The vehicle lifecycle
Lifecycle overview
The stages every vehicle moves through, and the order they must happen in.
Every vehicle in VehicleERP follows the same path. Understanding this path — and the order it must happen in — makes the rest of the system easy.
The stages
- Add the vehicle to your inventory (make, model, colour, insurance, etc.).
- Record the purchase — who you bought it from, the amount, and dates.
- Add a vehicle partner (optional) — a co-investor who helps fund this vehicle.
- Log expenses — repairs, transport, and other costs.
- Upload documents & insurance — RC book, insurance copy, and more.
- Record the sale — the buyer, the price, and GST.
- Ledger & settlement — record the actual money movements and settle up.
All of this happens on the Vehicle Detail page for each vehicle.
The golden rule: order matters
VehicleERP enforces a sensible order so your books stay correct. In short:
You cannot skip ahead
- You must record the purchase before you can add a partner, log expenses, upload documents, or record a sale.
- You must record the purchase payment in the ledger before you can add a partner's loan or record a sale payment.
- If a vehicle has a partner, you must record the partner's loan before you can record the sale.
- During settlement, money flows in a fixed order: sale receipt → return the partner's loan → share the partner's profit → pay GST → record company profit.
If you try to do something out of order, VehicleERP shows a clear message explaining what needs to happen first. You'll see these called out on each page in this section.
Locking
Once real money has been recorded against a stage, its core details lock to protect your records:
- After the purchase payment is entered in the ledger, you can no longer edit the purchase details.
- After the partner loan is entered, you can no longer edit the partner details.
- After the sale payment is entered, you can no longer edit the sale details.
This prevents accidental changes to a deal that has already involved real cash.