Getting started with Manifold means understanding what the product does before you configure anything. Manifold is the trade operating system for UK gas, plumbing, and heating teams. It connects properties, appliances, scheduling, mobile evidence capture, defect management, record generation, renewals, and client delivery in one workspace so a job moves from booked to compliant without spreadsheet drift.
- Hold clients, properties, and appliance registers in one place before any work is scheduled.
- Schedule gas safety checks and assign active engineers to the right jobs.
- Let engineers capture readings, defects, photos, and signatures from the mobile check flow, even offline.
- Generate Landlord Gas Safety Records (CP12) and related certificates from reviewed check data.
- Track satisfactory, due-soon, overdue, and action-required work across the whole portfolio.
- Deliver records to tenants and clients and let renewals chase themselves with automated reminders.
Before any of the setup below, you need a Manifold workspace. The first person from a company signs up, which creates the organisation (your tenant) and makes them its owner. Everyone else joins later by invitation from Settings rather than signing up again, so a company has one workspace, not one per person.
- 1Open the sign-up page and register with your work email, your name, and a password. Or continue with Google, Microsoft, or Apple.
- 2Confirm your email if prompted, then sign in. Manifold provisions your organisation and owner account as part of sign-up, so you arrive in the console ready to work.
- 3If sign-up was interrupted (a closed tab or a dropped connection), signing back in shows a short finish-setup step that completes provisioning safely. You are never left with an account but no workspace.
- 4From the console, follow the recommended setup order below to configure identity, team, and data.
- 5Add the rest of your team from Settings by invitation; invited office users and engineers accept an emailed invite instead of creating their own account.
Troubleshooting
- Sign-up says the email is already in use: that email already has an account. Sign in, or use forgot-password, instead of registering again.
- You were invited but tried to sign up: open the invitation email and accept it, so you join the existing workspace rather than starting a second one.
- You signed up but landed on a setup page: provisioning did not finish; follow the on-screen prompt to complete setup, which is safe to repeat.
On first sign-in the console offers a short walkthrough that mirrors the setup order below: add your first client, add a property, add an appliance, and record your first gas safety check. Sole traders also add their business details and Gas Safe number so certificates print correctly.
- Each step links straight to the screen it describes and ticks itself off as the workspace fills in.
- You can dismiss the walkthrough at any time and manage it again from Settings.
- 1Confirm organisation details, Gas Safe registration, certificate identity, timezone, billing, and notification settings.
- 2Invite office users and engineers from Settings, or switch on sole-trader mode if you work alone.
- 3Create or import clients, properties, and appliance registers.
- 4Schedule the first gas safety checks and assign engineers (or let sole-trader mode auto-assign to you).
- 5Run one check end to end: mobile capture, office review, record generation, and client delivery.
- 6Use the Dashboard, Ask Manifold, Records, and Exports to monitor the live workspace.
- Confirm the certificate identity block (business name, address, phone, email, Gas Safe number) is correct, because it prints on every record.
- Confirm each engineer can sign in on a phone and see only their assigned checks.
- Run one test property through scheduling, mobile capture, review, record generation, and tenant delivery.
- Confirm renewal reminders and notification recipients before you rely on them for compliance.
Troubleshooting
- If a user lands on the wrong page, check their role: engineers are routed to My Checks, office and owners to the console, platform staff to the platform area.
- If a check is missing from an engineer view, confirm the assignment and the scheduled date.
- If a record will not generate, confirm required check fields, per-appliance results, and the engineer signature are complete.
- Start of day: open Today and My Week, confirm cover, and resolve any clash tiles.
- During the day: engineers capture checks in My Checks; the office watches the review queue fill.
- After visits: review submitted checks, generate records, and deliver to tenants and clients.
- Weekly: work the due-soon and overdue tiles so no renewal lapses.
- Monthly: review analytics, reports, exports, billing, and notification settings.
A healthy Manifold workspace tells a complete compliance story without anyone explaining it. An office user should be able to open a property and understand its client, appliances, last record, current status, open defects, and next renewal from the records themselves.
- Property addresses and client names read the way the landlord recognises them.
- Every property has a current appliance register, so checks test the right equipment.
- Compliance status on the dashboard matches the latest record on each property.
- Open defects carry forward, so the next engineer arrives with context.
- Records contain reviewed evidence and avoid internal scheduling or diagnostic detail.
The point of a pilot is not to prove a record can exist; it is to prove the handoff between scheduling, capture, review, generation, delivery, and renewal is reliable before real volume depends on it.
- 1Build the smallest complete version: one client, one property, one appliance register, one check.
- 2Run it through mobile capture, office review, record generation, tenant and client delivery, and renewal scheduling.
- 3Use what you learn to fix certificate identity, required fields, and delivery wording.
- 4Only then import the wider portfolio.