WHMCS for a computer repair company

[CrunchyToast]

Is anyone doing this?

 

I've been through and demoed many CRM tools and whatnot. Majority of them do not have a built in billing system as good as WHMCS. Nor do any have one period. I'm curious as to if this is a good idea or not. I was thinking about also using the Project Management addon for keeping track of work done. Projects would actually be like service records.

 

A second thing I'm looking at is custom fields. Right now I'm using a CRM where I can add custom fields in separate sections so specific information can be grouped together rather than being all information in one location. I notice with WHMCS if I add a custom fields they're all just thrown in with the rest of the default customer data. If I modify the admin area customer detail template, is there a way to separate custom fields into groups?

 

Oh yes, I have looked into whmcsextras.com, but without an actual demo available I don't know how much it can help me.

 

If anyone is doing this, any input would be excellent! Thanks in advance for the information.

[WHMCS John]

Hi,

It should be possible, with a bit of clever template customisation to group the custom fields together in different sections on the order form/my details page.

[CrunchyToast]

Thank you for your prompt response. I don't want this to sound rude or down putting, but if I'm going to purchase an application for long term use, I have to know if it is possible for sure or not. I need a much more permanent solution for my business and WHMCS may be it. I've been through so many different products. I want to be able to have one permanently.

 

As for the custom fields, do you know if it's possible to have more than one section of for specific fields? For example,

 

Section1 - customfield1 customfield2

Section2 - customfield3 customfield4

 

Again thank you for your reply.

[artizhay]

What you would need to do is name your custom fields (probably in the description) in a grouping format. So if you wanted to list a group of favorite movies, books, etc. for a client in custom fields, you could mark the fields' descriptions as:

favorites-movies

favorites-books

favorites-music

 

So then the string to the left of the dash indicates what array each element belongs in.

 

So if you have group1, group2, and group3, you could mark them:

group1-element1

group1-element2

group2-element1

group2-element2

group3-element1

group3-element2

 

Then in the client summary, you would loop through these, pairing all the data by using the string to the left of the dash. If you wanted to use multiple words in the group name, you could either do my_group_name-element1 or mygroupname-element1. Doesn't really matter since it's only used for internal purposes.

 

Also, just to clarify, these are not the actual group name as specified in the Custom Fields creation area. Favorite movies, for example, would be called "Favorite Movies" (if you wanted) and the description would be favorites-movies.

 

You could also use the data to title your groups. So if you want a client summary box titled "Favorites" and then in that box it lists Movies, Books, and Music, you could describe these fields as:

Favorites-Movies

Favorites-Books

Favorites-Music

Basically just use proper casing instead of all lower case, then when you loop through these, split the data at the dash, so that you use "Favorites" for the box title and the string to the right of the dash for each subtitle. You would also need to use underscores for spaces if you went this route, so my_group_name-element1 would become My_Group_Name-Element_1

 

A little bit of template coding should be able to get all this working.

ALL that rambling being said, I can't get the custom fields to show up in the client summary. It seems it's not a defined array. I've tried using $customfields (used on invoices), $clientsdetails.customfields (fits with the client summary structure), and variations of those. Maybe if you play around you can get it, but it's possible that the data just isn't passed to the client summary page and will be impossible to implement.

[CrunchyToast]

Hopefully if I purchase WHMCS I'll be able to do such a task. The only area I really need majority of the info is in the admin panel. Customers will only have access to their personal info such as phone and address. So far, things are looking good for this.

[WHMCS Chris]

I like this idea.

 

Chunchy - once you get it all setup, send me a notification of your website. I'd love to take a look.

[CrunchyToast]

I have a pretty idea of how it can be done. I've been in contact with the developer for WHMCSExtras and he's actually thinking about implementing some of my ideas into the CRM addon. I just wish there was a live demo of it rather than just a video. I love how tickets can be linked to projects with the project manager. Customer can create a support ticket and if needed, a project could be created as a service order. This setup may be the best solution yet. I can see me using this long term and probably buying WHMCS owned license. If I decide to fully go through with it, i'll definitely let you know how it works out for me.

[znetindia]

Hello CrunchyToast,

I am an official representative of WHMCSExtras.com. We do provide a 7-day free trial of CRM Addon. Kindly check the same at our website.

 

 

Is anyone doing this?

 

I've been through and demoed many CRM tools and whatnot. Majority of them do not have a built in billing system as good as WHMCS. Nor do any have one period. I'm curious as to if this is a good idea or not. I was thinking about also using the Project Management addon for keeping track of work done. Projects would actually be like service records.

 

A second thing I'm looking at is custom fields. Right now I'm using a CRM where I can add custom fields in separate sections so specific information can be grouped together rather than being all information in one location. I notice with WHMCS if I add a custom fields they're all just thrown in with the rest of the default customer data. If I modify the admin area customer detail template, is there a way to separate custom fields into groups?

 

Oh yes, I have looked into whmcsextras.com, but without an actual demo available I don't know how much it can help me.

 

If anyone is doing this, any input would be excellent! Thanks in advance for the information.

[CrunchyToast]

Hello CrunchyToast,

I am an official representative of WHMCSExtras.com. We do provide a 7-day free trial of CRM Addon. Kindly check the same at our website.

 

I'm waiting until the new update is released first. I had a couple feature requests that I was told would be included in the January release.