Instant Work Office Release Notes

August 13, 2026

Connected business operations, banking discovery, and clearer public onboarding

This checkpoint brings the signed-in workspace closer to a connected daily operating system. Account owners can move between related clients, properties, invoices, products, services, checkout activity, tax planning, banking events, and reconciliation discovery while the public homepage offers an on-demand introduction to Instant Work Office.

Protected business reads, writes, calculations, ownership checks, and workflow transitions remain on the authenticated server boundary. Temporary reconciliation choices stay in the browser session, and the public intro video transfers only after a visitor explicitly opens it.

Includes

• Client and Property records now expose their owned associations, including direct View actions and invoice creation with the related records already selected.
• A feature-gated Monthly Goal card compares the saved recurring target with current-month invoice, proposal, and checkout activity without storing a second accounting total.
• The authenticated workspace now opens behind a responsive loading screen while authentication, settings, navigation, and server-backed data initialize.
• Products and Services consistently identify each record as a Product or Service, support server-owned inventory management, and feed shared catalog, proposal, invoice, dashboard, and Partner Homepage experiences.
• Business Tax provides a read-only annual planning report with completed paid income, tax collected, savings and tax estimates, server-owned settings, manual adjustment lines, and CSV export.
• Banking Monitor now begins with Register Till, which summarizes collected and uncollected activity from authenticated transaction events without saving an aggregate.
• Quick Checkout creates an authenticated standalone checkout, applies server-owned catalog and tax validation, decrements limited inventory once, and supports Partner-attested Paid or Void outcomes.
• Bank Reconciliation compares paid invoice, proposal, and checkout facts with a third-party statement using session-only Found controls, manual bank items, unpaid-document discovery, archived labels, negative refunds, and transient all/open PDF reports.
• Missing pseudo-money starts with every visible unresolved signed amount and updates immediately as records are marked Found or restored.
• The Banking Monitor Bank Reconciliation child card now includes its own lead icon and action-button chevron for reliable navigation decoration.
• The public homepage includes an explicit View intro video action beside Work Today; the large Cloud Storage video is not embedded, autoplayed, or preloaded.
• Storage access for the intro video is limited to the exact public object, while browser writes and unapproved object paths remain denied.

Release note summary

Account owners now have stronger connections between everyday records, clearer operational summaries, and practical discovery tools for taxes, checkout activity, banking events, and statement comparison. Visitors can also choose to watch an introduction without making every homepage visit download the video.

This is the current prepared checkpoint. Firebase Hosting, Functions, Firestore, and Storage deployment remain controlled production actions and are not implied by this release-note update.

July 17, 2026

Free trial access, completed Partner Homepages, and a clearer dashboard

This release improves the full path from discovering Instant Work Office to operating a business workspace. New account owners can begin with a no-card free trial, returning visitors get clearer account controls, Partners can present a more complete public homepage, and the signed-in dashboard is easier to scan across desktop, tablet, and mobile.

Protected account, business, inquiry, inventory, proposal, and payment workflows continue to use verified authentication and server-owned authority. The browser remains responsible for presentation, input, and requesting allowed actions.

Includes

• New accounts can start a 15-day free trial without entering a credit card.
• Google signup is presented as a first-class trial option, with email signup retained as a fallback.
• After a no-card trial expires, account access moves to a billing-required state and directs the account owner to the existing Stripe subscription checkout.
• The public homepage login now includes an accessible show-or-mask password control and improved top alignment on larger screens.
• A responsive shared footer now provides copyright information and direct Login, Start Free Trial, documentation, privacy, and terms navigation across the homepage and public documentation.
• Documentation Login and Start Free Trial links return visitors to the homepage and open the requested account workflow.
• Partner Homepages now use a completed responsive Bootstrap presentation for business identity, services, calls to action, contact information, and optional catalog checkout.
• Public Partner Homepage inquiries use a reviewed request flow with server-resolved delivery, abuse controls, delivery status, and audit history.
• Partner Homepage preview includes live controls for Document Name, Last Action, People I Serve, Inventory Name, and Totals Action, with the existing Save and Publish workflow retained.
• A new Property Activity summary shows this month's active property additions and comparison with the previous month from existing protected property records.
• An account-email attention notice takes the first full-width position whenever confirmation is required.
• Fraud-defense readiness and Business Profile completion now share a 30/70 dashboard row.
• Client Activity and Property Activity appear as equal-width neighboring cards on tablet and desktop.
• Day Plan, invoices, checkouts, daily activity, and accepted-work follow-up remain full-width for easier scanning.
• Sold-out inventory notices continue to appear directly after checkout activity when limited inventory needs attention.
• Phone-sized screens collapse the dashboard to a single-column reading order while tablet and desktop retain the wider layout.

