Digital inspections (DVI)

A digital vehicle inspection (DVI) documents what you find on a vehicle — each finding gets a condition grade, optional notes, and photos — and lives on the repair order. When a finding turns into real work, one click promotes it onto the estimate, and the photo evidence follows it all the way to the customer’s approval page.

Adding a finding with a photo, completing the inspection, and promoting it to the estimate — about 20 seconds.

Start an inspection

Inspections start from the repair order.

1. Open the repair order and scroll to the Inspections panel.
2. Click Start inspection. The inspection opens on its own capture screen.
3. If an inspection is already open on this repair order, the button reads Continue inspection instead and takes you back to it.

You can leave the capture screen at any time with Back to RO — the inspection stays open, and everything you added is already saved. Come back through Continue inspection whenever you are ready.

Note: the Start inspection button disappears once the repair order is invoiced. Completed findings stay visible in the Inspections panel either way.

Add findings

The capture screen puts the add row at the top so you can log findings back to back.

1. Type what you found in the Add a finding — what did you see? field.
2. Pick a condition: Green, Yellow, or Red.
3. Press Enter or click Add. The finding lands on the list below and the cursor returns to the field for the next one.

The capture screen. ① Type the finding. ② Pick its condition. ③ Photos attach per finding. ④ Complete when you are done.

Green means the item checked out. Yellow and Red flag problems — yellow for something to plan for, red for something that needs work now. Only yellow and red findings can be promoted to the estimate; the footer under the list reminds you of that.

To remove a finding, hover over its row and click the trash icon. On a phone the icon is always visible.

Notes

Click + Add note under a finding’s title to add detail, or click an existing note to edit it. The note saves when you click away; press Escape to cancel an edit. Anything the customer should understand about the finding belongs here — notes travel with the finding to the approval page.

Change a condition

Click a finding’s condition chip to re-grade it. A small picker opens with the three conditions; pick one and it saves immediately.

Click the chip, pick the new condition. The change saves on the spot.

Photos

Photos are what make a DVI persuasive — a worn pad in a picture beats a line of text.

1. Click the camera tile on the finding’s row. On a phone this opens the camera; on a desktop it opens a file picker.
2. The photo uploads in the background — you can keep adding findings while it does.
3. If an upload fails, the tile says so. Click Retry to send it again, or the ✕ to dismiss it.

Photos must be JPEGs of 10 MB or less; the tile tells you if a file does not qualify. To delete an uploaded photo, click the ✕ on its thumbnail and confirm.

Complete the inspection

When every finding is logged, click Complete inspection in the header. The button stays disabled until the inspection has at least one finding. Completing is one-way — it closes the inspection and returns you to the repair order, where the findings now show in the Inspections panel.

The Inspections panel on the repair order. Each inspection expands to its findings; a promoted finding shows the On estimate marker.

Each inspection in the panel shows its status, date, who started it, and a finding count. Click a row to expand it and review the findings with their photos.

Promote a finding to the estimate

Promotion turns a yellow or red finding into work the customer can approve, without retyping anything.

1. On the repair order, expand the inspection in the Inspections panel.
2. Click Promote to Estimate on a yellow or red finding.
3. A new job appears on the estimate, named after the finding, holding one part line and one labor line — both at $0.00.
4. Set the real prices on those lines like any other line in the estimate builder.

The promoted job on the estimate. The lines start at $0.00 — you set the prices before sending the estimate.

Each finding can be promoted once; after that it shows an On estimate marker instead of the button. Green findings have no promote button — they are the good news.

When you send the estimate for approval, the findings you recorded appear on the customer’s approval page — condition, notes, and photos — right above the priced work, so the evidence sits next to the ask.

Role note: Technicians can start, edit, and complete inspections, including photos. Promote to Estimate is an Owner and Advisor action, because promotion puts lines on the estimate — a Technician does not see the button.

Note: a yellow or red finding you complete without promoting is not lost. It becomes an open recommendation on the vehicle, and shows up as suggested work the next time that vehicle is in — see Customers and vehicles.

On a phone

The capture screen is built for the bay. On a phone the rows stack, touch targets grow, and Complete inspection pins to a bar at the bottom of the screen so it is always in reach. The camera tile opens the phone’s camera directly, so finding, photo, and grade happen where the car is.

Phone capture: the add row up top, findings stacked, Complete inspection pinned at the bottom.

Tip: a fast bay rhythm is words first, pictures second — walk the car adding titled findings with conditions, then go back down the list adding photos while the uploads run in the background.