BuildTrack for a fabrication shop
What is different for a sheet-metal, laser or fabrication business: your words on screen, no vehicle anywhere, Work orders numbered WO-0001, and checklists built for the floor.
Where it is
- Production → Work orders — Your Work orders board
- Settings → Business — Industry, and the Work order number prefix
- Settings → Modules & flow — Vehicles & fitment stays off
Settings for this
- Settings → Production → Checklists — The receiving, quality and dispatch checks
- Settings → Production → Job types — Fabrication, Rework and your own
- Settings → Production → Work Centres — Your lasers, brakes, weld bays and finishing line
What your industry changes
Your business is set to Fabrication & engineering (Settings → Business → Industry). That one setting is why BuildTrack talks about Work orders and Operators instead of jobs and technicians, why customers are told "Your order is ready", and why nothing asks for a vehicle, a rego or a fitment.
Nothing has been taken away. The parts of BuildTrack you use are the same ones a workshop uses; they just use your words.
No vehicle anywhere
Vehicles & fitment is a module, switched off for you (Settings → Modules & flow). With it off:
- quotes, Work orders and orders have no vehicle field
- customers have no Vehicles tab
- products have no fitment tab or "fit by vehicle" filter
- the customer portal, kiosk and dealer portal show no vehicle filters
- the website chat and the AI assistants describe you as a sheet-metal fabrication and engineering business in Australia
If you ever need vehicle records (a trailer builder, say), switch the module back on. Nothing was deleted.
Work orders
A Work order is one piece of work on the floor: a cut-and-fold order, a welded assembly, a rework. They are numbered WO-0001, WO-0002… (Settings → Business → Work order Number Prefix). The job types that came with your industry are Fabrication (the default) and Rework; Cutting, Folding, Machining and the rest were suggested from what you told us at onboarding, and you can rename or add your own under Settings → Production → Job types.
Your scheduling resource is the work centre (laser, brake, weld bay, powder line), not a hoist or bay. Set them up under Settings → Production → Work Centres, and the calendar's By Centre view shows each one's load.
Checklists built for the floor
Three checklists came with your industry, in place of the vehicle check-in and road-test QC a workshop gets:
- Receiving & pre-work check: drawing and revision, material and thickness, quantity, finish and due date confirmed; customer-supplied material counted and its condition noted.
- Quality check: dimensions to drawing, holes and cut-outs, bend angles and flatness, welds dressed, deburred, finish as ordered, labelled and counted. It blocks a Work order from going ready until every line passes.
- Dispatch & handover: quantity matches the order, docket ready, certificates attached where required, packed, invoice prepared.
Edit any of them under Settings → Production → Checklists. If you had already written your own before the industry was set, yours were kept.
What is coming for fabrication shops
The quoting rate cards (laser $/hr and cut speeds by thickness, bend rates, finishing $/m², minimum charges), the operator terminal on the floor and the customer order tracker are being built for this industry. Until they arrive, quote made parts as you do today and run Work orders from the Work orders board.