Release note summary

Visitors can begin evaluating Instant Work Office with less friction, account owners get clearer login and billing transitions, Partners can publish a more complete customer-facing homepage, and daily business information is organized in a more useful responsive dashboard. These improvements preserve the existing security, ownership, audit, provider, and payment-authority boundaries.

July 5, 2026

Clearer public homepage and account entry

The Instant Work Office public homepage now introduces the workspace with a concise product summary before guiding visitors into the existing Getting Started information.

Includes

• A new lead-in explains how clients, proposals, invoices, payments, daily planning, and team coordination fit into one expandable workspace.
• The Five W's overview now speaks directly to independent workers, freelancers, contractors, and solo operators while preserving its scannable card layout.
• Mobile, tablet, and desktop availability, security controls, payment safeguards, support, and subscription-module growth are described more clearly.
• The account card presents a clear primary Account Login action alongside Create Account.
• The public footer now uses updated language for proprietary account data, Partner Homepage, payment, private data, and cybersecurity protections.

Release note summary

Visitors now receive a shorter explanation of the product, a clearer path to product details, and a direct account-login action from the public homepage.

June 28, 2026

Partner Stripe relationship and payment foundation

This production release establishes the primary Stripe relationship between an Instant Work Office Partner and the Partner's own connected Stripe account. The core relationship, onboarding, readiness, customer payment, provider confirmation, and server-owned record structures are now in place, with additional edge cases and specialized transaction workflows remaining for later releases.

Partners remain the merchant of record. Stripe owns payment processing, balances, verification, and payouts; Instant Work Office owns workflow validation, payment-request records, status mirrors, and audit history.

Includes

• Partners can start a verified Stripe banking relationship from Profile Settings and grant Instant Work Office access through Stripe Connect.
• The Stripe callback stores the Partner's connected-account relationship on the server after validating the provider return and opaque state record.
• After the relationship exists, the setup action changes to a Stripe-hosted portal action for identity, business, and banking requirements.
• Stripe-reported account readiness controls whether Instant Work Office Stripe Checkout is enabled; a browser checkbox or manually entered account reference cannot grant production payment authority.
• Account-access billing remains separate from Partner merchant routing so subscriber customer and subscription records are not mixed with connected-account payment records.
• Partners can create or email server-owned payment links for completed-work and online-transaction use cases using authoritative invoice or transaction amounts.
• Customer payments use Stripe Elements and direct charges in the Partner's connected-account context, allowing funds to enter the Partner's Stripe balance without Instant Work Office holding or redistributing them.
• Platform-account and connected-account webhooks use separate endpoints and signing-secret boundaries.
• Provider-confirmed payment state updates the payment request, its parent transaction mirror, and server-owned audit history, with protection against duplicate finalization.
• The confirmed production happy path covers Connect relationship setup, Stripe-hosted onboarding, payment-link creation, customer payment, provider confirmation, and transaction-state reconciliation.

Remaining use-case work

• Broader acceptance coverage for declines, authentication challenges, delayed or replayed webhooks, and additional provider failure states.
• Live refund initiation, dispute consequences, settlement reconciliation, payout-status presentation, and accounting exports.
• Additional specialized payment types, connected-account product and price catalogs, and any future platform-fee workflow.

Release note summary

The main customer-visible result is that a Partner can establish a Stripe relationship, complete Stripe's hosted banking requirements, create a payment link, and receive a customer payment through the Partner's own Stripe account.

