Documentation

These fifteen concepts will make it easy to start using PestaRoo and improve your business! Most of us hate reading directions, but these 15 items will give you a sizable boost. You’ll be a power user in no time!!

When a home is purchased, the financier usually requires a Termite Inspection. Using this system to trigger the sending of a letter 90 days later (and probably after the closing) is a great way to earn new business. PestaRoo makes this easy with autoprinting ʼ90 Day Lettersʼ.

Let’s take a walk through a day at a typical company with three technicians but only one person in the office. We will review those things that mark a normal day and how they fit into the general flow. We’ll look at a handful of tasks that PestaRoo will help you manage.

You can add any of these 4 graphic objects to “Images” in Agreements, Customers, Inspections, and Locations. In many cases a picture is worth a 1000 words! Store contracts, letters, inspection photos, and more. Wow!!

One of the very valuable functions of PestaRoo is its ability to handle Renewals for Agreements. Up to three reminder letters (or Call Sheets) can be automatically printed with the text of your choice and the interval. You may have different letter text and in- tervals for the different Types of Agreements. Semi-Automatic and Fully Automatic methods are supported.

How do you NOT forget to followup on something you promised for a Customer or Agency? Use PestaRoo’s Alerts! They allow you to create reminders for any date in the future for any Customer, Agency, Staff or Vehicle! And when they do come due, it shows up as a red labeled button on Home Page!

PestaRoo provides an automated charge card payment system. This system is a valuable time-saving tool, allowing a customer’s charge card information to be entered once, securely stored as a token, and used continuously thereafter, saving tremendous data entry time.

Here are a few things that you need to do or track down before you start using PestaRoo. Most of these drive value lists and so ease the use of PestaRoo. Tend to these items and you’ll be up to speed in no time!

Sometimes your customers will want to pay in advance for services when they have no open invoices. How does PestaRoo track this money so that it is immediately available for future invoices? This is what Credits are for...

Treatment Areas appear as checkboxes on your printed Work Orders. These may be customized for each Work Order and even at the PreScheds that create Work Orders. This can be a nice time saver for your technician while improving upon your company’s disclosures.

Ranking your customers, finding those who only use a single service, or those who use one but not another service, or those that spend more than XX dollars on a given service are powerful tools for marketing your business. PestaRoo is the only pest control software that gives you this extremely powerful tool that can be used to grow your business.

Filters are an aid to speedy data entry. They allow you to quickly select a specific customer even if you have thousands. Pesta- Roo uses them in many places. Filters enhance your productivity.

Learning to work with Customers and Locations mean recognizing the difference between these two things . . . A Customer is who pays us, while a Location is where we do our work. Many accounting systems do not recognize this difference that is so key to our industry.


Most pest control companies make a deposit each day. PestaRoo helps with this daily chore by keeping track of your payments as you receive them and compiling them into a deposit report.

PestaRoo performs several functions upon file launch, these are called AutoTriggers. If your company has more than one com- puter running PestaRoo, then it is crucial for you to designate one of your computers as the AutoTrigger computer. This avoids potential data duplication and other messy errors.


If your company ever wants to give Discounts to customers or add Surcharges to Work Orders or Invoices, it’s quite easy to do with PestaRoo! The following shows how this can be done.

When people switch to PestaRoo from other software packages, they often want to enter some of their legacy invoice data. Typically, this is for those invoices still ‘Open’. This support document gives a simple overview of this process.

As one of the first steps in Getting Started, you need to tell! PestaRoo a little more about your company.

Occasionally PestaRoo will give you an error message that indi- cates a potential problem. This document summarizes the two most common and suggests appropriate responses.

No matter what we want to find, a work order, staff, invoice, cus- tomer, location, or the use of a single product the process is the same. One of PestaRoo’s greatest strengths is the ease with which it lets you find records. You’ll come to love it for this feature alone!


There are many situations in business where we need to send a similar letter or email to several or even lots of people. PestaRoo’s Form Letter component lets you design and send an un- limited number of form letters to any group of Customers or Agencies.

PestaRoo’s structure allows importing from a wide variety of data sources. Typically these are spreadsheets or tab separated lists. You can easily bring in multiple types of data: Customers, Loca- tions and Contact Details.

