Guides & how-tos
Short, plain-language guides to what Summit Hub does and how to use it.
Browse help guides
Getting started
Set up your account and learn the essentials.
- Signing in with a password, and two-factor authenticationSigning in with an emailed link works well, but some people would rather use a password, especially on a shared or slow-to-check inbox.
- Field accounts for on-site team membersField accounts give people working on site the job scope and customer details they need without exposing office or financial information.
- Getting started with Summit HubGetting from "I've heard about Summit Hub" to a running workspace with your pipeline ready, your team invited, and your tools connected.
- The Help centreThe guides that explain how each part of Summit Hub works are published in two places:
- NavigationTwo separate menus, both built to stay usable on a laptop-sized screen as the product has grown:
- Searching (and mistyping)Every search box in Summit Hub forgives a small typo.
- When something goes wrongWhen something you do in Summit Hub can't be completed — a save is refused, a page can't load its data, a link no longer works — you see one plain message instead of technical tex…
Your business
Shape your business, team, settings and financial view.
- Activity history"Who moved this job to Approved?" "When did that to-do get reassigned?" Activity history answers those without anyone having to remember.
- "Summit Hub has been updated" noticeEvery so often a new version of Summit Hub goes live.
- Your branding on the client experienceMake the client-facing side of the app look like your business, not ours.
- Category & Excel export configurationWho can use it: account owners (Settings → Category & Excel Configuration, at /admin/settings/categories).
- Closing your accountIf Summit Hub isn't for you any more, you shouldn't have to email someone and wait.
- Contractors: your subbies, in one listMost companies keep their subbies in a phone contact list, a spreadsheet, or their head.
- Your dashboardThe dashboard is the first screen you see when you sign in.
- Notification emailsSummit Hub has always shown notifications in the bell menu at the top of the screen.
- NotificationsNotifications tell you when something needs your attention: a task is assigned to you, a task you raised is finished, someone comments, a deal moves stage, a reminder comes due, o…
- Pipelines & stagesWho can use it.
- Plan and billingOne place to check where your subscription stands: which plan you're on, when you'll next be charged, how much of the plan you're using, and where to change your card or plan.
- The Privacy PolicyHow Summit Hub handles personal information is set out in our privacy policy.
- Region & tax settingsRecords the regional facts your organisation works in: the currency amounts are shown in, the number and date format, your timezone, and what you call your sales tax plus its rate.
- Sending emails from your own domainYour automation emails (workflow emails, team notifications) can come from your own address, like office@yourcompany.co.nz, instead of the platform address.
- The Terms of ServiceThe rules for using Summit Hub — the agreement between Summit Hub Limited and your business — live at [summithub.co.nz/terms](https://summithub.co.nz/terms).
Day-to-day work
Manage deals, estimates, costs and schedules.
- Cost usage by category (the client's cost chart)It answers the one question a client asks all the way through a build: how much of my job have I actually been billed for so far?
- Daily logs: a site diary for every jobWrite down what actually happened on site today: the weather, who was there, what got done, what held you up, who visited and anything safety-related.
- Editing a deal property from the cardThe About this deal card shows what HubSpot holds for a deal.
- Building out the deal cardEvery deal page opens on an About this deal card.
- The sectioned Details form on a dealYour deal properties normally show up as one long list.
- Rolling the sectioned Details form onto deals you already haveYou've turned on [the sectioned Details form](/help/deal-detail-form), or you're about to, and the deal list still shows every field you've ever had, in the order they arrived.
- Finding your way around a dealA deal used to show every section in one long row of tabs.
- Deal propertiesA deal comes with the fields everyone needs: a name, an amount, a close date, a stage.
- Deals with several Buildxact jobsA deal can be linked to more than one Buildxact job, for example a "Site Works" job and a later "Extension" job for the same client.
- Deleting a dealA duplicate.
- What happens when an estimate is acceptedWho it's for: owners (Settings → Estimates & quotes).
- Downloading a quote as a PDFTurn a native estimate into a tidy, client-ready quote PDF you can email or print, with your own logo, colours, terms and payment details.
- Line-item specifications: a price-free spec sheet for your field crewFlag any line item on a native estimate as needing a written specification, write that description once, attach photos, and hand your field crew or quantity surveyor a price-free…
- Estimating settings: your P&G rateSets the Preliminary & General loading your estimates carry.
- Job scheduling: a drag-and-drop timeline for every jobLay out a job as a set of tasks on a timeline, drag them around or resize them as dates change, wire up which tasks depend on which, and see every scheduled job across the company…
- Logged emails on a dealWho can use it.
- Pipeline boardThe Pipeline page is your board of every deal, laid out as columns: one per stage (New Lead, Quoting, Quote Sent, and so on).
- Price BookYour own list of codes for the things you buy and the labour you sell: 4x2 timber, 90mm nails, a box of glue, a carpenter's hourly rate, each with the price you're paying today.
- Quote templates: multiple quote layouts you can pick fromBuild more than one quote PDF layout for your business: a cover page, a personal cover letter, an image gallery of past work, pricing, terms and payment details, and choose which…
- Request for quotesOpen a deal's Requests For Quotes tab to get prices from your trade partners.
- Job calendars in Google Calendar, Outlook and Apple CalendarEvery job's schedule can be subscribed to from the calendar app you already use.
- Task remindersSome jobs aren't due yet, they're just easy to forget.
- Xero category rules: tag invoice lines by their Xero codeMost cost lines land in the same category every single time.
- Xero invoice defaultsWhen an estimate is approved, the app raises a draft invoice in Xero for you.
- A deal's Xero invoicesEvery deal shows the Xero invoices raised against its customer, with the running money picture above them.
Connected workflows
Connect your apps, client experience and automation workflows.
- The AI assistant: ask, don't typeChoose AI Assistant from the Work menu to open its full workspace.
- Client form blockSometimes a quick decision, checklist, or single question block isn't enough: you want to ask a client a short set of questions all at once and get one clean set of answers back,…
- Showing a client the scheduleYour client's project page has an Overview tab and a Financial tab.
- The client portalThe client portal gives every customer a live, branded window into their build, where the job is up to, the decisions they need to make, the documents you've shared, and a running…
- Connecting HubSpotThe app reads your HubSpot deals and contacts to line each job up with the deal it came from and keep pipeline, contacts, and activity in sync.
- Connecting XeroThe app reads your Xero invoices and contacts to show what's been billed, what's paid, and what's still to come on each job.
- Email loggingWho can use it.
- Matching your HubSpot pipeline to Summit's project statusesSummit tracks every job through six statuses: lead, quoting, approved, in progress, complete, archived.
- Website lead-capture formsInstead of enquiries landing in an inbox (or in a HubSpot form), a lead-capture form drops them straight into your pipeline.
- Tables on a client portal pageA table is the right shape for anything you'd otherwise write out as a list of items with a status against each: notes and changes, selections, variations, a schedule of finishes.
- Notify whoever answered, or the people on the jobWho it's for: anyone who builds workflows (Settings → Workflows).
- A form that already creates a deal, and an automation that makes anotherWho can use it.