Docs and training.

The demo

Choose Try the demo for a made-up law firm with staff, documents, paper files, letters, payroll and books. Every demo PIN is 1234. The demo is kept apart from your own data, and More > Reset demo puts it back as it was.

Setting up

Choose Create a workspace, or Create my workspace from the demo. Four steps:

Recovery phrase

After set-up WorkNest shows 24 words. Write them on paper and keep them away from the computer. They open your backups and are the way back in if the computer is lost or reset.

Reference prefix

Files, letters and invoices are numbered with a short prefix, for example AP-PF-0012 or AP-IN-0001. Set it in Settings before you register real records.

The sidebar lists every module that is switched on and that your role may open. Someone not seeing Payroll or Patients is by design. Home shows your numbers, notices and what is coming up from every module.

• Choose your name and enter your PIN. With Hide names at sign-in on, type your staff ID instead, for example AP-004.
• Five wrong PINs lock that person out for 30 seconds, doubling each time up to 15 minutes.
• WorkNest locks after 15 minutes idle. The padlock at the bottom of the sidebar locks it now.
• The bell shows what needs you: tasks, approvals, files passed to you, notices and reminders.

Open Documents, pick a folder and upload one or many files. Give each a category, tags and notes so search finds it later.

Versions

Uploading a new version never replaces the old one. Open a document to see every version and make any of them current again.

Scanning

1. Tap Scan pages. On a phone or tablet, photograph each page. On a computer, pick images.
2. Reorder or remove pages.
3. Save. The pages become one compressed PDF.

Text on the pages is read on the device, without the internet, and added to search. You can correct it by hand; the scan never changes.

Restricted folders

Restricted folders and documents are invisible to anyone without the restricted records permission, in search and exports too.

Storage places

Describe where paper lives first: buildings, rooms, cabinets, shelves and boxes. Your industry pack suggests a layout to edit.

Paper files

1. Tap Register and give the file a title. WorkNest gives it a reference, or type your own.
2. Choose its place.
3. Print labels: 24 per A4 sheet, each with a QR code.

Moving files

• Check out to a member of staff or a named visitor, with a return date.
• Return puts it back where it belongs.
• Report missing and Mark found keep track of lost files.

Every movement is kept and cannot be edited. Use the Overdue and Missing filters each week. Scan a label to open its file or shelf.

Linking

Link a scanned document to its paper original, so either one leads to the other.

Tap New task, assign it, and set a due date and priority. Link documents or paper files it is about. Comments and changes stay on its timeline.

An approval task goes to a named approver who holds the approval permission. They Approve, Send back or Reject it. Nobody approves their own work.

Register a letter as it arrives or leaves. Letters in and out get their own numbers, for example AP-IN-0001 and AP-OUT-0001. Record the sender's reference, who acts on it and a reply date, and attach the scan.

Register reply links an answer to the letter it answers. Late replies show on Home and the calendar.

Contacts holds clients, agencies and suppliers with their letters and documents. Import a CSV; WorkNest warns about likely duplicates.

• Forms: build with text, number, date, choice, yes or no and confirmation questions. Reviewers accept or return answers, and an answer prints to PDF. Changing a form makes a new version, so old answers keep their questions.
• Notices: post to everyone or a department. People confirm they have read it.
• Meetings: agenda, attendance, minutes and action items.
• Calendar: everything due from every module, including tasks, files due back, replies, meetings, leave and expiring certificates.

Employee records, with or without a sign-in. Leave counts working days against a yearly allowance and is approved by someone else. Also daily attendance, equipment with tags, and certificates with expiry dates.

Hiring

Open a job, add applicants with their CVs and move them stage by stage. Hire makes the employee record and starts the joining checklist.

HR records are private to HR. Everyone sees their own record, leave and checklist.

1. Set each person's monthly pay: basic, housing, transport, other allowances and loans.
2. Tap Prepare a payroll for the month.
3. Someone other than the preparer approves it. Approved runs never change.
4. Mark paid once the bank has paid.

PAYE follows the Nigeria Tax Act 2025 bands, with pension at 8% and 10% and optional NHF and rent relief, all editable. Payslips print to PDF. Export a bank schedule, the payroll sheet, and PAYE, pension and NHF remittance schedules. Anyone missing a tax ID or RSA PIN is named.

Check: have an accountant confirm the rates before your first real payroll.

