My business involves repair and service of automobiles(cars) and light trucks. I like the software thus far, but to avoid large database changes in the future, I would like to determine best practices now.
My goal is to track client info(name, address, billing; very easy, built in) as well as vehicle specific info(VIN, number plate, mileage). Most clients have multiple vehicles under the same billing info.
My current attempt is to create a new ‘client’ per vehicle. Each vehicle(client) then has the customers billing and contact info as a contact. Custom fields solve the VIN and license plate entry, but mileage I am unsure of. Mileage would be recorded(and displayed ideally) at the time of invoicing for record keeping and future sales.
My question: Is creating a ‘client’ for each car an effective strategy when considering reporting, searching, etc? Edit: I do see “Groups” are a feature, though I cannot figure out the functionality of them. Would it make sense to make a ‘Group’ for the customer, and multiple ‘clients’(vehicles) under that group? How do groups function?
Also: Is there a method for recording mileage at time of invoicing(and to display on PDF) and then updating a custom field on the client dataset?
I hope this makes sense, thank you in advanced for the help.
I will test adding vehicle info as contacts. Is there a limit to the number of custom fields? Or number of contacts?
Also, how will this effect the ability to sort/search for records on my end and in client portal. Example: John Doe asks about his Ford when the oil was changed last. Will it be possible to find recent records specific to the Ford if he has a Toyota listed as well? Sort/search invoices by contact(which is now vehicle) I suppose?
I understand I may be stretching the use case for the software so I appreciate your time and help in making this work.