The complete guide to running a repair shop with VMOTEK

01

Understand the operating record

The customer and vehicle are the durable service relationship. Appointments plan future visits. Estimates describe proposed scope and price. Approval records the customer's decision. The work order controls active repair execution. Purchase records explain unavailable parts. The invoice records the final charge, and payment settles it. Keep these records connected rather than recreating customer, vehicle or service information at each stage.

• Company: the organization operating one or more shops.
• Shop: the physical or operating location serving the job.
• Customer and vehicle: the owners of communication, service and billing history.
• Estimate and approval: proposed work and authorization.
• Work order: active operational record for labor, parts, assignment and status.
• Invoice and payment: financial completion; Delivered records the later vehicle handoff.

02

Configure the company

An owner or administrator enters the organization-wide company name, email, address, country and currency. Save, refresh and reopen the profile. The company identity in the profile should agree with the company shown in the application header.

How to get there: Select the Settings gear in the upper-right corner. Under Company, select Company Profile.

03

Configure each shop

Enter the shop's customer-facing name, phone, email, address, currency and tax settings. In a multi-location organization, repeat this for each shop. Use the company record for organization identity and the shop record for the location that appears on local operations and customer documents.

How to get there: From the Settings Hub, select Shop, choose the location, then select Profile & Email.

04

Configure work assignment and readiness

For each shop, choose advisor assignment, technician claiming or a hybrid dispatch model. Configure what must be true before work is Ready, which technician actions are allowed, how bays or crews are used and which notifications require attention. Explain the chosen method to the team.

How to get there: Select Settings → Shop → choose the location → Work Order Workflow.

How to get there: On Work Order Workflow, continue to Ready requirements and Technician actions.

05

Configure service menus, intake forms and diagnostic templates

Create the reusable operating content staff will apply during intake, estimating and repair. Company-level service menus and templates provide a consistent default; use a shop-specific override only when that location genuinely follows different services, pricing or inspection steps.

• Open Settings → Company → Service Menu to define reusable labor and part packages shown in Add from service menu.
• Open Settings → Company → Intake Template to define check-in and walk-around fields, evidence and condition controls.
• Open Settings → Company → Diagnostics to standardize inspection and diagnostic content.
• For a location-specific exception, open Settings → Shop → choose the location → Service Menu or Intake Template. Leave overrides empty when the company standard should apply.
• Name items in language advisors and technicians understand, include required evidence, and test the result on a sample work order before go-live.
• Review menus and templates whenever services, labor policy, equipment or customer-document requirements change.

01

Add employees, roles and shop access

Invite every employee with an individual email, then configure both role and shop access. Open Settings → Company → Roles & Permissions to review the preset roles and their module access. Use Team → Shop access to choose the locations where each employee may operate. Role permission and shop membership are separate controls; a correct role does not grant access to every shop.

• Owner or Admin: full access, including Settings and user administration. Reserve these roles for accountable administrators.
• Shop Manager: all operating modules for assigned shops, including estimates, invoices, purchasing, inventory, receiving, reports, customers, vendors and purchase requests—but no company Settings by default.
• Service Advisor: estimates, invoices and sales, customer records, inventory lookup and purchase requests. This lets an advisor build and price work without authorizing vendor purchase orders or changing company settings.
• Technician: restricted work-order access for eligible assigned or claimable jobs, with pricing and administrative access hidden. Do not add customer, invoice-editing, purchase-order or Settings access merely for convenience.
• Use Purchaser for vendor commitments and purchase orders, Receiver for receiving, and Accountant for invoices, bills, payments and reports when those duties are separated.
• A technician assigned to one shop should appear only in that shop's technician choices. Change the employee's shop access first if the person legitimately moves locations.
• After configuration, sign in as an advisor, technician and manager test user. Verify menus, direct URLs, editable fields, work assignment and shop selector—not just the role name.

How to get there: Select the Settings gear → Company → Roles & Permissions.

How to get there: Select Team in the left navigation. Choose Onboard person or Shop access.