• Accounts: set up your cash, bank and POS accounts first.
• Invoices: draft, then issue with a number. Record payments in parts, each with a receipt, or void with a reason. VAT at 7.5% when switched on.
• Expenses: by category, with the receipt attached.
• Fixed assets: cost, useful life and value at the end, written off each month.

Every invoice, payment, expense, asset and payroll posts itself to the books. Add journals by hand for the rest. Profit and loss, balance sheet and trial balance save to Excel.

Bank matching

Save a statement as CSV from internet banking, then Import statement. Lines already imported are skipped. WorkNest matches by amount and date; Match the rest by hand or record them as expenses or income.

On for the clinic pack, off elsewhere. Register patients with a hospital number, allergies and HMO details. Record visits with vital signs, notes, diagnosis and plan. Prescriptions go to the pharmacy queue; lab tests move from ordered to sampled to resulted.

Also appointments, wards and a bed board, inpatient charts, a daily drug round, drug stock with expiry dates, and HMO claims saved as Excel.

Important: WorkNest records what clinicians decide. It does not suggest or check doses, allergies or diagnoses.

On for the property pack. Add properties, units and landlords, then tenancies with rent per year, half, quarter or month, service charge, caution deposit and the signed agreement. Rent is invoiced period by period, deposit first. Repairs move from reported to done, with the cost recorded as an expense.

1. Each person taps Set passphrase. It is separate from the PIN and is never stored.
2. Add a login and share it with everyone who has access, or with named people.
3. Unlock passwords to see or copy one. A copied password clears from the clipboard after 30 seconds.

WorkNest warns about weak, reused and old passwords. Removing someone gives the login a new key and flags the password to change.

Reports summarizes every module: open tasks by person, documents by category and more. Export any register to one Excel workbook or CSV files, and every document as a ZIP by folder. Exports hold only what you may see, and are logged.

1. On the main computer, open More > Devices and turn on Share on this network.
2. Tap Add a device to show a pairing code.
3. On the other computer, choose Join a workspace and scan or type the code.

Paired devices work offline and catch up when they reconnect. Sync now catches up straight away. The main computer must be on for others to sync.

Settings > Customize sets your logo on the lock screen, sidebar and printouts, your colour, your own names for tabs (Patients as Clients, People as Staff), invoice defaults and a footer line. Saved once, it applies on every device. Each person can still pick light, dark and their own colour.

Three things to understand

• Recovery phrase: 24 words shown at set-up. It opens phrase-protected backups and recovers shared passwords.
• Backup file (.wnbak): every record and file, encrypted, including staff and their logins.
• Backup password: an alternative you choose when backing up. It opens the file on any computer without the phrase.

Set up once (15 minutes)

1. Write the 24 words on paper and have someone read them back. Do not photograph them.
2. Keep the paper away from the computer.
3. Open More > Backup and restore > Back up now and choose what opens it.
4. Save a copy to a USB drive.
5. Turn on Back up automatically: every 6 hours, every day or every week, with a copy to a USB drive or another folder.

Automatic backups run while WorkNest is open and someone who can back up is signed in.

Restoring

• Same computer: Backup and restore, then Restore a backup on this computer. A safety backup of the current data is made first.
• New computer: install WorkNest, choose Restore from backup, pick the file, enter the phrase or password, then sign in with a staff PIN.

Test your backups

Once a month, restore the latest backup on a spare computer and confirm documents, paper files and staff logins are there.

If something goes wrong

The owner or an administrator sets a new one in Staff and departments.

Five wrong PINs lock that person out for 30 seconds, then longer. Wait, then enter it carefully.

Either it is switched off in More > Modules, or your role cannot open it. Ask an administrator.

The text may have been read wrongly. Open the document and correct the scanned text. On Windows, text reading needs an OCR language, which English installs include.

Report it missing so everyone sees it, then check its history to see who had it last.

Check the person's pay and the tax and pension rates. Rates are editable, and an accountant should confirm them. An approved run cannot be changed; correct it in the next month.

Check the main computer is on with WorkNest open, both are on the same network, and Windows Firewall allows WorkNest on private networks. Then tap Sync now.

Set a new one. The owner then re-shares your logins using the recovery phrase. This is logged.

Mark them inactive and remove them from each login. WorkNest flags those passwords to change. Change them at the bank, tax office or email provider too.

Make a backup first, note what you did and saw, then contact us.