Hire, check and pay your farm team. Prove it at every inspection.
HarvestM8 takes every worker from sign-up to payroll under UK rules, and keeps the records that inspectors, auditors and buyers ask for. Built with a working UK vineyard, for the whole year and the harvest rush.
Free while we build it with growers. We approve each farm personally.
Harvest is short. The paperwork is not.
Hiring at speed
Dozens of new starters in a few weeks, many coming back from last year. Each one gets a link to sign up on their own phone, and returning workers keep their record so nobody starts from scratch.
Right to work, every time
Nobody can clock in until a valid check is on file. Share codes, document checks and follow-up dates for time-limited permission are tracked for you.
Fair pay for piece work
Bins and crates are recorded as they are picked, then checked against hours worked. If piece pay falls below minimum wage, a top-up is added before payroll.
Why the paperwork matters
£60,000
The most you can be fined for each person found working without the right to work in the UK.
6 years
How long you must keep minimum wage records. From April 2026 the same applies to holiday records, and failing to keep them is an offence.
1 in 4
Farmers with reliable mobile signal everywhere outdoors. That is why clock-in is being built to work with no signal.
Sources: Home Office civil penalties, Employment Rights Act 2025 and the NFU Digital Access Survey 2024.
From first message to first payday
Six steps, each one done once and shared with everyone who needs it. No retyping between spreadsheets.
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Invite
Add a name and email. They get a secure sign-up link by email or WhatsApp.
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Sign up on their phone
Details, tax questions and bank account. No app to install and no password.
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Checks and contract
Right to work confirmed and the contract signed on screen before day one.
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Clock in at the block
Scan the sign at the gate. Works on a supervisor's phone with no signal.
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Approve the day
Supervisors send in hours and bins. The office approves. Minimum wage is checked.
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Send to payroll
Approved pay goes to Staffology, Xero or a file for your payroll. Your payroll works out the tax.
One office for the whole farm year
People come first, because that is where farms lose the most time. Then we join up the rest of the farm office. Everything below is labelled honestly: what works today, what we are building and what we are still exploring with growers.
- Working now 23
- Planned 1
- Exploring 5
Your team
From first message to last payslip, all year and through harvest.
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Working now
Farm office and worker sign-up
A secure office for managers and staff. Workers sign up on their own phone, with no app and no password.
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Working now
Right-to-work checks
Share codes and documents checked properly, with reminders before time-limited permission runs out.
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Working now
Contracts on screen
Signed before day one and kept with each worker's record.
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Working now
Workers' own phones
The week's plan, messages, payslips, holiday and the contract on their own phone, in Polish, Romanian, Bulgarian or Ukrainian.
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Working now
Clock-in with no signal
Scan in at the block on a supervisor's phone, or on your own by scanning the site poster. It sends the hours when it finds signal.
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Working now
Piece rates checked against minimum wage
Bins and crates against hours worked, with age bands, the accommodation offset and a top-up when pay falls short.
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Working now
Holiday, absence and rotas
Requests, approvals and the six-year holiday record the law now asks for.
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Working now
The week's plan
Every site down the side, the week across. Crews, vehicles, pick-ups and start times, published to workers' phones in one press.
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Working now
Payroll hand-off
Approved pay sent to Staffology, Xero or a file. Your payroll software works out the tax.
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Working now
Advances and mileage
Wage advances agreed on the phone and taken back on the next payslip. Mileage claimed, approved and sent to payroll.
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Working now
End of season and re-hiring
Leavers handled properly, and returning workers back on the team in minutes next year.
Proof and reports
The records inspectors, auditors and buyers ask for, ready when they ask.
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Working now
Full audit trail
Every change recorded: who, what and when. Personal details encrypted.
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Working now
Minimum wage evidence for each worker
Hours, piece pay and any top-up on one page, ready if HMRC asks.
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Working now
Audit packs
Evidence for Red Tractor, SMETA and the WineGB sustainability scheme, from the records you already keep.
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Working now
Training and certificates
Inductions, spray certificates and tickets, with reminders before they run out. Write a course once and workers do it on their phones, in their language.
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Working now
Labour provider checks
Licence numbers on file and a nudge to check the register every 3 months.
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Working now
Reports and exports
Professional PDF reports for your accountant or bank, and Excel or CSV downloads of everything you store.
The farm office
The everyday jobs that live in notebooks, WhatsApp groups and heads.
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Working now
Suggestion box
Tell us what would save you time. Our reply shows in your farm office.
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Working now
Noticeboard and memos
Notices in your workers' own languages, with a record of who has read them.
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Working now
Calendar
Time off, starters, right-to-work dates and farm entries in the Google, Apple or Outlook calendar you already use.
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Working now
Job adverts
Write a job once. It shows on your own jobs page, in Google searches and on the government's Find a job site.
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Working now
Billing the farms you supply
For labour providers: bookings from each farm, invoices and credit notes made from the hours, your Terms signed online.
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Working now
Season dashboard
Who is working, hours, labour costs and what needs doing today, on one screen.
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Planned
Contacts
Vets, agronomists, contractors and suppliers in one list the whole office can use.
Land and the wider farm
Ideas we are researching with growers. Tell us which matter to you.
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Exploring
Blocks and rows on a map
Draw your blocks, or bring in field boundaries from the Rural Payments service.
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Exploring
Funding alerts
A heads-up when farm grants open or close, checked against GOV.UK.
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Exploring
Crop, spray and livestock records
Linked to the record-keeping tools you already trust, not replacing them.
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Exploring
Equipment and supplies
Machinery hire, servicing dates and suppliers in one place.
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Exploring
Farms outside the UK
Each country has its own employment law, so we will add countries one at a time. There is a waiting list.
Built around UK farming rules
The rules are the hard part of employing seasonal staff. HarvestM8 is designed around them from the start, not bolted on afterwards.
- Right to work
- Checks follow the Home Office code of practice. Evidence is kept for the time the law requires, then deleted.
- Minimum wage
- Piece rates are checked against hours worked every pay period, with age bands and the accommodation offset built in.
- HMRC
- Starter checklists, P45 details and pay records, kept for as long as HMRC says and handed to recognised payroll software.
- Labour providers
- Agencies are recorded with their gangmaster licence, checked on the Fair Work Agency register (formerly the GLAA), with a reminder to check again every 3 months.
- UK GDPR
- Bank details and NI numbers are encrypted. Every change is logged. Personal data is removed when it is no longer needed.
How we build it
On a working farm
HarvestM8 is built with a UK vineyard that employs around 65 people all year and up to 60 more at harvest. Every screen is tested against a real season.
You choose what comes next
Every farm office has a suggestion box. We ask how much time each idea would save, and build the biggest time-savers first.
We connect, not replace
Payroll, accounts and crop records stay in the tools you trust. HarvestM8 sends them clean, approved data instead of more retyping.
Planned connections
- Staffology payroll
- Xero
- Excel and CSV files
- Google, Apple and Outlook calendars
- Find a job (DWP)
- GOV.UK funding pages
Tell us about your farm
Register your farm to set up your office and your team today. Or, whether you grow, advise growers or are thinking of investing, talk to us first: we will show you what works today and where it is heading.
Already using HarvestM8? Log in to your farm office
Farming outside the UK? Join the waiting list