Service orders and custody

A service order organizes receipt, commercial work, and delivery of equipment associated with a report. Custody records what was received and who received it back.

Availability: Professional and Company; requires commercial operations permission. Level: Intermediate.

Purpose

Use an order to group customer, report, equipment, quotes, documents, delivery, and warranties. Use custody when the organization physically receives equipment and needs preserved intake and release evidence.

Requirements

• A visible report and active customer; each report supports one order.
• If the report already has a customer, the order must use the same one.
• A Related company must have Client or Both role.
• Equipment must belong to the same organization and cannot belong to another customer.

Step by step

1. Create the order from the report and select a customer.
2. Confirm title, description, labor and parts warranty days, and up to 50 equipment units.
3. To receive equipment, record the reported issue, condition, accessories, and photos.
4. Work the order while In progress and create quotes when needed.
5. Mark it Ready when work is complete.
6. Deliver it by identifying the recipient and adding outgoing condition and photos. Delivery automatically ends active custody records on the order.

Rules and effects

• Statuses are In progress, Ready, Delivered, and Canceled.
• A piece of equipment can have only one active custody, even if it appears on different orders.
• If equipment has no customer, adding it to the order assigns that customer; it cannot later be used on another customer's order.
• Intake evidence is not rewritten. Ending custody adds recipient, outgoing condition, and outgoing photos.
• Only an In-progress order can receive equipment or become Ready.
• Canceling an In-progress or Ready order requires a reason and no custody may remain active.
• Orders are preserved as history and are not deleted.

Required and optional information

Required: customer, warranty days from 0 to 3650; equipment when recording custody; recipient when ending custody or delivering. Optional: initial equipment, custom title and description, issue, conditions, accessories, and photos. Each custody supports up to 10 intake and 10 outgoing JPG, PNG, or WebP images, up to 5 MB each.

Practical example

A notebook arrives with its charger and a mark on the cover. The operator creates an order from the report, records both details, and takes photos. When finished, the order is marked Ready and delivered to Jane with outgoing photos. Custody preserves both sets of evidence.

Current limits

• An order cannot be created without a prior report.
• A report cannot have two orders.
• Intake evidence cannot be edited after it is recorded.
• Cancellation is blocked until all active custodies have ended.