Repairs by serial number
Retail Extensions · App · checked 2026-10-29 on a test bench
Repairs by serial number is for an electronics or phone store that repairs and services the units it sells. Each repair is recorded in iVendNext against the unit's serial number (or IMEI): what the customer says is wrong, how the unit came in, the tests you ran, the work you did and the parts you fitted, from the counter to the hand-over. Every repair shows under its serial number, so each unit's service history is one list, and the customer gets a slip. This page covers what the app adds, how to set it up, how your staff use it, how to run a recall by serial number, and how to remove it.
What it does
| Where | What you get |
|---|---|
| Repair | The Serial number (its item, item name and Warranty until date show from the serial number, read only); the Kind of job (Repair, Service, Test only, Recall work); the Customer (their name and phone show from the customer record, read only), or none for a unit of your own stock; Taken in at (the store), Received on and Ready by; the Fault reported and the unit's Condition and accessories; a row per Test with its result and a reading; the Work done, the Technician and a row per Part fitted with the part's own serial number; the sale that paid for it; notes for your store only. Numbered IVN-RPR-00001 and on. |
| Its steps | Received → In repair → Ready to collect → Collected, with Back to work if the customer is not happy, or Cancelled. Store staff cancel a repair that is still Received; only a store manager cancels one In repair. Nobody in the store deletes a repair: it is the unit's history. |
| The lock | Once a repair is Collected or Cancelled, its serial number, customer, kind, store, dates, fault, condition, tests, work, technician and parts cannot change, in Desk, in an import or through the API. On a collected repair, Collected by, Paid by sale and the notes stay editable. |
| The repair slip | Print gives the slip under your letter head: the kind and number, the item and its serial number and warranty date, the customer, the store and the dates, the fault and the condition; once the unit is ready, the work done, each test and each part with its serial; and at the foot a tag for the unit. |
| The unit's history | A serial number's form lists every repair of that unit under Repairs; a customer's and a sale's forms list theirs too. |
| Open repairs | A report of every repair not yet collected or canceled, by the date promised. |
| Parts out of stock | A Repair field on a stock entry of type Material Issue: choose the repair whose parts it takes out of stock. |
What you set up first
- Install the app from the App library (see About Retail Extensions). The install adds the record IVENDNEXT RPR Repair, its steps and lock, the slip, the report, the Repair field on stock entries and the lists under the serial number, the customer and the sale. It adds no role, no setting and no user, and it calls nothing outside your iVendNext.
- Switch the lock on: search Desk for Retail Save Rule, open the rule IVENDNEXT RPR repair locked once collected, tick Enabled and save. Like every rule an app installs, it arrives switched off; until it is on, a collected repair can still be changed.
- Let the repair counter read serial numbers: search Desk for Role Permissions Manager, choose Serial No, press Add a New Rule, choose Sales User, and save (the new row comes with Read and Select ticked; keep both). Do the same for Sales Manager. With Read, the repair shows the serial number's item and warranty date as soon as it is chosen, and staff can open the serial number itself; it also shows them the price the unit was bought at.
- Give the people at the repair counter Sales User (or a role of your own with the same rights on the repair): they take repairs in, record the work, print slips, hand units over and cancel a repair not yet begun. A Sales Manager cancels a repair in work. Neither deletes a repair.
- Put your store's name, address and phone on the Letter Head your store prints with (search Desk for Letter Head). The slip prints under it.
- Give whoever takes parts out of stock Stock User. It lets them read repairs, so the stock entry's Repair field can find one; it also shows them the customer's name and phone. If your site has no stock entry type named Material Issue, search Desk for Stock Entry Type and add one: name Material Issue, purpose Material Issue.
- To text customers when a unit is ready, add your own notification (below).
Texting the customer when the unit is ready
The app sends nothing itself. With your SMS settings in place, search Desk for Notification and add one:
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Document Type | IVENDNEXT RPR Repair |
| Send Alert On | Value Change |
| Value Changed | Workflow State |
| Condition | doc.workflow_state == "IVENDNEXT RPR Ready to collect" and doc.customer_phone |
| Channel and recipients | SMS to the document field Customer's phone |
| Message | for example, Your repair {{ doc.name }} is ready to collect. |
Keep the condition as written: it sends only when the repair moves to Ready to collect, and skips a repair with no phone. A message that cannot be sent never stops the repair: it is logged in the Error Log.
Repairs
At the repair counter, search Desk for IVENDNEXT RPR Repair and press + Add:
- Choose the Serial number: the item, its name and the warranty date show from the serial number (to change them, change the serial number).
- Choose the Customer: their name and phone show from the customer record, the phone the till keeps on the customer. Leave it blank for a unit of your own stock.
- Choose the Kind of job, check Taken in at and Received on, and set Ready by to the date you promise.