The main operator-visible result is a completed primary transaction foundation with server authority, provider readiness checks, separate webhook trust boundaries, auditable payment records, and clear scope for the remaining use cases. This release does not claim that every Stripe exception or future transaction type is complete.

June 12, 2026

Production security monitoring, partner domains, and subscription foundations

This production update strengthens the live Instant Work Office path for account owners, hosted partner sites, and future paid extensions. The app now has a monitored abuse-defense layer, a proven partner custom domain route, clearer refund guidance inside Smart Contracts, and server-owned subscription foundations for account modules and add-on style billing pending provider validation.

The release continues the same operating boundary used across the product: the browser displays status and requests actions, while Cloud Functions, Firebase, Stripe, and audit history remain the authority for protected workflow state, payment setup, hosted-domain routing, and subscription changes.

Includes

• Google Cloud Fraud Defense monitor mode is active for the production browser/API path, attaching App Check telemetry to supported API calls without blocking valid users during the first observation phase.
• The app shell now includes a readiness/status surface for the fraud-defense monitor so operators can see configured state without exposing private keys or enforcement internals.
• Partner-owned custom domains now follow the proven split-hosting path so a partner homepage can serve at its own domain instead of falling back to the Instant Work Office login shell.
• The Business Profile hosting workflow continues to use Firebase Hosting as the source of truth for GoDaddy DNS rows, with the partner making DNS changes manually at GoDaddy.
• Refunds now have a governed Smart Contracts entry point that explains refund rules, timing, fee expectations, reason mapping, and the server-owned authority boundary before live refund processing is connected.
• Stripe module subscription foundations are in place for future paid extensions: module catalog records, monthly provider pricing setup, subscription item enablement, subscription item removal, and account-owned module mirrors are handled by the server. This path remains pending Stripe test validation before final acceptance.
• Subscription item identifiers are tracked server-side so enabled modules can be removed later without relying on browser-maintained billing state.
• Stripe subscription webhooks now refresh account module mirrors from provider events, keeping customer-facing module state aligned with provider-owned billing events.
• Browser repository helpers were added for loading, enabling, and disabling module subscriptions through authenticated API calls only.
• Production handoff notes and release rules continue to identify InstantWorkOffice.com and the named Firestore database as the active production path.

Release note summary

The main customer-visible result is a more reliable production product: hosted partner domains can serve partner homepages, account owners have clearer refund guidance, and future paid extensions have a safer subscription path staged before Stripe validation and broader UI rollout.

The main operator-visible result is a stronger production control layer: fraud-defense telemetry is watching API traffic, hosted-domain setup has a confirmed route pattern, and Stripe module billing changes are staged behind authenticated server endpoints and provider webhooks instead of browser state.

June 10, 2026

Public-site polish, searchable records, and hosted partner domains

This release strengthens the public Instant Work Office experience and the signed-in app shell. Visitors get clearer product language and a more visual Getting Started path, while account owners get server-authorized search, dashboard activity tools, business branding controls, partner homepage publishing, and guided custom-domain hosting setup.

The release keeps the same production discipline: customer-facing pages and app controls are easier to use, while profile saves, hosted-domain setup, partner homepage publishing, dashboard records, search results, uploads, proposal actions, and audit-sensitive work stay behind authenticated server routes or provider-owned setup steps.

