HPool Service

Step 1 · Before you start

Before you start

Four accounts, one of them optional. If you already have them, you can breeze through this page.

The accounts you'll need

Claude
Claude Pro
The paid plan. This is what runs the skills and connects to your tools. Details below.
Airtable
Free to start
Where your business data lives. A free account is enough to begin.
Stripe
Your own account
For billing. A real, activated business account so payouts reach your bank.
Gmail — optional
Only to send email
Connect it if you want reports and reminders sent from your own inbox.

Which Claude plan do I need?

This is the one prerequisite worth getting right, because it decides whether everything else will work. You need a paid Claude plan — Claude Pro (about $20/month) is the right starting point.

Here's why Pro, specifically:

  • Uploading your own skills requires a paid plan. The free plan doesn't allow it.
  • You'll connect several tools (Airtable, Stripe, and maybe Gmail). The free plan only allows one such connection — not enough for this. Pro removes that limit.
Good to know
Max works too and simply gives you more usage headroom if you run Claude heavily. Team and Enterprise are only worth it if you want to share these skills across several employees' logins — a solo operator doesn't need them.

One setting to switch on in Claude

The skills produce files and run small calculations, so Claude's code-and-file feature needs to be on. It usually already is, but to be sure: open Settings → Capabilities and make sure “Code execution and file creation” is turned on. You'll do this once.

A note on Airtable's free plan

A free Airtable account is perfect for getting started and trying everything out. Its one limit worth knowing: a free database holds up to 1,000 records in total. Every customer, pool, visit, reading, and invoice is a record — so an active route fills that up over time. When you get close, Airtable's Team plan raises it to 50,000 and your data carries over untouched. Nothing to decide today; just know the upgrade path exists.

You'll also want, on hand

  • Your business name, phone, and email.
  • Optionally, a link to your logo and your brand color — they'll appear on the service reports your customers receive.