Ask your workspace: an AI chat over your own business data

An AI chat over your business data answers questions like "which invoices are overdue?" from your own records. In Swiftly Workspace it is Main Chat (Conversations in the sidebar): it looks up your customers, invoices, payments, projects and timesheets, and answers in text, tables or document previews.

Many small businesses already have the answers they need. They are spread over a customer list, an invoice list and a stack of timesheets. A chat that can look things up across all of them turns a ten-minute search into a sentence.

What you can ask

You ask	What it looks at	How the answer comes back
"Which invoices are overdue, and by how much?"	Invoices and their payments	A table
"Show me invoice 2026-0042."	That invoice	An invoice preview
"Who are our contacts at Lindenhof?"	Customers and contacts	Text or a table
"How many hours went into the website project this month?"	Projects, timesheets and hours	Text or a table
"Summarize where the Harbor Street project stands."	The project, its phases and its time	A short written report

Answers show up in the conversation as plain text or as an artifact you can read on its own: an invoice, credit note or proforma preview, a payment receipt, a table, or a written report. How chat artifacts work goes into each kind.

How it works

1. Open Conversations. It is in the sidebar on a Mac and on iPad, and in the menu on iPhone. Start a new conversation.
2. Pick the AI. The picker below the message field lists the providers your company has connected, for example OpenAI, Google Gemini, xAI Grok, Mistral, Cohere, DeepSeek or Perplexity, plus Apple Intelligence on supported devices.
3. Ask in plain words. The assistant decides which of the app's lookups it needs (customers, invoices and payments, projects, timesheets) and runs them.
4. Read the answer. It replies in the conversation, with a table, a preview or a report where that is clearer than text.

Cloud AI in Swiftly runs on your company's own provider key, which an admin connects once for the whole workspace. What bring your own key means explains the model, and adding a key on iPhone or iPad walks through the setup. Without a key, Apple Intelligence runs on supported devices, and the request isn't sent to a cloud AI provider.

What happens to your data

• The server makes the call. With a cloud provider, Swiftly's server sends the request with your company's key. Your devices don't contact the provider; the request leaves from Swiftly's server.
• What is sent. Your message and the records the assistant looks up to answer it go to the provider you picked. Ask about one customer, and that customer's details are part of the request.
• On device. With Apple Intelligence picked, the model runs on your iPhone, iPad or Mac and the request isn't sent to a cloud AI provider. More in what on-device Apple Intelligence can do.

Getting good answers

• Name things the way the app does. A customer's or project's name as it appears in your lists is easier to look up than a nickname.
• Give a time frame. "This month", "since June" or "last quarter" narrows the lookup and the answer.
• Ask for the shape you want. "As a table" or "in three bullet points" usually gets you exactly that.
• Check the figures that matter. Before you act on an amount, open the record itself. The chat is a fast way in, and the record is the source.
• Change records where they live. For a change to one customer or invoice, use the AI assistant in that record's window. There, changes like adding, updating, finalizing or recording wait for your Yes.

Where it fits in a working week

A chat over your data is at its best for the questions you would otherwise answer by opening three lists and a calculator:

• Monday overview. "Which invoices fell due last week and are still open?" gives you the follow-up list for the day.
• Before a client call. "What have we invoiced Lindenhof this year, and what is still unpaid?" puts the numbers in front of you in one answer.
• Project check-ins. "How many hours did the team log on the website project last week?" shows whether the work is on pace without building a report.
• Month end. "List this month's credit notes as a table" gives you something to check line by line.

For ready-made questions, see prompts for a service business, and if you are still deciding which AI to connect, how to choose an AI provider.

Frequently asked questions

Can an AI chat answer questions about my invoices?

Yes, when it can look them up in your own system. In Swiftly, Conversations reads your invoices, credit notes, proformas and payments, so it can list what is overdue, show one invoice as a preview or total what a customer still owes.

Does the AI see my whole database?

It works by looking things up. For each question, the assistant fetches the records it needs, and those go to the provider with your message and the context it needs to answer. A question about one project sends that project's details rather than a copy of your workspace.

Which AI providers can I use for a business chat?

In Swiftly you connect your own key for providers such as OpenAI, Gemini, Grok, Mistral, Cohere, DeepSeek or Perplexity, and pick one per conversation. Apple Intelligence works on supported devices without a key.

Is Conversations the same as the assistant in a record?

No. Conversations works across your whole workspace. Each record window also has its own assistant, bound to that record, where changes like adding, updating, finalizing or recording wait for your Yes.