Includes

• Primary app search now submits authenticated requests to the server and returns grouped results for Clients, Properties, Products and Services, and Proposals.
• Search results open the existing record owners, including client, property, product or service, and proposal detail workflows.
• The public Getting Started page now includes a Bootstrap "What we do" carousel using real workflow imagery for Day Plan, clients, support, signage, email, onboarding, payments, products and services, properties, smart contracts, and website hosting.
• The public Getting Started page now presents Independent Contractors and Limited Liability Companies as side-by-side Bootstrap cards so account owners can quickly choose the business path that fits their setup.
• Visible product wording now uses "Products and Services" and "Product or Service" where customers see it, while the existing route, collection, and server behavior remain stable.
• The Add New menu now offers both Add Product and Add Service entries that use the same existing product-or-service workflow.
• Product and Service records now include image support so account owners can attach a visual reference to product or service detail workflows.
• The Daily Workflow Wizard is available as a guided day-plan workflow for organizing daily business activity from the app shell.
• Partner Page wording has been updated to Partner Homepage across visible app and public-route surfaces.
• Business Profile Save now publishes the partner homepage through the existing server-owned publish route, with the manual Publish action still available as a repair or retry path.
• The Business Profile Hosting card now guides GoDaddy custom-domain setup for partner homepages, including domain entry, IWO validation, Firebase Hosting setup, GoDaddy DNS actions, propagation checks, SSL completion, and final connected-route status.
• Hosting guidance now makes Firebase-provided DNS records the source of truth, warns account owners to remove conflicting GoDaddy Website Builder, parking, forwarding, and old hosting records, and keeps GoDaddy system records such as NS, SOA, Domain Connect, and DMARC intact unless provider instructions say otherwise.
• Connected custom domains are treated as a hosted-route setting instead of ordinary Business Profile copy, so a live domain can be changed only through a deliberate hosting change workflow.
• Smart Contract: Invoice is available as the basic invoice entry point for creating and opening invoice workflows under Smart Contracts.
• Refunds now have a governed Smart Contracts entry point when Smart Invoice and Payments are enabled, opening a planning dialog that explains refund sources, timing, fee expectations, reason mapping, and the server-owned authority boundary before live refund routes are connected.
• Primary Business Logo upload is available through Business Profile and is validated, stored, mirrored, and audited by the server before appearing on the partner homepage.
• The dashboard now includes a 24hr To-do List widget and a Daily Activities widget for proposal activity, both keeping state and writes server-owned.
• Business Color is available as a profile and dashboard preference so account owners can apply a saved brand accent without adding a custom dark or light mode controller.
• Email confirmation readiness continues to gate proposal and checkout actions until the account controller email is confirmed.
• Production rules and handoff notes were refreshed for the active InstantWorkOffice.com target, named Firestore database, cache-suffix guidance, and stable release verification posture.

Release note summary

The main customer-visible result is a clearer product surface: the public site better explains what Instant Work Office does, the app uses more accurate labels for products, services, and partner homepages, and account owners can search across their working records from the main shell while preparing hosted partner domains from Profile Settings.

The main operator-visible result is a stronger stopping point for production: public pages, search, dashboard widgets, profile branding, partner homepage publishing, GoDaddy/Firebase hosting guidance, and account confirmation all follow the same server-first boundary before the next work cycle begins.

May 29, 2026

Account trust, legal readiness, and workflow controls

This release adds a stronger trust layer around account setup, proposal work, subscription management, legal notices, and active-record display. It keeps the public product focused on clear customer actions while preserving the Instant Work Office rule that business authority, billing changes, audit history, and protected data changes stay server-owned.

The release also improves the public documentation surface and everyday app handling: account owners get clearer legal acceptance, email confirmation, cancellation, privacy, support, proposal history, and active-record behavior without exposing internal tickets, credentials, provider identifiers, or private customer data.

Includes

• Standalone Terms of Service and expanded Privacy, Security, and Site Terms pages with visible policy versions and signup acceptance language.
• Required signup clickwrap acceptance that records legal agreement through the server-owned account bootstrap and audit path.
• Account email confirmation readiness that sends verification mail, mirrors confirmed email status, and blocks proposal business actions until the controller email is confirmed.
• Business Profile subscription controls for requesting account-access cancellation while preserving access through the active billing period when the server reports one.
• Privacy representative notice for current United States availability and future EU, EEA, and UK expansion review.
• Public proposal history display improvements so viewed events can show the recipient email when available and avoid raw internal identifiers in visible history labels.
• Active-record display standardization: record counts and lists default to active records, with a shell-level View All option for inactive or deactivated records.
• Security hardening that moves user profile hydration behind the authenticated API boundary and prevents browser SDK reads or writes to protected user records.
• Customer support and proposal email readiness through the active InstantWorkOffice production SMTP path, with diagnostics limited to configured/missing state and no secret values exposed.
• Business Profile usability improvements, including editable-by-default settings, dirty-save state, close protection for unsaved changes, and clearer Quick Proposal terminology.
• Mobile dialog width fixes for Business Profile and proposal drafts so narrow screens avoid horizontal overflow while desktop and tablet layouts remain stable.
• Release guidance updates that document active-record behavior, local automated test ownership, and the current production cache suffix for deployed browser modules.