01

Create or find the customer

For daily intake, the advisor searches before creating a customer. If no reliable match exists, create one household or business record with the correct contacts and billing information. For an existing customer database, use the native bulk import: Settings → Company → Data Import → Customers. Download the current CSV template, prepare the file, map the source columns, import it and review every added, updated and rejected row.

• Customer import requires company_name (the legacy name header is also accepted). Map contact_first_name, contact_last_name, email, phone or mobile, address fields, tax/account fields, billing mode, billing frequency and notes when available.
• Email is the case-insensitive matching key for an existing customer. Clean and verify it before import; missing or shared email values require deliberate reconciliation.
• Use the mapper to connect each source heading to the corresponding VMOTEK field. Do not rename data merely to force an uncertain match.
• Run a representative pilot first. The result reports inserted, updated and failed rows with row-level reasons; correct the staging file and rerun only after duplicate behavior is understood.
• After import, search sample customers and verify organization name, contacts, address and billing settings. Resolve duplicates before live work begins.
• Record SMS consent before sending text messages.
• For a business, keep the organization separate from individual operational and billing contacts.

How to get there: For one customer, select Customers → New Customer. Customer creation is also available during New Work Order intake.

How to get there: For an existing database, select Settings gear → Company → Data Import → Customers.

02

Identify or create the vehicle

For daily intake, search by VIN or license plate and confirm the vehicle belongs to the correct customer. For an existing vehicle database, import customers first, then open Settings → Company → Data Import → Vehicles. Download the vehicle template, map the source columns, upload the CSV and reconcile every result before using the records for service.

• Every vehicle row requires serial_no, used as the VIN or durable serial identifier.
• Link the vehicle to its customer using customer_email or customer_accno. The referenced customer must already exist, which is why customers are imported first.
• Map description, manufacturer, model, assetnumber or fleet unit, asset type/status and acquisition or warranty dates when the source contains them.
• Normalize obvious VIN spacing, but never guess unknown characters. Do not treat license plate alone as a durable duplicate key.
• After import, sample consumer and fleet vehicles. Verify the owner, VIN, unit number, make/model and service-history relationship.

How to get there: For one vehicle, select Work Orders → New Work Order. Search VIN or plate, or choose new vehicle and customer.

How to get there: For an existing vehicle database, select Settings gear → Company → Data Import → Vehicles.

03

Create vendors and use vendor catalogs

Create a vendor before issuing its first purchase order. Select Procurement → Vendors → Add Vendor, enter the required vendor name and the available contact, address, currency, tax and account information, then save and reopen the record. Use Catalog on the vendor list to view and search catalog items supplied for that vendor.

• Search before creating a vendor so spelling variations do not split purchasing history.
• Verify ordering email, phone, payment terms, currency and ship-from information before live purchasing.
• Current production-safe workflow: create vendors manually and use the catalog pages to view/search vendor catalog data already onboarded.
• Important limitation: the current Upload vendors control is not a persistent native-API import, and the repair UI does not yet provide a persistent vendor-catalog CSV upload. Do not rely on either for production migration.
• For bulk vendor or catalog onboarding, prepare a controlled source file and coordinate the supported import/integration path with VMOTEK Support until native persistent import is released.

How to get there: Select Procurement → Vendors → Add Vendor.

How to get there: Select Procurement → Vendors, then Catalog for the intended vendor; or use Procurement → Vendor Catalogs.

01

Preserve declined work and service history

Keep declined recommendations, inspection evidence, estimates, work orders, invoices and payments connected to the vehicle. Schedule appropriate follow-up rather than rebuilding the recommendation from memory. Update preventive-maintenance evidence from verified completed service.

02

Operate fleet customers

Create one organization record, add authorized operational, approval and billing contacts, register active units and configure maintenance rules. Invite authorized contacts to the portal using their business email. A portal identity invited by several repair companies selects the intended company and never receives staff application access.

How to get there: Under Insights, select Fleet Ops. Use All reminders and Bulk schedule PM for preventive-maintenance action.

