If you came here for the checklist, it is right below — print this page or take the PDF, use it freely, change whatever you like. No email, no signup.
The rest of this post is what the sheet cannot say for itself: what belongs on a vehicle inspection form, why the point count on the cover is marketing, and where the paper version quietly loses the work it finds.
Shop
TechnicianDate
Customer
VehicleOdometer
G = checked, OK · Y = needs attention soon · R = needs attention now
| Item | G | Y | R | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tires & wheels | ||||
| Tread depth LF ____ RF ____ LR ____ RR ____ | ||||
| Pressure set to spec (all four + spare) | ||||
| Wear pattern / visible damage | ||||
| Brakes | ||||
| Front pads / rotors | ||||
| Rear pads or shoes / rotors or drums | ||||
| Lines, hoses, parking brake | ||||
| Fluids — level and condition | ||||
| Engine oil | ||||
| Coolant | ||||
| Brake fluid | ||||
| Power steering / transmission (where accessible) | ||||
| Washer fluid | ||||
| Battery & charging | ||||
| Terminals, hold-down, corrosion | ||||
| Battery age / load test | ||||
| Belts & hoses | ||||
| Drive belt — cracking, glazing | ||||
| Hoses and clamps — seepage, swelling | ||||
| Steering & suspension | ||||
| Play in steering linkage | ||||
| Shocks / struts | ||||
| Bushings, CV boots | ||||
| Lights & wipers | ||||
| Every exterior bulb | ||||
| Wiper blades / washer spray | ||||
| Under the car | ||||
| Leaks by location | ||||
| Exhaust condition | ||||
| Visible corrosion | ||||
| Cabin basics | ||||
| HVAC blows hot and cold | ||||
| Horn, dash warning lights | ||||
What a vehicle inspection form has to cover
The sheet above is a multi-point inspection — the structured walk of the whole car that dealer service lanes hand out as a “27-point” or “50-point” check. The count on the cover is marketing; the systems are what matter. If a form covers tires, brakes, fluids, battery, belts, steering and suspension, lights, the underside, and the cabin basics, it is a real inspection form at any point count. If it lists forty items a tech can tick without opening the hood, it is theater.
Two design choices on this sheet are deliberate.
Tread depth gets four blanks, not one checkbox. A number per corner is evidence — it shows the measurement happened, it catches the alignment problem a single “tires OK” tick hides, and next visit it becomes a trend.
Every item gets a Green box. Green is not filler. It is the proof you looked, and it is what makes the Yellow and Red items credible when the estimate lands. A form that only records problems reads like a sales document; a form that records twenty-two Greens and two Yellows reads like an inspection.
If you are inspecting a car before buying it rather than servicing one you already own, the systems are the same but the process goes further — see our used-car pre-purchase inspection checklist.
How to use it without slowing the bay down
Print a stack, keep them on the service cart, and make the rule simple: every car gets one, whether it came in for an oil change or a noise. The car that came in for wipers leaves with its brakes actually looked at — and, in a shop that does it right, a record of what was found.
The rules that keep it honest:
- Mark at the car, not at the counter. The sheet filled in from memory at the desk is where the fourth and fifth findings disappear.
- Yellow means a date, not a shrug. “Front pads at 4 mm” beats “brakes yellow” — it tells the writer what to quote and the customer when to come back.
- Findings become estimate lines the same day. A checklist that never turns into an estimate the customer can approve is paperwork, not a process. Declined work goes on the vehicle’s record, so next visit starts with “last time we noted the belt.”
Where the paper version leaks
Here is the part we would be lying to skip: this sheet has a known failure mode, and it is not the looking — it is the delivery.
The tech marks the findings, the service writer reads the Yellow items aloud at pickup while the customer stands there with keys out and card already tapped, and the sheet goes home to die in the passenger floor mat. Nothing on it was wrong. But a verbal summary at pickup is the worst possible moment to sell deferred work, and a checkbox marked “brake pads: yellow” is a claim, not evidence.
The fix is logistics, not technology: the findings need to reach the customer before pickup, in a form they can look at on their own time, attached to a price they can say yes to. That is the whole case for doing this same checklist digitally — a digital vehicle inspection is this exact sheet on the phone in your tech’s pocket, with a photo of the worn pad where the checkbox is, texted to the customer while the car is still on the lift. Same walk, same systems, minus the floor mat. For the full plain-English rundown of how that flow works end to end, see what a digital vehicle inspection actually is.
Start with the paper. It costs nothing and it builds the habit. When you find yourself re-typing findings into estimates every afternoon, that is the moment the digital version pays for itself — and you can see a finished one in the demo shop first, no signup, no sales call.