Release note summary

The main customer-visible result is a more controlled account experience: users can create an account with clearer legal acceptance, confirm the controller email, manage subscription cancellation from the profile area, and see privacy and terms information in a more complete public documentation surface.

The main operator-visible result is stronger workflow discipline: proposal actions, profile access, active record displays, billing-state changes, and audit-sensitive work are being routed through consistent server-owned boundaries while the browser remains a rendering and request client.

May 26, 2026

Instant Work Office public release readiness

Instant Work Office now serves as the public product home for work previously explored through Appointment.City and Corporation.City. Those earlier efforts have been rolled into the InstantWorkOffice.com release path so the public product can present one stable identity, one documentation surface, and one clearer operating model for account owners, partners, customers, proposals, payments, and support.

This release focuses on public-site readiness, account onboarding, profile setup, proposal workflows, payment preparation, support routing, and interface polish. It also establishes a safer release-note pattern: customer-facing outcomes are summarized publicly, while internal ticket details, private records, provider configuration, credentials, and unreleased implementation notes remain out of the public archive.

Includes

• Public InstantWorkOffice.com identity, homepage, about, getting started, privacy, terms, and release-note documentation work.
• Rollup of Appointment.City and Corporation.City product exploration into the Instant Work Office public product direction.
• Signup and account-access improvements, including clearer onboarding context and legal acceptance readiness.
• Profile settings improvements for saving business information, payment preferences, proposal defaults, and account setup details.
• Partner-page readiness, including public partner activation, partner page view links, and payment collection context.
• Dashboard and app-shell polish, including progress indicators, cards, badge counts, dialogs, typography, Bootstrap alignment, and responsive layout improvements.
• Customer, property, product, and active-record interface improvements for cleaner data entry, display, validation, and modification workflows.
• Proposal workflow improvements covering proposal creation, bundle details, customer email text, notifications, signature flow, PDF viewing, and acceptance-readiness.
• Deposit and payment-preference groundwork, including amount-or-percentage deposit handling and Stripe payment readiness.
• Stripe integration planning for partner payment collection, checkout bridging, pricing structure, and partial-to-full proposal payment workflows.
• Contractor and W-9 workflow preparation for collecting contractor records through a more controlled account workflow.
• Support-center and customer-support readiness so users have a clearer path for help, account questions, and workflow issues.
• Role, signup, and access-control planning to support safer account boundaries as the product moves toward public use.
• Validation and formatting improvements for profile, customer, property, and product records to reduce incomplete or malformed submissions.
• Testing and quality-control work, including non-human browser testing, UAT feedback, and targeted fixes before public release.
• Security and release-discipline improvements that keep workflow authority, payment policy, audit behavior, and protected records behind server-owned business rules.

Release note summary

This entry represents a consolidation release. The public product is now described as Instant Work Office, while legacy development work from Appointment.City and Corporation.City is treated as upstream product discovery, staging, or implementation history. Public notes should describe the usable outcome for customers and operators, not the internal path taken to build it.

The main customer-visible result is a clearer product surface: users can understand what Instant Work Office is, where to start, how account setup fits together, how proposals and payments are expected to work, and where support and legal documentation live.

The main operator-visible result is a stronger workflow foundation: account records, partner pages, proposals, payments, contractors, and support flows are being organized around stable UI patterns and server-owned business rules before broader public use.

Release discipline

What belongs in release notes

Release notes should be written after changes reach a stable stop-point. Each entry should explain what changed, who benefits, and whether the change affects account access, records, billing, proposal workflows, documents, legal terms, or customer-facing pages.

Release notes should not expose internal ticket descriptions, private customer records, raw audit data, Firebase document paths for sensitive records, Stripe identifiers, secrets, credentials, or unreleased business plans. Technical details can be summarized when they help customers understand reliability, security, workflow ownership, or support expectations.

Template

Future release entry format

Use this structure for future entries so the archive stays consistent: