Current RMS vs pro-posal.io: Understanding the Difference

This one comes up often: "Should I use Current RMS or pro-posal.io?" The honest answer is that the question itself is a category error. They are not competitors. They do different jobs in the AV business. Here is what each one is for, and why most AV companies end up using both.

What Current RMS actually does

Current RMS is a rental management platform. Its job is to manage the physical kit, the bookings, and the operational side of a rental business:

• Inventory tracking (what kit you own, where it is, what condition it is in)
• Availability checking (is this kit free on these dates)
• Opportunity and order management (the booking pipeline)
• Sub-hires (kit you hire from other companies for a job)
• Crew scheduling
• Delivery and collection notes
• Invoicing
• Reporting on equipment utilisation and revenue

Current RMS is operations software. It runs the business behind the scenes.

What pro-posal.io does

pro-posal.io is proposal software. Its job is the client-facing document you send before the booking is confirmed:

• Branded multi-section proposals
• Drag-and-drop sections for executive summary, kit list, team profiles, timeline, technical specification, FAQ, terms, and acceptance
• Online acceptance with a typed name and timestamp
• Branded PDF generation
• Client conversation thread on the proposal
• Open and view tracking
• Win/loss and decline-reason analytics
• Revision history

pro-posal.io is the sales document. It is what convinces the client to say yes.

Where the overlap is, and is not

Current RMS does generate quote documents you can email to clients. They look like rental quotes, because that is what they are.

pro-posal.io does not manage your kit, your warehouse, or your crew scheduling.

The overlap is small: both can produce a document with a kit list and a total. The difference is what the document is for.

• A Current RMS quote is an operational document. It is accurate, complete, and looks like a rental quote.
• A pro-posal.io proposal is a sales document. It is branded, structured, persuasive, and built to be read by a non-technical decision-maker.

Why most AV companies use both

The natural workflow:

1. Enquiry comes in.
2. Build the kit list and check availability in Current RMS. This is where it belongs: against your inventory, with sub-hires and pricing.
3. Pull the quote into pro-posal.io. pro-posal.io has a Current RMS integration that pulls opportunities directly. The kit list and pricing flow across without re-keying.
4. Wrap the kit list in a proposal. Add the executive summary, team profiles, timeline, brief confirmation, and terms. Apply your branding. Send.
5. Client accepts in pro-posal.io. Acceptance is captured with a timestamp.
6. Back to Current RMS to confirm the booking. The opportunity becomes an order, the kit is reserved, the crew is scheduled.

Each tool does what it is designed for. Neither has to fake being the other.

What happens if you only use Current RMS

You still send proposals, but they look like rental quotes. For dry hires and known clients, that is fine. For competitive bids, tenders, or any job where the proposal is part of the sell, a Current RMS quote is not pitched at the same level as a competitor's branded proposal.

The companies that win bigger jobs out of Current RMS-only workflows are usually pasting the quote into a Word or PowerPoint deck and wrapping a manual proposal around it. That works once or twice. It does not scale.

What happens if you only use pro-posal.io

You can build great-looking proposals, but you are tracking kit, availability, sub-hires, and crew scheduling somewhere else (often a spreadsheet). For small operations with a small kit list, that is fine. For anything bigger, the operational side will eventually need a real rental management tool.

A simple way to decide

• If your kit list is small and your operational complexity is low, you may not need Current RMS. Use pro-posal.io and a simple spreadsheet.
• If your operational complexity is high but your proposals are simple (mostly known clients), you may not need pro-posal.io. Use Current RMS and email the quotes.
• If your proposals are competitive and your operations are complex, use both. They are designed to work together.

What the Current RMS integration in pro-posal.io actually does

When you connect your Current RMS account to pro-posal.io:

• pro-posal.io can list your Current RMS opportunities and let you pick one
• The kit list (with quantities, hire periods, and prices) flows into a quote section
• Member or venue details can populate the proposal automatically
• Updates to the underlying opportunity can be re-pulled into the proposal

The connection is read-only from pro-posal.io's side: pro-posal.io does not modify your Current RMS data. The proposal is the wrapper around the quote, not a replacement for the quote.

The honest summary

Current RMS and pro-posal.io solve different problems. If you do AV professionally and you want to win bigger jobs while running a tighter operation, the two tools together are stronger than either alone.

Try pro-posal.io free for 60 days, no card required: pro-posal.io.