FileMaker and PestaRoo must both be installed on your computer. FileMaker 12 is the engine behind the magic of PestaRoo. Proper installation insures that everything works as designed.


FileMaker must be installed on each machine, whereas PestaRoo will only be installed on the ‘Host’ computer. This document explains how to install each copy of FileMaker, the ‘Host’ copy of PestaRoo, and how to connect to PestaRoo from other computers.

PestaRoo was built behind the scenes using the incredibly powerful software of FileMaker Pro (FMP). Here we summarize a few common interface elements used throughout PestaRoo.

After we complete a Work Order the details including the products used and the final charge must be put onto an Invoice for billing and long-term record keeping. PestaRoo makes this process quick and easy. The different ways to approach this are described.

How to set up PestaRoo Mobile on your iPad(s) if you are a Premier user.

If you want to access PestaRoo from a computer outside of the office, or maybe use the PestaRoo Dashboard from your iPhone, or sync PestaRoo Mobile from out in the field, you will need to allow network access to PestaRoo. Here’s how you configure your local network....


PestaRoo is protected by several layers and types of passwords. This protects your confidential data from local and safeguards you from internet hacks.

Payments can be initiated from a Customer or an Invoice. In either case, they can be quickly made and posted. Special options are also covered.

This is one of those ways that PestaRoo can boost your sales and make you money. It is based on the careful printing of mailing labels for sending preprinted postcards. The most reliable way to grow any business is to provides additional services to customers you already have.

PestaRoo’s PreSched system automatically creates Work Orders for you via recurring intervals. With PreScheds you can control every aspects of these auto-created Work Orders. Never miss another service call again! The PreSched system is a very effective tool in boosting your sales.

PestaRoo uses a very effective technique to select which products to print on each WO. This list of Products varies depending on which service you have selected and which products you have designated as your default products.

PestaRoo supports QuickBooks integration as a powerful tool to meet your pest control needs AND your financial accounting needs.

Everyone eventually makes the mistake of deleting a customer, only to find that they deleted the wrong one.... So, how do you retrieve a record from a backup copy of PestaRoo? Learn how to do this so that all related data is preserved.

PestaRoo is based upon FileMaker Pro, which does a wonderful job preventing damage and protecting your data. But even FileMaker can’t protect your file from a power outage. If your copy of PestaRoo is damaged there is a straight forward way to repair the damage and get back to work. These directions work for Server-based or client-based installations.

PestaRoo provides a fully automated Reminder System. Reminders is a powerful, time-saving tool to quickly and easily communicate with customers regarding their upcoming service date. You may send Text messages, emails, or print call sheets from this system.

If you take the time to setup your Routes carefully, PestaRoo’s Route system will save your company far more money than the cost of PestaRoo. A day spent in this setup will pay long-term dividends. Although there are several ways to use Routes, the a!pproach that follows is the most common and effective.

PestaRoo’s Schedule Book lets you manage any number of technicians quickly, with a visual interface. It displays his/her Work Orders (WOs) for any date, in time order. It includes Hot Links for Routes, Blue Triangles for navigating, and buttons for instant scheduling on any Tech/Date combination.

If you want to quickly access key information, and you want your database available at your fingertips, then PestaRoo Dashboard is for you. This article will guide you through the setup process so that you can start using PestaRoo Dashboard ASAP!

Purchasing an existing customer base from another company and/or running promotions are two methods for expanding your business. ‘Sources’ makes it easy to track sales generated by these two methods so you can evaluate their effectiveness.

Keep track of you scheduled and unscheduled maintenance in one place. PestaRoo supports an unlimited number of vehicles, with any number of maintenance, cost, and note records each. Alerts for upcoming maintenance are also supported.

Getting new customers and keeping them is the hardest thing for any growing business. Automatically sending a ‘Thank You’ letter is a key part of retention. PestaRoo makes this easy with auto printing ‘Welcome Letters’.

Work Orders (WOs) and Invoices are totally different concepts. Work Orders (also called Job Tickets) describe what we intend to do. Invoices are built once we have done the work. Working with both is core to your business and running it successfully.