- Type the Fault reported in the customer's words, and the unit's Condition and accessories (a cracked corner, with its charger, no SIM card).
- Save and Print the slip for the customer; cut off the tag at the foot and keep it with the unit.
When work starts, press Start work. Add a row for each Test (Battery health, Passed, 82%), type the Work done and the Technician, and add a row for each Part fitted: the part's item in your stock, what it is, the part's own serial number and how many. A row left with no test, or with no part and no description, is not printed. When the unit is done, press Ready: the slip now shows the work, the tests and the parts. If the customer is not happy, press Back to work. A unit you could not repair is handed back the same way: say so in Work done, press Ready, then Hand over.
When the customer collects, type Collected by if someone else collects it and choose the Paid by sale if the till charged for the repair, then press Hand over. From now on the repair stays as it was. If a repair will not go ahead, press Cancel (a store manager, once work has started): it prints Cancelled: this repair was not done. The repair's history shows who pressed each button and when.
To see a unit's history, open its serial number (search Desk for Serial No): its repairs are listed under Repairs. You can also open the repair list and filter it by Serial number. Search Desk for IVENDNEXT RPR Open repairs for the repairs still to finish or hand over.
Charging for a repair
Charge the repair at the till as you charge any service: an item that is not a stock item (Repair labour, say), and the parts as their own items if you sell them. Then choose that sale on the repair.
Parts out of stock
Take the parts out of stock as you do today: a Stock Entry of type Material Issue from the store. Choose the repair in its Repair field (it shows on a Material Issue only, and can be set after the entry is submitted). To see the parts a repair used, open the Stock Entry list and filter by Repair. If you duplicate a Material Issue, clear its Repair on the copy.
Recall by serial number
When a maker recalls a model, or the units between two serial numbers, you need no app:
- Who bought them. Search Desk for Serial No Ledger. Choose the recalled Item and the Serial No of one unit. Each row is one movement of that unit; its sale names the customer it was sold to under Party. Look each unit up by its own serial number: listed by the item alone, a sale that carried several units on one line names its buyer on the first unit's row only. A till sale shows here once its day's sales are booked to stock (on some sites at once, on others when the day closes). A sale to the store's walk-in customer names no one to contact. For many serial numbers, export the item's rows, copy each sale's buyer down to the rows beneath it, and match your list.
- Stop the rest being sold. Move the recalled units still in stock to a store your tills do not sell from (a quarantine warehouse that is on no POS Profile) with a Stock Entry of type Material Transfer naming their serial numbers. The till then refuses them: it sells a serial number only from its own store. A till working offline learns of the move only when it next connects: a recalled unit it sold meanwhile is refused then, and that sale waits on the till until a manager settles it.
- The units brought back. Take each in as a repair of kind Recall work. Filter the repair list by Kind of job to see which have come back.
The ledger is a stock report: whoever runs the recall needs Stock User (Sales User alone cannot open it). It shows customers' names, so give it only to them. A recall by lot, of food or medicine, is a different app, Expiry and recall.
Where it shows
In Desk only: the repair, its slip, the report, the Repair field on a Material Issue, and the lists on the serial number's, the customer's and the sale's forms. Nothing is shown on the till.
What leaves your iVendNext
Nothing, from the app: it has no service and no outside address. Your own notification sends texts through your SMS settings. A repair keeps the customer's name and phone: personal data you keep under your own policy, as you keep your customers'.
Limits
- The app keeps no charge, quote or deposit: the till charges the repair. A quote the customer approves first, a deposit, or a claim to the maker or an insurer is not part of this app: an iVendNext Partner can build it on top.
- The repair is written in Desk, at the repair counter; the till does not take repairs in.
- What shows from the serial number and the customer follows them: a slip printed again after the customer is renamed shows the new name.
- A part's own serial number is typed on the repair; a part tracked by serial number in your stock is named on the Material Issue too.
- The stock entry names the repair; the repair does not list its stock entries. Filter the stock entry list by Repair.
- Which buttons a person sees in each step is Desk's rule; the lock is not: it refuses the change itself, for everyone.
- Desk shows the record, the report, the steps and the buttons with the app's prefix, IVENDNEXT RPR: the button Hand over reads IVENDNEXT RPR Hand over.
How to remove it
- Delete your own notification on the repair first.
- In the App library, find the app under Installed and press Details.
- On the app's record, press Export and uninstall and confirm. iVendNext first exports your repairs to a file.
- iVendNext removes the repair, its steps and lock, the slip, the report, the Repair field and the lists under the serial number, the customer and the sale. Your serial numbers, customers, sales, stock entries and stock stay. The rules you added on Serial No in step 3 stay too: remove them in the Role Permissions Manager if you no longer want them.