In this guide 6 sections
A car ends up with three stock numbers because sales, accounts and the yard each start their own list and never agree on a key. The fix is one vehicle record. It is keyed on the chassis number, read and written by every department, with stock number, booking and invoice hanging off that single record.
Where the three numbers come from
The showroom manager gives a car a stock number when it arrives on the transporter, while accounts books the purchase invoice and writes the chassis number. The yard supervisor chalks a bay number on the windscreen and keeps a private sheet that nobody else in the dealership ever sees.
Nobody is careless. Each person needs a handle that works inside their own job, and trouble starts when a customer pays a token amount and sales raises a booking number.
One car now has three names. A fourth appears when the insurer asks for the engine number, and by then nobody remembers which of the four lists was updated last.
- Stock number from the showroom register
- Chassis number from the purchase invoice
- Booking number from the sales book
- Bay or row number from the yard sheet
What the drift costs you on a normal Tuesday
A salesperson promises a white diesel to a walk-in customer, but the yard says that car left on Saturday for a test drive that never came back. Accounts still shows it as unsold stock, so the month-end valuation counts a car that has already left the yard and inflates the stock value.
Duplicates hurt too. Two bookings land on one chassis because each salesperson checked a different list, so one customer waits and a deposit refund follows.
Delivery paperwork suffers as well. The registration form, the gate pass and the invoice must all quote the same chassis, and a typo in any one of them delays the number plates by days.
How to find the damage in your own showroom
Pick ten cars from the yard today and note each stock number, chassis number and booking number exactly as the sales book, purchase ledger and yard sheet show them. Do not fix anything yet.
Count the mismatches. A car with a stock number but no chassis in accounts is a gap, while a booking pointing to a chassis that shows as sold elsewhere is a clash.
Expect mismatches quickly. The pattern of gaps and clashes shows which hand-off between sales, accounts and the yard is leaking, and that tells you where to start the cleanup.
- Cars with no chassis number in the purchase ledger
- Bookings against a chassis already invoiced
- Stock numbers reused after a car was returned to the OEM
- Trade-in cars that never received a stock number
- Yard sheet entries for cars not in the showroom register
What one vehicle record changes
A single vehicle record is keyed on the chassis number, because that number is stamped on the car and cannot be argued with. The stock number becomes a label on that record, and booking, purchase invoice, insurance, registration and delivery all point back to the same row.
A salesperson who opens a car sees its status at once: in transit, in yard, on test drive, booked, invoiced or delivered. Accounts sees the same status.
The yard updates it with a gate scan, so nobody has to phone the showroom to ask where a particular car is parked right now. Trade-ins and used cars get a record on day one, with refurbishment cost, photos and the previous owner’s papers attached, so margin on each car becomes a simple read.
- Chassis number as the one key
- Status that moves through fixed steps
- Booking blocked if the car is already held
- Purchase, sale and insurance linked to one row
Move to one record without stopping sales
Start with the cars in stock today, entering each chassis number once, checking it against the purchase invoice and giving it a status. A few dozen cars take an afternoon. From the next arrival onward, no car gets a stock number until its chassis is in the system, and the yard supervisor gets the status buttons.
Retire the paper sheet after a fortnight. Repeat the ten-car test when the month closes, and if the stock, chassis and booking numbers now agree on every car, the old lists can finally go.
Vehicle number reconciliation sheet
Use one printed sheet for the ten-car test, with a line for each car and columns for stock, chassis, engine and booking numbers, yard bay, status and last editor. Mark each line matched or mismatched. Add a note on the cause, run it once now and again after the month closes, and compare the two sheets to see whether the hand-offs have stopped leaking.
Open a blank worksheet to printQuestions owners ask
Which number should be the master key?
The chassis number. It is stamped on the car, printed on the purchase invoice and quoted in registration and insurance papers, while stock and booking numbers can change over time. The chassis stays with the car.
What about cars bought as trade-ins?
Open a record on arrival. Enter the chassis from the registration book, then add valuation, repairs and photos, which keeps used stock from becoming a separate world with its own numbering.
Can a spreadsheet do this job?
Very small yards can cope. A spreadsheet works when a single named person owns it, but it breaks once several people edit it or when sales, accounts and the yard need the same status.
How long does it take to clean up the data?
A few dozen cars take an afternoon. The slow part is chasing missing papers on older stock, so start with the cars you are about to sell and leave the long-parked ones for the following week.