The story behind PhaseContract
Built from a real
trade-business problem,
not a whiteboard.
I studied engineering, went into the trades, and got tired of chasing three-month-old invoices. So I built the tool I actually needed — one job record the client approves up front, with payment and review built in.
How it started
I went into the trades to escape bureaucracy. Then I met the invoice.
I started in computer science, then switched to mechatronics engineering — I wanted to build cool things. University felt too academic, so afterward I took a normal engineering job. It became a living hell: dumb meetings, slow corporate processes that resisted every common-sense improvement, and nothing ever really getting done. So I quit and went into the trades — small general contracting and handyman work, mostly by myself. The work is good. You use your hands and your head at the same time.
The part I didn't like was getting paid. A couple of weeks late I could live with — annoying, but I've got rent to pay too. The real ones dragged three months: eight texts, four calls, "hey, that invoice is still open," and still nothing. I got stiffed outright a couple of times, and a mechanics lien was so slow it usually cost more in admin than the job was worth.
Then it clicked. "Invoice now, pay later" can never really work, because it always hangs on "next Friday," "waiting on a paycheck," or "let me move some money around." Every other industry already runs pay-first — you pay, then you get the thing. Only manual labor does it backwards. So I stopped hunting for a better invoice app and built PhaseContract.
It is for electricians, painters, installers, landscapers, cleaners, remodelers, and other trade businesses that want the deal to be as clear as the work.
August 2023. This is the job where the idea finally stopped feeling theoretical. The client moved the next day and never paid. That was the moment the payment problem stopped feeling like bad luck and started looking like a structural failure.
The loop I kept living
I could do everything right on the work and still lose on the deal.
I'd finish a job clean, then start the payment conversation from scratch — like the work hadn't already happened.
Send the invoice. Follow up. Follow up again. Sit there doing the math on whether a mechanics lien was even worth the paperwork.
Try one more back-office app — dozens of features, and never the single one I actually needed.
The conclusion
Make the invoice a receipt, not a request for payment.
Every other industry collects before it delivers. Trade work runs in reverse — do the work first, then chase the money with texts, calls, and excuses. PhaseContract flips it with a lightweight, pseudo-escrow structure: the client funds the work phase at the start, a payment processor holds it, and it releases to you once the pre-agreed conditions are met. By the time you hand over an invoice, it's already paid — a receipt, not a request.
So that's what I built — and honestly, all I ever wanted it to do is this. Describe the work in your own words. Turn it into deposits and work phases. The client approves one job record. The payment step runs when each work phase begins, and your payout releases once the work is reviewed or auto-approved.
Describe the work like you'd say it out loud.
Break it into clear deposits, work phases, and changes.
Let the client approve one job record they can actually read.
Keep proof, review, payment, and payout attached to the same work phase.
What I won't compromise on
These aren't slogans. They're the rules I build by.
Sort the deal out before the work gets messy
Most of the conflict I ran into wasn't about the work itself. It started because scope, timing, payment, and approval were never nailed down at the beginning. Getting that clear up front is a lot cheaper than a lien later — I learned that the expensive way.
Built for the truck, not the back office
I'm not sitting at a desk, and neither are you. The job record has to open fast, take voice input, and stay out of the way while you're on the clock — not ask you for another spreadsheet at nine at night.
Fair for both sides, or I won't ship it
Clients get clarity and real review rights. Contractors get a clear path to payment and payout. Structure that only protects one side isn't structure — it's leverage, and I didn't get into this to build that.
Why I keep building it
People who do real work deserve to get paid like it's normal — because it should be.
Not another dashboard full of charts nobody opens. Not another invoice app that wakes up after the work is already done. The job should be easy to explain, easy to approve, easy to run, and easy to close — without a single follow-up text about a three-month-old invoice. If you do good work, that's the least the tooling owes you.
"I built the thing I needed on a job site. If it saves you one awkward 'hey, that invoice is still open' text, it's doing its job."