03

Generate regular or consolidated fleet billing

Use regular billing when each repair is invoiced separately. For fleet consolidated billing, complete eligible work throughout the billing period, open Fleet Billing, select the customer and reconcile queued work before generating the combined invoice.

How to get there: Under Insights, select Fleet Billing. Administrative permission is required.

01

Connect and monitor integrations

Connect Stripe, Twilio, Gmail and QuickBooks Online only through accountable administrators. Validate one real workflow in test mode and again after production cutover. A Connected badge is not enough; confirm the result and errors in VMOTEK and the provider.

01

Schedule an appointment when work is planned

Create an appointment with customer, vehicle, shop, requested service, date, time and expected duration. Add technician or bay only when known. Confirm the customer's contact channel and use appointment status to distinguish scheduled, arrived, completed, cancelled and no-show activity.

• Do not create a work order merely to reserve a future time slot.
• Record the customer's stated concern without prematurely diagnosing it.
• At arrival, continue into intake so the appointment and repair history stay connected.

02

Check in the vehicle and document intake condition

At arrival, verify mileage, fuel or charge level, warning indicators and customer concern. Complete the walk-around and record meaningful pre-existing damage or condition evidence. Confirm authorization for road testing or diagnostic work according to shop policy.

03

Record the complaint and perform inspection or diagnosis

Write the concern in the customer's language, then add technician findings separately. Use inspection states consistently and record measurements, photos and notes where they support a decision. Diagnosis remains the responsibility of qualified shop personnel; software does not replace professional judgment.

• Condition: what was observed or measured.
• Consequence: why it matters.
• Recommendation: what service or further diagnosis is proposed.
• Priority: service now, schedule soon or monitor.

04

Create the estimate

The advisor adds customer-readable labor, parts, quantities, rates, fees, discounts and taxes. Verify the customer, vehicle, shop, fleet unit, PO requirement and complete total. Separate urgent work from future recommendations and remove internal abbreviations the customer will not understand.

How to get there: Select Estimates and open the estimate, or create it from the applicable customer and vehicle workflow.

05

Send the estimate for approval

Select Send for approval, choose Email, SMS or Both, verify the recipient and attach the PDF when appropriate. SMS requires valid consent. The same single-use link is sent through both channels when Both is selected and expires after 30 days.

How to get there: Open the estimate and select Send for approval in the action area.

06

Process approval, requested changes or decline

The customer sees the itemized estimate and can Approve, Request changes or Decline. Approval applies to the complete estimate. If only part of the work is wanted, the customer requests changes; the advisor revises the scope and price and sends a new link. Never infer authorization from message delivery or link opening.

How to get there: The customer opens the single-use email or SMS link; no repair-staff login is required.

07

Prepare the work order

Create or update the work order with the approved labor and parts. Confirm the serving shop, concern, instructions, approval, intake requirements and parts readiness. Mark the work Ready only when the configured conditions are satisfied.

How to get there: Select Work Orders → New Work Order, or continue from the approved estimate when available.

08

Assign or claim the work

In advisor-assignment mode, an authorized advisor assigns an eligible technician. In claim mode, an eligible technician claims Ready and unassigned work. In hybrid mode, both paths are available according to configuration. The technician must belong to the work order's shop unless company policy and access are deliberately changed.

• Open and No technician identifies undispatched work.
• Assigned and Not started identifies work waiting for the named technician.
• Ready describes preparedness; it does not necessarily mean unassigned.
• A 403 on assignment usually requires checking role, work-order shop and technician shop membership.

09

Start repair and record labor

The eligible technician moves the work to In Repair, records work performed and technician time according to shop policy and updates progress or blocked reasons. Advisors use status and assignment rather than side conversations to understand current work.

10

Find and allocate parts

Search inventory from the work order. Compare on-hand, committed and available quantity before allocating a part. In a multi-shop company, check local and other-shop stock. Keep the shared catalog item connected to the work-order line so quantity and history remain traceable.

How to get there: Choose the work order's shop in the top bar, then open Procurement → Inventory or use the work-order part search.

