Workflow: Fleet Management — A Vehicle's Lifecycle

Modules involved: Fleet (Vehicles · Bookings · Logbooks · Work Orders · Fuel · Maintenance · Inspections · Parts · Insurance) · HR Profile · Purchase · Expenses · Invoices
Who uses it: Fleet Manager · Drivers (Driver role) · Finance · Maintenance
Typical duration: Continuous (daily bookings) + monthly cycle (costs) + annual cycle (inspections, insurance)

Overview

The Fleet module manages the complete lifecycle of a company vehicle: registration, driver assignment, bookings, travel logbook, maintenance, spare parts, fuel, inspections, and insurance. Maintenance costs are financially tracked through Expenses (from_fleet=1), and invoiced bookings go through Invoices (from_fleet=1).

Mandatory dependencies: The hr_profile and purchase modules must be active. Fleet checks at every load — if one is missing, it redirects with an error. Without these modules, Fleet does not function.

Note on Assets: There is no functional link between the Fleet module and the Assets module (tblassets). Integration stubs exist in the code but the referenced methods are not implemented.

Flow diagram

[INITIAL CONFIGURATION — admin]
  │
  ├── Vehicle Groups + Vehicle Types
  ├── Garages (+ Maintenance Teams)
  ├── Insurance Categories / Types / Status / Companies
  ├── Part Groups + Part Types
  ├── Inspection Forms (with questions and failure criteria)
  ├── Criteria (for driver benefits/penalties)
  └── Assign 'Fleet: Driver' role to employees who drive
  │
  ↓
[VEHICLE REGISTRATION]
  │
  ├── New vehicle: type, group, license plate, VIN, technical data
  ├── Insurance added: category, type, company, validity, amount
  └── Parts inventoried and assigned to vehicle
  │
  ↓
[BOOKING]
  │
  ├── Client or internal user submits booking (Fleet_client controller)
  ├── Initial status: new
  ├── Fleet Manager manually approves: new → approved
  │     (or: rejected / processing)
  └── Booking confirmed → Amount set for future invoicing
  │
  ↓
[LOGBOOK — TRIP EXECUTION]
  │
  ├── Logbook created for confirmed booking: vehicle + driver + date
  ├── Time Cards added: start_time / end_time per work session
  ├── Logbook status: new → processing → complete
  └── Fuel entry: odometer, liters, price, type, vendor
  │
  ↓
[MAINTENANCE / WORK ORDER (if malfunction or scheduled service)]
  │
  ├── Work Order created: vehicle, vendor, odometer in/out
  ├── Status: open → in_progress → parts_ordered → complete
  ├── Consumed parts added as Work Order Details (part_id, qty, price)
  ├── Upon completion: Create Expense → Expense created with category 'Fleet: Work Order'
  │     from_fleet=1 · vendor = vendor from Work Order
  └── (Simple maintenance alternative: Maintenance record without Work Order)
  │
  ↓
[INSPECTION (periodic or post-incident)]
  │
  ├── Inspection created based on a configured Inspection Form
  ├── Results filled in per question (answer, boxdescriptionid)
  ├── Answers with is_fail=1 → inspection marked as failed
  └── Inspections can be recurring (recurring_type, cycles)
  │
  ↓
[BOOKING INVOICING]
  │
  ├── From completed booking: Create Invoice button
  ├── Invoice automatically created with amount from booking + from_fleet=1
  └── Invoice tracked and paid like any standard invoice
  │
  ↓
[REPORTS & COSTS]
  │
  ├── Fleet → Transactions: all invoice + expense with from_fleet=1
  ├── Fleet → Reports: Profit & Loss · Sales Chart per vehicle
  └── Driver benefits/penalties: recorded with criterion + amount

[VEHICLE DECOMMISSIONED → out_of_service_date + final odometer]

Step by step

1. Initial configuration (admin)

Where: /admin/fleet → Settings

Configuration order matters — some entities depend on others:

1a. Vehicle lookups

Where: Settings → Vehicle Groups + Vehicle Types

Create at least one group (e.g., "Passenger cars", "Vans") and one type (e.g., "Sedan", "SUV", "Truck"). These are required when creating a vehicle.

