QuoteShield vs Fergus
Fergus manages your jobs. QuoteShield makes sure only the right jobs get there. Here's why serious tradies use both.
Overview
Fergus is field service and job management software built specifically for trade businesses. At $49/user/month, it handles quoting, job scheduling, purchase orders, invoicing, and financial reporting — the full back-office workflow from quote won to invoice paid. It's particularly strong for electrical, plumbing, and other licensed trades that need job costing and compliance documentation.
QuoteShield solves a completely different problem. It sits on your website and qualifies incoming enquiries before you ever spend time preparing a formal quote. Using AI, it analyses customer-submitted photos, estimates the job scope, and scores each lead — letting you focus your Fergus quoting time on the leads that are actually worth winning.
Think of it this way: Fergus is where you manage the work. QuoteShield is what determines which work gets to Fergus. Together, they create a complete, AI-powered workflow from first customer contact to final invoice — with no wasted hours on enquiries that were never going to convert.
Feature Comparison
| Feature | QuoteShield | Fergus |
|---|---|---|
| Primary function | Lead qualification — AI scores incoming enquiries before you respond | Job management — quoting, scheduling, purchase orders, invoicing, and financial reporting |
| AI lead scoring | Every lead scored by AI — budget signals, job scope, urgency, and tyre-kicker detection | No lead scoring. Fergus starts from when you've decided to quote a job |
| Photo analysis | AI analyses customer-uploaded photos to assess job scope and complexity before quoting | Photos can be attached to jobs — no automated AI analysis of job scope |
| AI quote estimation | AI estimates a price range based on photos and description to help you decide whether to quote | Detailed quoting tool with labour, materials, and markup — but requires manual input |
| Job management | Not a job management tool — lead qualification only | Full job management: work orders, scheduling, field notes, and compliance docs |
| Formal quoting | AI estimate to help you decide IF to quote — not a formal quoting platform | Professional quote builder with templates, line items, labour rates, and client sign-off |
| Invoicing & financials | Not included | Full invoicing, job costing, purchase orders, and financial reporting |
| Website widget | Embeds on your website — customers submit job requests with photos directly to you | No embeddable widget — Fergus is a back-office platform, not customer-facing |
| Real-time lead notifications | Instant push and email notifications with AI summary when a new lead arrives | Job and schedule notifications for your team — not lead notifications |
| Pricing | Free tier (20 leads/month) or $29/month flat for unlimited leads | $49/user/month — scales with team size |
Pricing
QuoteShield
Free: Free tier — 20 leads/month with full AI analysis
Paid: $29/month — unlimited leads, priority support
Fergus
Fergus charges $49 per user per month (billed monthly), with discounts on annual plans. A 3-person team pays around $147/month. They offer a free trial period. Check fergus.com for current pricing and plan details.
Best For
QuoteShield
Best for tradies who want to stop wasting time on bad enquiries — AI qualifies leads from your website before you spend time preparing formal quotes in tools like Fergus
Fergus
Best for trade businesses that need comprehensive back-office management — quoting, job scheduling, purchase orders, invoicing, and financial reporting all in one platform
Key Differences
QuoteShield works BEFORE a lead enters Fergus — qualifying it with AI so you only quote jobs worth winning. Fergus takes over once you decide to pursue a job.
QuoteShield is customer-facing (an embeddable widget on your website). Fergus is a back-office tool used internally by you and your team.
QuoteShield uses AI to analyse lead photos and estimate job value. Fergus has a detailed manual quoting tool for building formal, itemised quotes.
At $29/month, QuoteShield adds AI lead intelligence to your workflow without duplicating what Fergus already does — they stack, not overlap.
The Verdict
QuoteShield and Fergus cover different ends of the same workflow — and using both is how serious trade businesses eliminate wasted time.
Here's the typical flow: A potential customer finds you and submits an enquiry through your QuoteShield widget. AI analyses their photos, estimates the job scope ($1,800–$2,400), and scores the lead as high priority. You contact them, visit the site, and decide to quote. That job goes into Fergus — you build a detailed quote, schedule the work, manage materials, and invoice when done.
Without QuoteShield, some of the leads going into Fergus would be dead ends — unrealistic budgets, vague scope, or tyre-kickers who'll never commit. QuoteShield filters those out before you spend quoting time on them.
For electricians, plumbers, and other licensed trades already running Fergus for job management, adding QuoteShield at $29/month is one of the highest-ROI decisions you can make. You save hours every week on bad enquiries, and every lead that reaches Fergus has already been AI-qualified.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Fergus have a lead capture widget for my website?
No. Fergus is a back-office job management platform — it handles jobs you've already decided to pursue. For capturing and qualifying leads from your website, QuoteShield's AI widget does that. The two tools complement each other at different stages of your workflow.
Can QuoteShield replace Fergus?
No — they do fundamentally different things. QuoteShield qualifies leads before you quote. Fergus manages jobs, scheduling, materials, invoicing, and financial reporting once you've won the work. For a complete workflow, you need both.
Do QuoteShield and Fergus integrate?
Not natively at this stage. The typical workflow is: a lead comes in via QuoteShield → you qualify and contact them → you win the job and create it in Fergus. Many tradies copy the relevant details across manually. A direct integration is something we're exploring for the future.
If I'm already paying $49/user/month for Fergus, is QuoteShield worth an extra $29/month?
Do the maths on your own time. If QuoteShield saves you from chasing even one dead-end enquiry per week — say 45 minutes of your time — and you value your time at $80/hour, that's $260/month in recovered time. At $29/month, it pays for itself many times over. Plus, it means every lead that reaches Fergus is already AI-qualified, making your Fergus quoting time more efficient too.
QuoteShield for Your Trade
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