Track Anything and Everything Using Custom Fields

This is an older blog. See the latest post on Custom Fields.

For efficient asset tracking and inventory management, EZOfficeInventory comes with a predefined set of fields. However, every business is unique and you may need specialized attributes for your specialized needs. For this we provide Custom Fields to track any data point with an asset/inventory.

Here are a few examples of how our customers in various industries make use of this feature:

Industry(s)	Custom Field(s)
Media and Production	Recording the focal length of a camera lens, keeping tap on whether a flashlight is buzzed.
Service Providers	Tracking Job Numbers, condition of the equipment checked out, recording any damages on return, setting up maintenance alerts.
Health Care	Expiration date alerts on drugs, recording whether a tool has been sterilized after return.
Software and IT	MAC Address of devices, Installed OS, Installed programs.

Let’s dig a bit deeper!

1. Adding Custom Fields

You can add custom fields from More → Custom Fields → Items → Add Custom Field. A custom field can be any field type e.g. radio buttons, text field, date field etc. When you’re adding a custom field, you can choose to associate it with groups of items:

• All the groups i.e. all the items
• All the groups that you’ll create in future
• Only a few specific group (use shift+click or ctrl+click to select a bunch in a single go)

2. Customizing Assets and Inventory Details

All associated custom fields will start appearing on the relevant items’ details page. e.g. Focal length will appear on the Lens page details. See image below:

You can edit a single item to update the custom field values. Or you can select a bunch of items on Asset Listing (Items → Assets) and from Actions → Edit, edit custom fields for all of them in a single go. Same goes for inventory and asset stock listings. Say you have a stock of 10 camera lens that are 65mm. You can mass edit all of them to update their focal length to 85mm.

3. Customizing Items Listing

The best part is that you can edit the Asset, Inventory and Asset Stock listing tables to include columns that are more important to you. These columns can also include custom fields.

4. Customizing Check-in/out and other events

You can add custom fields of your choice on Check-in/out forms. The Display on checkout and Display on check-in options are available under Preferences when you’re adding/editing a custom field.

Here are some ways in which you can configure these settings:

• Selecting Display at checkout will show this custom field on the checkout form. The user can enter a new value for this field.

• Selecting Mandatory on reservation shows the custom field on reservation form. The values recorded for the custom field(s) on reservations are also recorded in the checkout events log when you check out a reservation.

• Similarly, you can configure how the custom field(s) will Display on check-ins.

5. Set up Date Alerts

You can also enable date alerts using custom fields. For example, you may want to get an alert when a laptop battery expires. For scenarios where some equipment require regular servicing, you can set up recurring date alerts e.g. a Forklift Truck requiring inspection every 2 months.

5.1 Custom Date Time Alerts

In order to send alerts at a specific time period, companies can now add Date Time Alert. For instance we add the Date Alert custom field for Items as show below:

Once added, the custom field can be edited from the Items details page: 

The final date time alert custom field will be shown like this:

6. Record History

Keep a history trail of how a custom field value is changing over time for a particular item. Make sure that the Save History option is checked under preferences for the custom field(s) for which you’d want to have a history record.

Say you have a custom field called OS for your Macbooks. You can track when was the OS updated to Yosemite from Mavericks, and who made that change.

You can also export the history trail to a CSV.

7. Other options

• Any custom field can be printed on a Print Label.
• You can also have a custom field shown when someone scans the QR code for an asset. Enable Company Settings → Public QR-Code Scanning → Custom Fields.

8. Importing Custom Fields

Data for all the custom fields can be imported to your EZOfficeInventory account from an excel sheet. The custom fields are available when you’re mapping columns during the excel import. Make sure to create all the required custom fields from More → Custom Fields → Items before importing data for them.

If you have more questions on this feature, do write to us at support@ezo.io