Setting up your service department

Before your team books its first job, tell MotoDealerHQ how your shop works: when you are open, how long jobs take, who does the work and what you charge. The setup wizard walks you through it in ten short steps. Every rooftop (location) has its own service settings, so a dealership with several stores sets each one up separately.

Before you start #

• Service is part of the Pro and Enterprise plans (plan feature service). See plans and trials.
• You need the service.settings.manage permission. Technicians and bays also need service.technicians.manage; labor rates and service types need service.labor.manage.
• Add your staff as users first if technicians should use the time clock. See users, roles and MFA.

Run the setup wizard #

1. Open Service & parts › Service settings and select Setup wizard. (The Service dashboard also shows a "Start the setup wizard" link while a rooftop is not set up.)
2. If you have more than one rooftop, pick it in the Location list at the top.
3. Work through the steps. Each step has Save and continue, Back and Skip, and you can jump to any step from the list of steps:
   1. Service department: department name, service phone and service email.
   2. Business hours: up to three opening windows per day. Leave a day empty to close it. Use two windows for a lunch break, for example 08:00–12:00 and 13:00–18:00.
   3. Appointment rules: appointment interval (10, 15, 20, 30, 45 or 60 minutes, or custom), default length, earliest and latest start, minimum notice for online booking, how many days ahead customers can book, same-day booking, how many appointments can run at the same time, daily limits per technician, advisor and bay, overbooking, and which arrival options you offer (wait, drop-off, pickup / delivery, mobile service).
   4. Service types: 22 standard services (oil change, tire installation, brake service, diagnostics and more) are ready. Untick what you do not offer, and choose which ones customers can book online.
   5. Technicians: add each technician with an optional staff login (needed for the time clock), skills and a technician class.
   6. Bays: optional. Add lifts or workstations if appointments should reserve one.
   7. Labor rate: hourly rates for this rooftop: customer pay, warranty, internal, fleet and insurance.
   8. Tax and fees: sales tax rate (empty uses your accounting default), shop supplies as a percentage of labor with a cap, an environmental fee, the RO number prefix, how many days estimates stay valid, and whether parts, labor and fees are taxable.
   9. Online scheduling: let customers book on your website, let them reschedule or cancel with their private link (and how many hours before the appointment that closes), text confirmations to customers who agreed to texts, and instructions for the confirmation email.
   10. Publish: check the summary (hours, services offered online, technicians and bays), tick Turn on online scheduling if you want it, and select Publish.

The wizard starts with sensible defaults: Monday to Friday 8–5, Saturday 8–12, 30-minute slots, 60-minute appointments, two appointments at a time, two hours' notice and 60 days ahead. It also adds four inspection templates (motorcycle, ATV / UTV, automotive and PWC / marine). You can come back to the wizard at any time.

Fine-tune later in Service settings #

Service & parts › Service settings holds everything from the wizard, plus a few more options.

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1. Setup wizard: reopen the wizard.
2. Location: settings are per rooftop.
3. Section links: General, Hours, Holidays & closures and Website page.
4. Department switches: Service department active and Customers can book online.
5. Appointment rules: the same rules as wizard step 3.

Other settings on this page:

• Holidays, closures, special hours and blackout dates: add a date range with a kind (Holiday (closed), Temporary closure, Special hours, Blackout (no appointments)), optional times and a label such as "Thanksgiving".
• Default labor rate used when no other rate applies, and Technicians may clock overlapping time.
• Internal repair orders, reminders and invoices: whether closing an internal RO adds its cost to the vehicle, how internal labor is costed, the switch for service reminders, and the invoice terms printed on service invoices.
• Website service page: heading, description, brands serviced, YouTube video links and an optional financing mention for your website's /service page. See online scheduling.

Add technicians, advisors and bays #

1. Open Service & parts › Technicians, advisors & bays.
2. Select Add technician. Enter the name, employee number, rooftop and Staff login (time clock, My jobs).
3. Add a Technician class (for example A, B or Master) if you bill different rates per class, plus an efficiency target, skills, brands and unit types the technician works on. Empty means "any".
4. Set normal working hours if they differ from the shop's hours, and add Vacation and absences after saving.
5. Under Service advisors, choose a staff member and select Add advisor. Appointments are spread across active advisors, each with an optional daily limit.
6. Select Add bay for each lift or workstation: how many units it holds at a time, supported unit types, allowed types of work and, optionally, which technicians may use it.

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1. Add technician / Add bay.
2. Technicians: class, skills, efficiency target and labor cost.
3. Service advisors: staff members who take appointments.
4. Bays and workstations.

The online scheduler uses all of this: it offers a time only when a qualified technician is working and free, a suitable bay has room, and an advisor is under their daily limit.

Labor operations, rates and service types #

Open Service & parts › Labor & service types. It has three tabs.

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1. Tabs: Service types, Labor operations and Labor rates.

2. New service type.

3. Online: whether customers can book the service on your website.

   • Service types are what customers book. Each has a public and internal description, appointment length, default labor hours and labor operation, a price and how it shows on the website (hidden, exact or "starting at"), capacity units, eligible brands, unit types, technicians and bays, and switches such as Bookable online, Requires an estimate and Needs a bay.
   • Labor operations are your standard jobs: code, description, category, standard time, customer / warranty / internal rates, the skill needed and service intervals.
   • Labor rates: the most specific rate wins: technician class, then labor operation, then location, then organization, then the operation's own rate, then the rooftop default. Warranty, fleet and other rate types fall back to customer pay when not set.

Tips #

• Set up hours and service types first. The wizard's last step tells you what is still missing.
• Add a staff login to every technician who should clock time. Without it, My jobs cannot show their work.
• Leave capacity at the default until you have a week of real bookings, then adjust.
• Have your accountant confirm what is taxable in your state. The tax switches are only defaults for new lines.

Permissions #

Limitations #