A fleet is a company that brings you several vehicles: a delivery firm, a taxi operator, a council's vans. In GarageFlow a fleet is a customer with a company name, so everything a customer has (orders, invoices, payments, credit, the portal, messages, appointments) works for a fleet in exactly the same way. What a fleet adds is the shape of a business account: its own vehicles with unit numbers, the people who work there, its own payment terms, and a statement at the end of the month.
Included in ProCreating a fleet
Go to Lists → Fleets and press Add Fleet. Only the Fleet Name is required. The rest is optional:
- Account Number: your reference for the account, such as
FL-1042. It is printed on statements as the payment reference. - Primary contact: the person you deal with at the fleet. A fleet doesn't need one; its name is the company.
- Phone, email, address and payment terms, as for any customer.
Already filed a company as an ordinary customer? Open it, edit, and switch Customer type from Customer to Fleet. The record keeps its whole history, so there is nothing to re-create. You can switch it back the same way; a fleet turned back into a customer lets go of its contacts, who stay on file as ordinary customers.
Fleets have their own list; Lists → Customers shows only individuals. Every customer picker (new order, new appointment, taking a payment) shows both, with fleets marked Fleet.
The fleet's vehicles
A fleet's page opens on its Vehicles tab: unit number, vehicle, plate, VIN, mileage, number of orders and last visit, with a search that matches unit numbers too.
- Add vehicle creates a new one already owned by the fleet.
- Add existing moves a vehicle you already have on file into the fleet. The search shows each car's current owner, and the service history moves with it.
Unit number is the fleet's own number for a vehicle, the one their drivers and managers use ("van 14"). It appears on the vehicle form when the owner is a fleet, and is then shown wherever the vehicle is named: the vehicle page, the order header, the workflow card, global search, and the estimate and invoice PDFs.
Contacts
The Contacts tab holds the people who work at the fleet: the fleet manager who approves work, the drivers who drop the vans off.
- Add contact creates a new person linked to the fleet.
- Link existing links a customer you already have.
- Remove from fleet in a contact's menu unlinks them. The person stays on file as an ordinary customer.
A contact is still their own customer record. What the link changes is that every picker labels them Contact at the fleet, and their own page links back to it. So when a driver walks in, the writer sees whose van it is and can put the order on the fleet instead of on the driver.
Payment terms for fleets
Businesses usually pay on account. Under Settings → Payment Terms, press Set as fleet default on the term your fleets pay on, such as Net 30. A new order picks its term in this order:
- The customer's own payment term, if it has one.
- Otherwise the shop's fleet default for a fleet, or its customer default for anyone else.
- Otherwise the first term with no days to pay.
If you change an order's customer, the term is picked again for the new customer, unless somebody chose it by hand. The due date on the invoice comes from that term. See getting paid.
PO numbers
Many fleets won't pay an invoice without their purchase order number on it. Type it into PO number under Details in the order sidebar. It prints on the estimate and the invoice, shows in the order summary, and the invoice list search finds it.
Two rules worth knowing: the PO number is frozen once the order is invoiced, and Duplicate does not copy it, because a PO authorizes one job, not the next. PO numbers work on every order and every plan, not only for fleets.
Statements
Statement in the ⋯ menu on the fleet's page builds a statement of account. It defaults to last month and shows:
- Every invoice issued in the period, with its vehicle, unit number, PO number, total, what's been paid and the balance.
- Every older invoice that is still unpaid, unless you switch off Include unpaid invoices from before.
- The amount due, what is overdue, and an aging summary: current, 1-30, 31-60, 61-90 and over 90 days, counted from each invoice's due date.
- Any credit the fleet has with you, taken off the amount due.
Download PDF gives you the statement as a file. Send emails it to the people you tick: the account's own email and any contact with an email address, with an optional note. Record payment opens the payment dialog for paying several invoices at once, which is how a fleet's monthly transfer is usually recorded.
Statements work for any customer, not only fleets. Sending one needs a verified email address on your GarageFlow account, like every document the shop emails.
Reports
The order, invoice, aging, payment transaction and sales-by-customer reports have a Customer type filter: Fleets runs the report for fleet accounts only, Customers for everyone else. See reports and exports.
On Basic and Growth
Fleets are a Pro feature. On a lower plan you can't create a fleet, turn a customer into one, or link new contacts, and Lists → Fleets shows an upgrade notice. A shop that downgrades keeps everything it already has: existing fleets, their vehicles, contacts, orders and invoices all keep working, and a fleet can always be turned back into an ordinary customer. Statements and PO numbers stay available on every plan.
Troubleshooting
"A new order for the fleet didn't start on Net 30." The fleet has a payment term of its own, which wins over the fleet default, or no term has been set as the fleet default yet. Check both under Settings → Payment Terms.
"The unit number field isn't on the vehicle form." It only shows when the vehicle belongs to a fleet. Move the vehicle into the fleet first.
"I can't edit the PO number." The order has been invoiced. The PO is part of what was billed.
"There's nobody to send the statement to." Neither the fleet nor any of its contacts has an email address. Add one to the fleet or a contact.
"I can't create a fleet." Your plan doesn't include fleets. Fleets are on Pro and above.