The VIN You Should Have Logged Three Services Ago
A silver Toyota Yaris comes in for an oil change — same owner, fourth visit. Your mechanic reaches for the history and finds an intake card with a plate number and a handwritten note about the last service grade used. No VIN, no engine number, no record of whether the A/C freon was topped up during the March visit. The customer asks about the gearbox oil — when was that last changed? Nobody knows.
The gap between "we've seen this car before" and "we have a complete service record for this vehicle" is where small workshops bleed time and customer trust simultaneously. Getting the VIN at first intake and recording it against every subsequent visit eliminates the ambiguity that forces technicians to make educated guesses about oil grades, service intervals, and what was actually done last time.
The Workshop template structures each service as a complete record, not an entry in a rotating log. Every vehicle gets its own identity — make, model, year, plate number, VIN (via barcode scan), engine number, fuel type, and colour — paired with the service record for each visit.
What Gets Recorded at Every Intake and Why
The entry datetime captures the exact moment the vehicle arrives. Exit date is date-only — day-level precision is what matters for customer pickup commitments. Status is binary: Ready or Pending (Pending is the default). That simplicity is intentional. A filter on Pending status gives you every car currently in the shop without nuance. The nuance lives in the work log, not in the status field.
The current mileage (Χιλιόμετρα) and next service interval (Επόμενη Αλλαγή) are paired integer fields. The interval field is the mileage target for the next oil change, not a date. When both values are recorded at every service, you have a complete odometer history that lets you tell a customer exactly how far overdue they are — and document that fact in writing before work starts.
The service checklist multichoice field covers 13 items: engine oil, oil filter, air filter, cabin filter, fuel filter, alternator belt, A/C belt, gearbox fluid, brake fluid, coolant, diagnosis/calibration, spark plugs, and A/C charge and freon top-up. Selecting multiple items from a single field creates a clean documented record of everything completed during the visit. No line items in a narrative field that someone has to parse later.
The Oil Brand Fields as a Technical Asset
The two free-text fields for oil brand and viscosity — engine oil and gearbox oil (valvoline spec) — are the fields that solve the "what grade did we use last time?" problem permanently. An independent workshop serving cars that range from a 2005 diesel wagon running 5W-40 to a 2019 petrol hatchback requiring 0W-20 long-life synthetic cannot rely on technician memory for this information. Both fields recorded at every service means the answer is always one tap away.
When the next service arrives and the customer asks whether you can use an alternative brand, you have documented what the previous grade was. If the customer declines the recommended Mobil 1 and wants to use a cheaper alternative, you note it in Παρατηρήσεις (Observations) and move on. The record is the protection.
The MySmart image field at the top of the record captures the condition of the vehicle at intake — visible damage, pre-existing scratches, whatever the mechanic photographs before the car enters the bay. Combined with the VIN barcode scan and the stamped entry datetime, the intake record is a defensible document.
The total cost field (Σύνολο) in EUR is the final figure for the visit. It's a currency field, not a calculated sum, which means it reflects the agreed invoice amount after any adjustments — parts margins, labor rate, discount applied — rather than a mechanical addition of itemized costs. The Εργασίες που εγιναν (Work Completed) free-text field carries the narrative of what was actually done, distinct from the checklist, for anything that falls outside the 13 standard categories.