Software comparison
Tradify vs Fergus for a 3 person Australian plumbing crew
Tradify prices per user: Pro is $52 a month per person before GST, $171.60 for 3 people with GST added. Fergus prices per plan: Professional is from $77 a month, though its page does not state how many staff that covers. Both are New Zealand built and neither is ServiceM8, so this page judges them on their own terms. Checked 25 September 2026.
Last checked 25 Sep 2026 against the sources listed at the end of this page.
Tradify
Pick Tradify if you want a price that scales predictably and exactly with headcount, and you are comfortable paying per person even as your crew grows.
Fergus
Pick Fergus if its Professional feature set fits and you confirm directly how many staff the base price covers, since that is the one thing its own page will not tell you.
What it costs
Tradify: AUD per user per month, excluding GST as published; we added 10 per cent GST to show what you actually pay. Fergus: AUD per month, published per plan rather than per user; the page does not label prices as GST inclusive or exclusive, though its FAQ says Fergus applies GST on invoices it generates.. Prices captured 25 Sep 2026 from Tradify and Fergus.
| Plan | 1 user | 3 users | 8 users | How we worked it out | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tradify | Pro | $57.20 | $171.60 | $457.60 | Pro lists at $52 a month per user before GST: $57.20 with GST for one user, $171.60 for three, $457.60 for eight. This scales exactly with headcount because Tradify bills per person. |
| Fergus | Professional | $77 | $77 | $77 or Enterprise quote past 10 staff | Fergus's Professional price is published as "from $77 per month" with no stated seat cap, so the figure does not change on the page between 1 and 8 users. Past 10 staff, Fergus moves you to Enterprise on a custom quote. |
Feature by feature
| Tradify | Fergus | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Per user, per month. Cost rises with every added person. | Per plan, per month. The page does not say how many staff the price covers. |
| Health and safety compliance | Health and safety forms and compliance certificates on Pro and Plus. | Hazards and SWMS on Professional. |
| Job photos | Included on Pro and Plus. | Not named as a separate line item; File & Photos is included on both Essentials and Professional. |
| Purchase orders | Plus only. | Professional only. |
| Accounting links | Xero, QuickBooks Online, and in Australia MYOB AccountRight and MYOB Essentials (Essentials limited to customers and invoices). | Xero, QuickBooks and MYOB, listed as included on both plans. |
| Offline access | No. Tradify's help centre says both the web console and app need a live internet connection. | Not stated on the pricing page. |
Declared bias: we build on ServiceM8
FFP Digital is a ServiceM8 developer, and neither Tradify nor Fergus is the tool we build for, so we do not have the same stake in this particular comparison that we would in a ServiceM8 page. We still think ServiceM8 is worth a look for a 3 person plumbing crew, and we say so, but the verdict below is between these two tools on their own published numbers and features.
We do not earn a commission from either vendor for this page.
Two different ideas of what you pay for
Tradify charges per person, per month, in AUD, ex GST: $48 for Lite, $52 for Pro and $62 for Plus. A 3 person plumbing crew on Pro pays $52 times three, plus 10 per cent GST, which comes to $171.60 a month. Add a fourth person and the cost rises by the same amount again, every time, because the price is tied directly to headcount.
Fergus prices by plan instead: Essentials from $53 a month, Professional from $77, both published in AUD on its Australian site. What its page does not say is how many staff seats sit inside that $77. There are named extra roles, Timesheet Users from $26 a month and Contractor Users at $4 a day, but nothing tells you whether your 3 regular staff are already covered by the base price or whether some of them count as one of those extra roles. That is a real gap if you are trying to budget a 3 person crew against Tradify's clean per user number.
Plumbing compliance features, side by side
Tradify's Pro plan adds job photos, timesheets, and health and safety forms with compliance certificates over Lite, which is roughly the feature set a plumbing crew doing certified work would want once they move past basic job tracking. Fergus's Professional plan adds its own health and safety tools, hazard management and SWMS, plus checklists, forms, job phases and purchase orders over Essentials.
Both vendors gate the compliance paperwork behind their higher tier, so a 3 person plumbing crew comparing the two on features is really comparing Tradify Pro against Fergus Professional, not the cheaper base tier of either.
Being honest about both, since neither is ours
On the numbers we can actually compare, Tradify tells a 3 person crew exactly what they will pay: $171.60 a month for Pro, no guessing. Fergus's $77 headline is lower on its face, but until you ring Fergus and confirm how many staff that covers, you cannot honestly say it is cheaper for the same 3 people. If a known, scalable per user price matters more to you than a lower looking headline number, that gap is worth weighing on its own, separate from either tool's actual features.
Common complaints and catches
Tradify
- Reviewers reporting more than one Tradify price increase within a fairly short stretch of time
- Some Australian users describing the app as slow to load or sync
- Long standing complaints about notification handling that reviewers say has gone unaddressed
- Sign up and onboarding crashes mentioned in a number of reviews
Fergus
- Reviewers noting Essentials only gets email and chat support, slower than the phone access Professional includes
- Occasional accounting sync issues mentioned by reviewers
- A jump in complexity reviewers describe when moving from Essentials up to Professional
- Some field staff reporting mobile app performance problems
Switching between them
Customers, contacts and price list items are the parts most likely to move between Tradify and Fergus by CSV in either direction. Job history, photos, completed forms and any custom checklists carry more risk and usually need exporting and rebuilding by hand, since neither vendor publishes a direct import from the other. Run both tools side by side for one full billing cycle so no open invoice is lost in Xero or MYOB during the switch.
FFP Digital is a ServiceM8 developer and builds for Cliniko clinics. We have tried to be fair; prices are the vendors' own published figures on the date shown.
Sources
- Tradify's three Australian plans run $48 for Lite, $52 for Pro and $62 for Plus, each per user per month in AUD before GST; billing is month to month with no contract, Custom pricing is available on request, and a 14 day free trial is offered. Tradify, checked 25 Sep 2026.
- Moving from Lite to Pro on Tradify adds recurring jobs, job photos, timesheets, and health and safety forms with compliance certificates; Plus goes further again with service reminders, job tasks, purchase orders and reporting. Tradify, checked 25 Sep 2026.
- Fergus publishes three Australian tiers: Essentials starting at $53 a month, Professional, its most popular plan, starting at $77, and Enterprise for firms with more than 10 staff at a custom quoted price. Billing runs month to month with no lock-in, and new signups get a 14 day free trial without needing a credit card. Fergus, checked 25 Sep 2026.
- Fergus's Professional plan adds GPS tracking, checklists, forms, job phases, purchase orders, tiered pricing, hazard management and SWMS on top of Essentials; Timesheet Users cost from $26 a month and Contractor Users $4 per user per day on both plans, and the base plan price does not state how many standard staff seats it includes. Fergus, checked 25 Sep 2026.