Answer
How can a contractor use AI for back office work like email, paperwork and payroll?
Claude or ChatGPT, two AI assistants, can take the back office work that repeats in a contracting company. Start with email: connect Gmail or Outlook in the app's connectors, or paste three emails. Last week 581 work emails came in, and about 150 needed me. My AI drafts those replies, and I approve each one. Each night it checks that sign-in sheets match the daily logs. Before payroll goes out, it checks pay against each job's rates.
Eugeen Bernan, COO of a 90-person New York contractor.
How to do it
- Pick the lane that costs you the most hours: email, job site paperwork, payroll checks, the card statement or collections.
- Start with email. Connect it to Claude or ChatGPT, and have it sort what needs you and draft the replies. Nothing goes out until you say send.
- Turn each meeting into two lists: your tasks and everyone else's promises, each with a name and a date.
- Get one money page each week: profit by job, cash, who owes you, and every total checked against its parts.
- Keep anything that commits money, scope, a date or a legal position under your own name.
See it for yourself
- The free email guide
Sort your inbox and draft replies with Claude or ChatGPT. Every prompt is written out.
- The free TASKS file
Turn your last meeting into two lists, with a name, a date and each person's exact words.
- The free MONEY REPORT file
One page that tells you if you're making money. Every total has to equal its parts.
- Video: how I work my email now
How my email went from four hours a day to just hitting send.
- Bernan Wage Check
A free plugin for Claude that checks certified payroll against the prevailing wage schedule and your sign-in sheets.
- Work with me
Each area I build, from payroll checks to collections, in plain words.
Want the next step?
Own a business? On a free 30-minute call, we pick one task. I tell you straight if AI is worth it there.