team pays from its page.

Print a pick list of approved orders by day and place. Hand each order out, and the team shows in Who has what as the kit's holder. Take it back line by line with its condition. At your next event, the team can order the same again in one step.

• Your price list: what each team pays, with your margin
• Held on approval: kit you approve cannot be promised twice
• Pick list: by day and by place, ready to print
• Invoice: for each priced order, paid from the team's page

• Let outside teams order kit and equipment for your event

Have each supplier's insurance and paperwork before load-in

Ask your suppliers, caterers and contractors for public liability insurance, a risk assessment or a method statement. You can also ask for a food hygiene, gas safety or electrical safety certificate. Set a due date and say what the file must show. Each team adds the file on its own page. Teams of the same kind that you add later get asked too.

Under each file, Fai shows what she found in it, such as the expiry date, the cover and the name it insures. She flags what does not match, like a policy that ends before your event does. Accept the file with its expiry date confirmed, or send it back with what needs to change. The team gets an email in its own language.

Each request shows which teams are done, which files need checking, who is overdue and what expires soon. Let Fai suggest each reminder on Today, or turn on reminders before the due date and before an accepted file expires. Accepted files sit under each team in Licences and certificates, beside your traders' certificates.

• Common documents: insurance, RAMS and safety certificates
• What Fai found: expiry date, cover and who it insures
• Reminders: before the due date and before expiry

• Collect insurance and certificates from your event's outside teams