Knock vs spreadsheets

Spreadsheets are a fine start. Recurring billing is where they strain.

A spreadsheet is flexible, free and familiar, which is why most subscription businesses begin there. The strain shows up when you have recurring invoices to generate on time, tax on every line, customers who want to see their own invoices, and more than one person editing.

Feature matrix

Capability	Spreadsheets	Knock
Recurring invoices	You copy last month's row or run a macro you maintain	Generated on schedule, once per period
Duplicate or missed invoices	Found by eye, usually after a customer asks	Generation is idempotent, so a repeat run never double-bills
GST and tax per line	Formulas per sheet that drift as sheets are copied	Tax rules defined once and applied to every line
Who can see what	Anyone with the file or link, usually everything	Admin, staff and customer roles
Customer self-service	Emailed PDFs and screenshots	Portal for quotes, invoices and payments
History and audit	Overwritten cells, version copies	Tracked subscription lifecycle and recorded payments
Reports	Pivot tables you rebuild	Revenue, receivables and subscription reports
Setup cost	Minutes	An hour or two to import customers and create plans
Total flexibility	Anything you can imagine	Opinionated: products, plans, quotes, subscriptions, invoices

Who each fits

Spreadsheets fits when

A handful of customers and a few invoices a month
Highly unusual pricing that does not fit plans and products
One person does all billing and keeps it in their head
You are validating pricing before you commit to a process

Knock fits when

Invoices go out on a schedule you must not miss
More than one person touches billing
You want customers to see and pay invoices themselves
You need consistent tax on every line and reliable history

The honest take

Knock is a hackathon project, so a mature spreadsheet process you already trust may be safer for real revenue today. The point where moving makes sense is usually when a missed or doubled invoice would cost more than an afternoon of setup.

Migration steps

Export your customer list to CSV. Use the customer import sample template for the right columns
Import customers. Duplicates are skipped and invalid rows are reported
Create products, plans, taxes and discounts once
Create a subscription per customer and set the next billing date to match your current cycle
Run a dry run of billing before the first real cycle and compare it with your sheet
Keep the spreadsheet read-only for one cycle, then retire it

Get the import template

Try Knock on a few customers

Import a handful, create a plan and run a dry run of billing. It is free to try.

Get started free