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Add Photos and Notes to a Work Order

Photos and notes capture what the unit looked like, what you found, and what you did. They appear on the service report the customer signs and stay with the work order forever for audit.

Before you start​

  • The work order is in ongoing status. Photos and notes show as a card on the work order, but the card is hidden until you start the work order.
  • You have photos.create and notes.create (the technician role gets both by default).

Add photos​

  1. Open the Files card

    On the work order edit page, find the Files card on the left. The card is collapsed by default — select the header to expand it. The grey badge next to the label shows the current file count.

  2. Pick the file(s)

    Inside the card, use the file input at the bottom of the panel. Selecting it opens your device's file picker. On a phone, the picker offers a camera capture option ("Take Photo" / "Take Video") because the input accepts image/*, video/*, and .pdf.

    You can pick multiple files in one go.

  3. Upload

    Select the small blue upload-icon button next to the file input. The form posts and the page reloads with the new thumbnails in the grid above.

Limits​

  • One file can be up to 50 MB (51200 KB).
  • Allowed types: JPG, JPEG, PNG, GIF, WebP, BMP, MP4, MOV, AVI, WebM, PDF.
  • There's no fixed cap on the total number of files per work order, but very large galleries slow down the page on weak connections.

Add a note​

  1. Open the Internal Notes card

    On the work order edit page, find the Internal Notes card on the right. The card is collapsed by default — select the header to expand it. Existing notes are listed with author and timestamp.

  2. Type the note

    Use the Add a note... input at the bottom of the expanded card. Keep it under 1000 characters — that's the server cap.

  3. Save

    Select the small blue plus-icon button next to the input. The form posts and the page reloads with the new note at the top of the list, with your name and the current time.

Delete a photo or note​

If you uploaded the wrong file or wrote the wrong note:

  • Photo — locate the thumbnail in the grid. Select the small red × in its top-right corner and confirm Delete this file?. Deletion is immediate and permanent.
  • Note — find the note in the list and select its trash icon. Confirm Delete this note?. Same deletion behavior.

You can only delete photos that aren't flagged prevent deletion — those show a small lock icon instead of the ×. Signature captures and compliance evidence are typically locked once attached.

What happens next​

  • Photos appear on the service report PDF the customer signs at job completion.
  • Notes are internal — they don't appear on the service report. Use them for context the office needs (parts ordered, pause reasons, escalations).
  • Both photos and notes are timestamped with your name. The audit trail is permanent.
  • Photos attached to a checklist item live with the item, not the work order — that's a different upload flow. See Use a Checklist on a Work Order.

Common situations​

SituationWhat to do
Customer asks for a photo of the work for their recordsTake it, upload it. The customer's signed PDF includes every photo on the work order.
You want to attach a vendor invoice or warranty PDFUpload it as a PDF — PDF is in the allowed types.
Phone won't upload — file too largeMost likely the file is over 50 MB. On iOS, change the camera setting to High Efficiency (HEIF) instead of Most Compatible to halve the file size. On Android, lower the camera resolution.
You need to add a long note (over 1000 chars)Split it into two notes, or attach a .txt or .pdf file with the longer text and add a short note pointing to it.
The photo finished uploading but isn't on the pageReload the page. If still missing, the upload may have failed silently — try again.

Troubleshooting​

The Files card isn't there at all.

The work order is in pending (or earlier). The card hides until you start the work order. Status moves to ongoing and the card appears.

The upload fails with "The photo must be a file of type: jpg, jpeg, png..."

Your file's extension or MIME type isn't in the allowed list. Convert to one of the supported types (JPG, PNG, WebP, MP4, PDF, etc.) and re-upload.

The upload fails with "The photo must not be greater than 51200 kilobytes."

The file is over 50 MB. Re-export at lower resolution or quality, or split a long video into shorter clips.

You deleted a photo by accident.

You'd have already had to confirm Delete this file? before it went, so it's a deliberate action — but mistakes happen. Deletion is immediate and there's no undo from the technician's view. Re-upload from the same source if you still have it.

You can't see the red × on a photo.

That photo is flagged prevent deletion — a small lock icon is shown in the top-right instead. Customer signatures and compliance evidence files are typically locked once attached. A supervisor can remove the protection if needed, but the lock exists to preserve the audit trail.