GarageDoorBossPro Blog — Garage Door Software

CSV Import: Bringing Your Garage Door Customer List Into New Software

The scariest part of switching software is the customer list. Years of homeowners, property managers and commercial accounts live in your old system, a spreadsheet or a stack of tickets. Typing them in one at a time is not an option. A CSV import is how they move over in an afternoon.

Clean Clients Make a Clean Import

The way clients and addresses fit together, laid out in Clients With Many Addresses: How Garage Door Software Organizes Customers, is worth reading first. It tells you how to shape the spreadsheet before you import it.

What a CSV Is

A CSV is a plain spreadsheet file: rows of customers, columns of details. Almost every system can export one, and any spreadsheet program can save one. If your list is in an old system, look for an export option. If it is in a spreadsheet already, save a copy as CSV. If it is on paper, a spreadsheet is the place to start.

What to Include

At a minimum, each row should have:

• Client name
• Phone number
• Email address
• Street address, city, state or province, and ZIP or postal code

Useful extras include a company name for commercial clients and property managers, and notes. Do not worry about getting every door and opener into the spreadsheet. Equipment is easier to add on the first visit, when the tech is standing in front of it.

Clean It Up First

An hour of cleanup before importing saves a lot of confusion after. Look for:

• Duplicates. The same customer entered twice, often with slightly different spellings or phone numbers. Merge them in the spreadsheet.
• Property managers. A property manager with many rentals should be one client with many addresses, not many clients.
• Old customers. Decide whether to bring in customers you have not seen in years. Many owners bring everyone, because old customers still call.
• Address problems. Missing ZIP codes, typos and “same as above” entries. Fix them so each address can be placed correctly.

Addresses Go on the Map Automatically

Imported addresses are placed on the map automatically. You do not need to look up coordinates or drop pins by hand. Once the import is done, your customers show up on the map, ready for the Waiting List and the dispatch board to route.

If an address was entered badly in the old system, it may land in the wrong spot. A quick look at the map after importing will show any pins that are clearly off, and you can fix those addresses one by one.

After the Import

With customers in, a few steps make the list ready to work:

1. Set up tune-up plans. Add yearly tune-up plans to the customers who have them, using last year's visit dates so this year's come due in the right weeks on the Waiting List.
2. Set Monthly on the right clients. Property managers, HOAs and commercial accounts that get one statement a month.
3. Add tags. Property manager, HOA, commercial, tune-up plan, whatever helps you sort.
4. Add equipment as you go. Each time a tech visits a house, fill in the door, opener and springs. Within a season, your busiest houses are fully recorded.

Equipment From Old Records

If your old system or spreadsheet has equipment notes, like “16x7 steel, 1/2 HP chain,” you can bring them in as notes and turn them into proper equipment entries when the tech visits. For your most important customers, like commercial accounts with many doors, it can be worth adding the equipment by hand right after the import so the first maintenance visit has it all.

Test With a Small File First

If your list is long, try a small import first: twenty or thirty customers, including a property manager with several addresses and a commercial account. Check that names, phones and addresses landed in the right fields and that the pins look right on the map. Once the small file looks good, import the rest with the same columns. It is much easier to fix a column mix-up on thirty rows than on the whole list.

Keep the Old System Around Briefly

For the first few weeks, keep access to your old records. When a customer from years ago calls, a quick look gives you anything that did not make it into the import. Over time you will need it less and less.

The import is one step in getting set up. The rest is in Setting Up Garage Door Software: Services, Vans, Techs and Customers, and the full set of tools is on the GarageDoorBossPro garage door software page.