Technicians, users and logins

Two lists are easy to confuse. A user is a login to the system. A technician is a person who works on cars and whose hours are tracked. A mechanic is usually both, and the two are joined through the employee card.

Adding a technician

Open Technicians and press Add technician. You pick an existing employee or create one, set a skill such as Mechanic or Painter, and optionally a cost per hour. That cost is not a selling price; it is used only to estimate labour cost and nothing is posted. A technician can be marked as able to clock in, and shows which user he signs in as. A technician with no login is clocked in and out by a manager. Only a manager, meaning a user who can manage the workshop, can add or change technicians.

Adding users

In the setup guide, or in Settings under Users & Permissions, you give each person a full name, a username without spaces, a password of at least 6 characters in the guide, and a role. Sign-in rules such as password length, lockout after failed attempts and session timeout are set in Settings under Sign-in rules.

Why linking matters

My work shows a technician his own jobs as large cards with a timer. It only works when his login is linked to a technician through his employee card. Otherwise the screen says to ask your manager to link the login to a technician. The same link decides the Clock Board: a technician can use the buttons on his own row only, and only a manager can clock another person.

• A person can be clocked into one job at a time. Clocking into a second job is refused until he clocks out of the first.
• Breaks are excluded from hours.
• Time clocked on a job the customer has not approved yet is recorded but is not billable.