11

Transfer stock from another shop

When another shop has transferable quantity, open the item and select Transfer. Choose source, destination and quantity and add the work order or reason. The current transfer action posts the movement immediately using source FIFO lots, so submit it only when the physical handoff is controlled.

How to get there: Open Procurement → Inventory, select the item, then Transfer. Purchasing permission is required.

12

Purchase unavailable parts

A single shop normally creates a purchase order directly: choose vendor and destination, add items, quantities and costs, submit for approval when configured, send it to the vendor and receive actual quantities into the correct shop. Partial shipments remain partially received.

How to get there: Select Procurement → Purchase Orders → New Purchase Order.

13

Use purchase requests and consolidated procurement

In Connected Operations, a shop can submit an internal purchase request. An approver validates the need. Central procurement selects approved requests sharing a vendor, reviews demand, historical price, tier breaks, catalog exceptions, vendor lead time and AI-assisted buyer guidance, then creates one consolidated PO while preserving source shop and cost center.

How to get there: Select Procurement after purchase requests have been approved, then select compatible requests sharing one vendor.

14

Handle additional work discovered during repair

The technician documents the new finding and evidence. The advisor adds the additional scope and price to a revised estimate and obtains a new decision. Do not perform chargeable work outside the approved scope merely because the vehicle is already disassembled or in the bay.

15

Complete repair and quality control

The technician completes authorized lines, records final notes and measurements and marks the repair Completed or ready for the shop's configured quality-control step. The responsible reviewer confirms the repair, parts and labor, warning indicators, cleanliness and final road test or reason it was not performed.

• Completed means repair execution is done.
• It does not mean the invoice is paid or the vehicle has been returned.
• If Completed is clicked as a status filter, a second click should not silently remove the same completed records.

16

Create and email the invoice

The advisor or billing user creates the invoice from completed authorized work. Review labor, parts, fees, taxes, discounts, customer information and total. Open the invoice and email it to the verified customer or billing contacts. Add CC recipients when needed and allowed.

17

Record payment and deliver the vehicle

Collect payment through the configured method and reconcile the status. If Stripe is used, confirm the payment in both VMOTEK and Stripe. Mark Delivered only when the vehicle is handed back to the customer or fleet representative. Retain the invoice, payment and delivery status as separate facts.

01

Use dashboards and reports as exception queues

Owners and managers review operational status, shop performance, fleet exceptions, unpaid invoices, procurement pipeline and other reports according to role. Define every KPI and reconcile it to source transactions. A dashboard should direct action, not replace responsibility.

How to get there: Under Insights, select Reports and open the required report.

02

Daily operating checklist

Advisors review today's appointments, arrived vehicles, unassigned Ready work, pending approvals, blocked repairs, completed work awaiting invoicing and vehicles ready for delivery. Technicians review assigned or claimable work and blocked reasons. Purchasing reviews urgent shortages, approved requests, open POs and expected receipts. Billing reviews unpaid or failed transactions.

03

Weekly management checklist

Review work-order aging, technician and bay flow, declined-work follow-up, inventory shortages and adjustments, open and partial POs, procurement opportunities, fleet PM due queues, unpaid invoices, communication failures and role or location changes. Assign every exception an owner and next date.

04

Monthly control checklist

Reconcile payments and accounting sync, consolidated fleet billing, inventory value and cycle counts, vendor price and delivery performance, estimated versus realized procurement savings, subscription and integration charges, administrators and cross-shop access, portal membership and backup or export obligations.

05

Troubleshoot without bypassing controls

A 403 usually requires checking user role, module permission, active shop and explicit shop membership. An empty list may reflect the shop selector or status filter. A queued SMS requires provider delivery evidence. OAuth failures require exact origins, redirects and granted scopes. Do not change database permissions, tenant data or business states merely to bypass a workflow error.

06

Completion standard

A shop is operating successfully when staff can take a customer from appointment or walk-in through intake, evidence, estimate, approval, authorized work, parts, purchasing, technician execution, invoice, payment and delivery without losing the relationships between records or relying on an undocumented spreadsheet. Managers can identify exceptions, and every sensitive action has an accountable user and shop.