Work orders · Guide
Free general maintenance work order template
Choose your country below to open the work order maker with this preset selected.
A general maintenance work order covers the everyday jobs that keep a building, a piece of equipment or a site running: a leaking tap, a broken light fitting, a jammed door, a gutter that needs clearing. It is the paper trail between "something is broken" and "it is fixed", and it matters more than most small businesses treat it.
Why a maintenance work order matters
Without a written work order, a maintenance job lives only in a phone call or a text message: what was asked for, what was actually found on site, and what was done to fix it. That is fine until a customer disputes the bill, a part fails again a week later, or a landlord asks for proof a repair was carried out. A work order fixes the record before any of that happens: the site address, who requested the job, the date it was scheduled, and a line-by-line list of parts and labour used.
What to include
A clear general maintenance work order shows: a work order number so every job can be referred to later; your business details and the customer's; the site address, which is often different from the customer's billing address; who requested the work and when it was scheduled; each part used and each hour of labour, priced separately so the customer can see where the cost comes from; and a space for the customer, or whoever is on site, to sign off that the work was completed to their satisfaction.
Parts and labour, kept separate
Splitting parts from labour on the line items is not a legal requirement in most places, but it is good practice: a customer who can see "callout and one hour's labour" against "replacement tap washer" trusts the bill more than one that just says "repairs, $180". It also makes it far easier to work out your own margins over a run of similar jobs.
Turning it into an invoice
Once the work is signed off, there is no reason to type the job out again. Papertern's work order maker carries your business, the customer and every line straight into the invoice maker with one click, so the invoice matches the work order exactly.
Work order makers by country
Each country edition uses the same tax name and business ID field as that country's invoice maker, with this preset selected.
| Country | Business ID field | Tax |
|---|---|---|
| Australia | ABN | GST |
| New Zealand | GST no. | GST |
| United Kingdom | VAT no. | VAT |
| Ireland | VAT no. | VAT |
| Canada | GST/HST no. | GST/HST |
| United States | EIN | Sales tax |
| Singapore | GST reg. no. | GST |