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Add a Customer

Add a customer when you're about to quote or dispatch for someone TuffOps doesn't already know about. A customer record is what every quotation, work order, and unit hangs off of, so it's usually the first thing you create for a new account.

You only need a name (or a company name) and a type. Everything else is optional and editable later.

Before you start​

  • You have the customers.create permission.
  • The customer integration is off. If TuffOps is syncing customers from QuickBooks (or another external system), the New button is hidden and you'll see "Customer data is managed by an external system." on the Customers page. Add the customer there, then sync.

Steps​

  1. Open Customers

    Select Customers in the top navigation bar.

  2. Start a new customer

    Select the green New button at the top-left of the list.

  3. Pick the type

    • Type — Commercial, Residential, or Government. This drives the colored badge in the customer list and is used by reporting.

  4. Fill in the name

    Either First Name or Company Name is required. Both work fine if you have them.

    • First Name — for residential customers, the bill-to person. For commercial, the main contact.
    • Last Name — optional surname.
    • Company Name — the business name. Use this on its own for company-only records, or combine with First/Last Name for "Maria Santos at Caribe Solutions LLC"-style records.
    note

    The form requires only one of First Name or Company Name, regardless of customer type. Pick whichever fits — or fill in both. There's no enforcement that commercial or government customers must have a company name.

  5. Add contacts

    • Email — one or more emails, comma-separated. The first one is the default for sending quotations and work order reports.
    • Phone — one or more phone numbers, comma-separated. Used for WhatsApp delivery of quotations.

  6. (Optional) Add the address

    • Address, City, Country, Postcode — the customer's billing or main address. This isn't the install address — that lives on the unit and on each work order.

  7. (Optional) Set a customer-level discount

    • Discount Rate (%) — a default discount applied to every quotation for this customer. Leave at 0 for no default discount. You can still override on a per-quotation basis.

  8. Save

    Select the green Save button.

What happens next​

  • The customer is created and you're taken back to the Customers list, sorted to show them near the top of their letter group.
  • The customer is selectable in the Customer dropdown on quotations, work orders, and units.
  • Their Units and Quotations counts are both 0 and grow as you create those records.

Common situations​

SituationWhat to do
The customer is a business with a primary contact (e.g. "Maria Santos at Caribe Solutions LLC")Fill in First Name, Last Name, and Company Name all three. The display name shows as "Maria Santos (Caribe Solutions LLC)".
You only know the company nameSkip first/last name. The customer shows as the company name everywhere.
The customer has multiple billing emails (AP, owner, manager)Comma-separate them in the Email field. All emails receive the quotation. The first email is the WhatsApp / email default.
You want to bulk-load 50+ customers from your old systemDon't add them one by one. Use Import Customers from a CSV.
The customer has multiple service addressesCreate one customer record. Add the addresses on each unit instead. The customer-level address is for billing.

Troubleshooting​

The New button isn't there.

Either you're missing the customers.create permission, or the customer integration is enabled. Look for the "Customer data is managed by an external system. Editing is disabled." banner at the top of the Customers page — that's the integration. Add the customer in the source system instead.

Save fails with "The first name field is required when company name is not present."

You filled in neither First Name nor Company Name. One of the two is required. Add a value to either field and save again.

The customer was saved but their address looks blank in the list.

The address column in the list shows a one-line summary of address + city + country. If you only filled in City, only the city shows. Open the customer to confirm the fields you actually entered.