Ballpark

We launched a new feature today that makes getting estimates and invoices into your clients’ hands even easier. When you send an estimate or invoice, you’ll now see an option to attach the PDF version to the email that Ballpark sends to your client. Many clients like having a PDF copy saved for their records, and now they can receive it along with their link to view it online.

We also added new text to the end of each email that reads: “View, print, or comment on this estimate online” and a complete URL for their reference. This note is meant to help alleviate any confusion clients might have about where the estimate or invoice is or how they can get to it.

In response to feedback from the community, we also removed the “Delivered by Ballpark” and “Sent with Ballpark” footnotes from the email notifications and the client view on all paid accounts. This means that you and your clients will no longer see any form of Ballpark branding.

We’re happy to announce the launch of a brand new version of Ballpark as of late Monday night. The new version features a complete ground-up rewrite of all of the code that Ballpark runs on. It was quite an ambitious goal, but the effort definitely paid off.

Our primary goal was to improve speed and reliability. We also improved consistency throughout the code that will make it easier for us to proactively prevent bugs and make sure Ballpark just works.

New Features

We made small improvements to Ballpark everywhere we could, but we also launched a few more noticeable new features that we’ll highlight here:

• Managing multiple users in Ballpark is now more straightforward. Instead of deleting users you can now “Archive” them, which will disable their access but guarantee that the logical flow and timeline of activity and comment threads is always kept.
• Scheduling recurring invoices is more flexible. You can now specify an arbitrary interval between recurring invoices (e.g. 2 weeks, or 3 months), which means that you can set biweekly, quarterly, and biannual intervals.
• PDF invoices and estimates now include the full contact information of the recipient as required by law in some locations.

Wrapping Up

We’re still working on finishing up some features in the new version, and we will be launching those as they are completed in the next few weeks.

One of the major benefits of this new version is that it will make new feature development easier, and we’ve already started to lay the foundation for some exciting new additions. We’re looking forward to introducing those later this year.

Although we’re rather fond of the distinctive style of Ballpark, we wanted to provide our users with a pared down, minimal alternative to the “Airmail” style template. For those who would prefer a neutral aesthetic for their invoices and estimates, you can now use the “Simple” template.

If you’d like to make the switch, just head to your account’s Settings screen, and then the Defaults tab, and you’ll find an area labelled “Invoice & Estimate Template”,  with the default Airmail option and the new Simple option.

For our UK/European users who, for tax reasons, are required to include their client’s address on invoices, your client’s contact information will appear alongside your own in the Simple template.

The team has heard the call for a more personalized and brand consistent experience with Ballpark, and one of the most professional touches you can present to a client is your own domain name. Head to the Settings screen of your account, and you’ll find a new Custom Domain tab where you can get started.

There are a couple of caveats to bear in mind with this new feature. One is that SSL will not be enabled when using a custom domain, and the other is that this feature is only available for users at the Studio subscription level and above.

Now you can stay informed about all of your dashboard activities right from the desktop. Simply download and install Ballpark Notifier and link it to your Ballpark account. A handy icon will appear in your menu bar, and you can receive your choice of built-in or Growl notifications.

Update 2 Nov 10: Ballpark Notifier is temporarily unavailable while we upgrade our API. We’ll post another update when it’s available again.

We’ve just finished working on a great new feature for Ballpark users. It’s becoming more and more common for people to use their iPhones for just about everything, and now keeping your estimates and invoices in order with Ballpark is on that list.

Users can navigate to the Ballpark dashboard on their iPhone and be greeted with an optimized view of their activities. Even the browser controls will disappear for a more complete application experience.

Adding Ballpark to the home screen will display a custom icon that fits right in with the rest of your applications. For those inclined to do so, that same icon will appear when creating a desktop version of Ballpark with Fluid.

Head to Ballpark on your iPhone now to check out the new dashboard!

We just completely revamped our pricing structure. Plans now start at $6 and up, and we’ve added unlimited estimates, SSL, and PayPal instant payments across the board. Existing plans have been automatically updated and the new features should be live immediately.

Check out the new plans on the sign up page

Universal Live Search
Live search is now available at the click of a button. Just click the magnifying glass in the navigation bar and start typing to search across invoices, estimates, and contacts.

Improved Contact Management
You can now keep track of additional contact information, view recent activity across all invoices and estimates, and keep notes about each client.

Notes are especially useful if you’re working with a team. While Ballpark has always had internal comment threads for specific invoices and estimates, notes are a great way to let your team know that you’ve been in contact with a client, keep track of background information (how you met, their birthday) and ensure that everyone is on the same page.

Send Invoices and Estimates to Multiple Recipients
Need to send a copy to accounting? No problem. You can now enter multiple recipients on the fly.

FreshBooks Import
We’ve also added the ability to import your FreshBooks clients into Ballpark in seconds. Just click on “Settings” and hit the “Import” tab.

As always, let us know if you have any questions about the new features. We hope that you enjoy them as much as we do. More on the way!

We just pushed one of the biggest changes to Ballpark yet, a completely redesigned client view. The client view is what a client sees when you send an invoice or estimate. When we started building Ballpark last year, we were simply going to send invoices and estimates as PDFs attachments via email. As a result of this, the web-based client was an afterthought, a stopgap that we threw together quickly to meet our launch deadline.

We spent the last few weeks redesigning the client view from the ground up and we couldn’t be happier with the new look. We might be biased, but we think we’ve got the slickest invoices around.

View full-size

View Recent Invoices & Estimates
In addition to the new look, we’ve also added the ability to view recent invoices and estimates that you have been sent. When your client visits the invoice or estimate, they will now see a drop-down that shows them their most recent invoices and estimates as well as the status (open, overdue or paid).

The dropdown shows your their 5 most recent invoices and estimates across all Ballpark accounts and color codes them yellow for open, red for overdue, and green for paid.

Make Payments in Any Amount
We’ve also added the ability to specify the payment amount. In the old client view, clicking “Pay via PayPal” would simply redirect you to PayPal and ask you to pay the full balance, with no option to change the amount. It meant that if you wanted your client to cover PayPal fees, or make a partial payment, they had to bypass Ballpark completely.

Now when your client clicks “Make a Payment”, they’ll have the ability to specify the amount.

We hope you enjoy the new client view. Let us know if you have any questions or comments.

Today we’re adding two highly requested features to Ballpark: recurring invoicing and estimate to invoice conversion.

Recurring Invoicing

Recurring invoices make it easy to automatically send clients an invoice on a weekly or monthly schedule. For instance, if you work on a monthly retainer, Ballpark can automatically send your client an invoice for that month’s hours each month.

To create a recurring invoice, click on “Create a New Invoice”, enable recurring billing by flipping the switch to “On”, tell Ballpark if you want your recurring invoice to be drafted or sent automatically, then punch in the date. Once your recurring invoice has been created, you can edit its details by selecting the invoice in the recurring invoices section in your invoices dashboard.

Estimate to Invoice Conversion

We’ve also added the ability to quickly convert an estimate to an invoice. Once a client accepts your estimate, you can convert it into an invoice with the click of a button, make any necessary changes, and send it off immediately.

To convert an estimate to an invoice, simply click the “Convert to Invoice” button that appears in the sidebar once you mark your estimate as accepted.

Textile Markup Support

We’ve also added full textile markup support in comments and notes.

We hope you enjoy these additions! As always, if there’s something you’re itching to see in Ballpark, please let us know on our customer support community.