Software for an authorised service centre

An authorised service has two customers, and they pay under different rules. The owner pays for what they broke; the manufacturer pays for what broke by itself. ServiceCenterSoft separates those two streams from the first minute of intake.

Why an authorised centre is harder

An ordinary workshop has one price list and one payer. An authorised centre juggles at least three things at once:

• Its own price list for chargeable repairs.
• The brand's price list for warranty work — and every brand has its own.
• An obligation to report to the manufacturer in the form they accept.

If all of that lives in one spreadsheet, sooner or later a warranty repair gets costed at your own prices and a customer pays for something the brand should have covered. Both mistakes cost money; the second also costs reputation.

The warranty price list

The price of a warranty repair is made of three coordinates: brand, repair category and device. Replacing a control board in one brand's washing machine costs one thing and another brand's a different thing, and the software knows both.

Brands, categories and devices are ordinary reference lists you maintain yourself. Adding a brand you have just signed with is a line in a list and some new price rows — not a call to the developer.

At intake the warranty price lines appear as soon as the brand and device type are chosen: the front desk picks the right category, and that price becomes the base of the estimate. Chargeable work is costed as usual: from the device price list, diagnostics only, or your own price for the case at hand. In both cases parts and extra work are added as estimate lines on top of the base, so you can see what the brand pays for the labour and what went on parts.

The date of sale decides who pays

Next to the serial number, the intake form has a date-of-sale field. It is not a formality: it answers the main question — is this a warranty case or not.

The date of sale prints on the job sheet and on the certificate, so the customer keeps a document showing what you based the decision on. "But I still have warranty" is settled by paper rather than memory.

Honestly: the software does not check warranty by serial number against the manufacturer's system — there is no such link. The date of sale is entered by the front desk from the warranty card or receipt.

A certificate the manufacturer accepts

The completion certificate prints from the same job: number, brand, model, serial number, date of sale, the estimate as a table — the work at the brand's price on the first line, then parts and labour with quantity and price, the total — and the work log beneath it. You edit the certificate form yourself, inside the software.

That matters specifically for authorised work: each brand has its own requirements for what the document must contain, and no universal form exists. The software has one certificate form per document language, so it is set up for the brand you work with most. If brands demand entirely different forms, a separate form for each is custom work.

Partners: shops, distributors, insurers

Devices reach an authorised centre from more than their owners. They arrive from the shops that sold them, from distributors and from insurers. The job has a partner field for that, and the partner list holds a name, phone and email.

The job list can then be filtered by partner: how many of this shop's devices are in progress, how many were handed back and for what amount. At month end that is a ready basis for reconciliation — without the side spreadsheet people usually keep.

Parts for warranty repairs

A warranty part is usually ordered from a specific supplier — the one the brand comes through. The brand list has a "parts supplier" field for this, and a part request from the job goes by email to exactly that address; if no supplier is set, to the brand's email. You see the text of the email and can correct it before sending.

When the part arrives, it is booked into stock straight from the request, and in the repair it is written off as an estimate line. A month later you can see which part came for which job and from whom (spare parts).

Warranty and chargeable work do not mix in the money

Repair type is a reference list and you fill it with your own: warranty, chargeable, repeat, paid diagnosis. Because the type sits on the job, the list can be filtered by it, and the report for a period shows how much was done under each.

As a result, "how much was billed to the brand this month and how much came from customers" takes two clicks rather than an evening with a calculator (reports and statistics).

What to set up before the first warranty repair

Setting up takes an evening, happens once and is never thought about again. The order is:

1. Brands you are authorised for.
2. Repair categories — the complexity or type of work in the brand's own classification: board replacement, board-level repair, mechanics. Do not confuse these with repair types.
3. Devices — the kinds of equipment you take in.
4. The price list at the intersection of those three lists.
5. Repair types — warranty, chargeable, repeat. These are something else: the category answers "what kind of work is this", the type answers "who pays for it".
6. The certificate form — to the requirements of the brand you work with most.

Two lists with similar names are the one place people usually get confused. The rule is easy: the category goes into the price, the type goes into the report.

The serial number is the key field

In an authorised service the serial number matters more than anywhere else: the manufacturer identifies the device by it, and you prove by it that you repaired that exact unit. The number is recorded at intake, goes into every document, and search works on it.

Searching by serial number shows the device's whole history: how many times it has been here, what was done and at whose expense. For repeat warranty claims that is the first thing anyone looks at.

What the software does not do

• No exchange with manufacturers' systems. There is no upload to a brand portal and no pulling statuses or claims from one — the certificate is printed and passed on the way you already do it.
• No loan-device tracking. Units handed out for the duration of a repair are not managed separately.
• No automatic warranty check by serial number.
• No tracking of the brand's own warranty terms. How many months of warranty this model carries is decided by the front desk, not the software.

If one of those is what you need, write to us and we will quote it as custom work.

What you get

• A warranty price list across three coordinates: brand, category, device.
• Date of sale and serial number on the job and in every document.
• A certificate with the estimate at the brand's prices, its form shaped to the brand's requirements by you.
• Part requests sent straight to that brand's parts supplier.
• Partner records and a filter for everything that came from one shop.
• Warranty and chargeable work kept apart in the money and in the reports.
• Device history by serial number for repeat claims.

What it costs

One price for the whole service — regardless of how many brands, locations and employees it has.

You can look at it in the demo. Related pages: home appliance service and the repair intake form.

Frequently asked questions