1b. Garages

Where: Settings → Garages → Add Garage

Fields: name, country, city, address. After creation, you can add a Maintenance Team: employees (staff) assigned to that garage for maintenance.

1c. Insurance setup (4 separate tables)

Where: Settings → Insurance Categories / Insurance Types / Insurance Status / Insurance Company

All 4 are required before adding an insurance policy to a vehicle.

1d. Part Groups + Part Types

Where: Settings → Part Groups + Part Types

Required before creating inventory parts.

1e. Inspection Forms

Where: Settings → Inspection Forms → New Form

Each form has:

• Questions with response types (checkbox, text, etc.)
• is_fail set on answers that mark the inspection as failed

Forms can be configured as recurring (recurring=1, recurring_type, cycles).

1f. Criteria (for benefits/penalties)

Where: Settings → Criteria → Add Criteria

Used in Fleet → Benefits & Penalties for formal recording of driver rewards or penalties.

1g. Assigning driver role

Where: /admin/staff → edit staff → Roles → check "Fleet: Driver"

The Fleet: Driver role is created automatically upon module installation. Only staff with this role appear in driver dropdowns throughout Fleet (Assignments, Logbooks, Work Orders, etc.).

2. Vehicle registration

Where: /admin/fleet → Vehicles → Add Vehicle

Required fields:

Recommended fields:

Vehicle insurance: Where: vehicle record → Insurance tab → Add Insurance

Parts assigned to vehicle: Where: /admin/fleet → Parts → Add Part → assign vehicle

3. Assigning a driver to a vehicle

Where: /admin/fleet → Vehicle Assignments → Add Assignment

A vehicle can have multiple successive assignments. The full history is preserved.

4. Booking — vehicle reservation

Where: external client → portal /clients/fleet (Fleet_client controller) or admin → /admin/fleet/bookings

Booking statuses (fleet_bookings.status):

Important: There is no automated approval workflow. The approved column (INT) exists in the table but is not read or written by any active method in the code. Status transition is exclusively manual — the fleet manager changes the status explicitly.

Required permission to change status: service_management → edit OR is_admin().

Key booking fields:

5. Logbook — trip execution

Where: /admin/fleet → Work Performance (Logbooks) → Add

The Logbook documents the execution of a booking or an independent trip.

Logbook statuses (fleet_logbooks.status):

Time Cards: per logbook, work sessions are added with start_time and end_time (fleet_time_cards). Allows calculation of total hours.

Fuel: Where: /admin/fleet → Fuel History → Add

6. Work Order — maintenance with parts

Where: /admin/fleet → Work Orders → New Work Order

Work order statuses (fleet_work_orders.status):

Key fields:

Consumed parts (Work Order Details): Add lines with part_id (from Fleet inventory), qty, price → total is calculated automatically.

Generating an expense from Work Order (status=complete): The Create Expense button in Work Order → automatically creates:

• tblexpenses with from_fleet=1, amount=work_order.total, category='Fleet: Work Order', vendor_id=work_order.vendor_id
• Work Order receives expense_id in the linking field

7. Vehicle inspection

Where: /admin/fleet → Inspections → New Inspection

Select the vehicle + Inspection Form. Fill in answers per question. Answers marked is_fail=1 automatically mark the inspection as failed.

Inspections can be set as recurring (recurring=1): the system automatically generates future inspections based on recurring_type and cycles.

8. Booking invoicing

Where: /admin/fleet → Bookings → booking record → Create Invoice

The create_invoice_by_booking($id) method automatically generates:

• A standard invoice (tblinvoices) with amount from booking and from_fleet=1
• The booking receives invoice_id and invoice_hash in the linking fields

The generated invoice also appears in /admin/invoices and can be managed like any standard invoice (sending, payment, reminder, eFactura).

9. Reports and costs

Where: /admin/fleet → Transactions / Reports

Required permissions

Gotchas

Module references

• Fleet — module documentation
• Assets — asset management (separate from Fleet)
• Expenses — expenses generated from Work Orders
• Invoices — invoices generated from Bookings
• HR — Staff — assigning Fleet: Driver role