Running an Auto Glass Job from Start to Finish

What happens at each step of the guided Auto Glass job — vehicle, NAGS estimate, who pays, approval, parts, scheduling, the install checklist, invoices and payment — and the judgment calls at each one.

Updated 8 hours ago 3 views estimates workflow jobs insurance auto-glass nags

Running an Auto Glass Job from Start to Finish

An auto glass job has more moving parts than most service work. There's a specific part with a national number and a list price, labor in NAGS hours, often an insurer paying, glass that may need ordering, a camera that may need calibrating, and urethane that needs time to cure. Miss one and you either lose money or bring the car back.

The Auto Glass screen walks every job through ten steps, in order, and remembers where each one is:

Vehicle → Estimate → Payer → Approval → Parts → Schedule → Install → Billing → Payment → Closed

You always see the whole row of steps at the top of the job. You can jump back to an earlier step to check or fix something. You can't skip ahead past something the next step needs; for example, the invoice can't exist before the estimate is approved.

Under the hood it's a normal Suprata job with a normal estimate and normal invoices. Open the standard job page, in the job's … menu, opens the classic work order, and the invoice pages open the same invoices. Anything done there, such as a payment taken on the invoice page or an appointment booked on the calendar, shows up in the workflow within a few minutes.

Starting a job

Book it the way you book any job: from a call, the New Job form, or New job on the Auto Glass board. Choose your Auto Glass job type. When you save, you land on the Auto Glass screen instead of the plain work order.

Insurance referrals from Safelite, LYNX or HSG arrive in a referral inbox and become jobs from there. See Insurance billing for auto glass.

1. Vehicle

Type or scan the VIN. It's looked up as soon as all 17 characters are in (Look up tries again). A VIN pins down the exact vehicle, including options that change which glass fits, such as rain sensors and heads-up displays. Year, make and model alone often can't.

No VIN handy? Pick Year, Make, Model and Body style from the lists. You'll see Catalog match when the vehicle is matched to the parts catalog. If the parts catalog isn't turned on for your company yet, type the year, make and model instead.

Finding the vehicle doesn't save it. It shows as Not saved yet until you save, so take the moment to add the plate, odometer and colour. Insurers ask for the plate and odometer on a claim, and they're the details nobody goes back for later. Then press Save and continue: the vehicle and its details are saved together and the job moves on to the estimate. If you try to leave the step with something unsaved, you're asked first.

A VIN never uses the letters I, O or Q. If a lookup fails, check for a 0 typed as an O first.

2. Estimate

Choose the opening (windshield, back glass, a door or a vent) and Find the glass. You get every part that fits, with its features: Camera / sensor, Heated, Acoustic, Solar coated, and so on. If the vehicle has a camera behind the mirror, pick the part flagged ADAS. The wrong part is the most expensive mistake in this business.

When you pick a part:

  • Hardware and kits that NAGS lists for it come ticked (Suggested items are ticked). Untick what you won't use, such as a moulding you're re-using.
  • Labor is added as NAGS hours × your labor rate. If the job needs more time, change the hours; the line is marked edited so a reviewer can see you went off NAGS. Back to the NAGS hours undoes it.
  • The part is added to your price list at today's NAGS price, so every quote uses current prices.

Then add services: static or dynamic camera calibration, mobile service, glass disposal. Use Search your parts and services for your own items, such as a rain-sensor gel pad.

The Estimate panel on the right keeps a running total and shows your labor hours against NAGS hours. People who can see costs also see the margin, and a warning if it falls below your target.

Customer pays, on an insurance job, marks a line the insurer won't cover, for example an upgrade the customer asked for. It goes on the customer's invoice instead of the claim.

3. Payer

Who pays?

  • Customer: the invoice goes to them.
  • Fleet or business: a rental company, dealer or fleet pays. Choose the billing account. The estimate and invoice move to that account, and the job stays on your customer's history. See Billing accounts: fleets and other payers.
  • Insurance: choose the insurance company, then enter the claim number, policy number, date and cause of loss, and the deductible.

Choosing a payer re-prices the estimate to that payer's agreement, if you have one: an insurer's network rates or a fleet's contract prices. The toast tells you how many prices changed.

4. Approval

Lock the estimate for approval first. A locked estimate can't change under someone's signature. Then choose how it's approved:

  • Approve in person: the customer is there, or on the phone. Record who approved, with a signature if your shop asks for one.
  • Send it to the customer: a link by text or email. They read the estimate on their phone and approve it themselves. The job moves on by itself when they do.
  • Insurance authorization: enter the authorization number the insurer gave you.

The calibration disclosure is recorded here too, with the exact wording the customer saw.

Need to change an approved estimate? Use New version on the Estimate step. The old version is cancelled (any glass set aside for it goes back on the shelf), a copy opens for editing, and it needs approving again. Once the job has been billed, changes are made on the invoice instead.

5. Parts

Where do the parts come from? For each part you see what's in stock in each warehouse:

  • Take it from a warehouse: pick the warehouse. The part is set aside for this job straight away, so nobody sells it twice.
  • Order it: press Order on the part's row, pick the vendor (or leave it for purchasing to choose), and Send to purchasing.
  • Order several from one vendor: tick the parts, say the windshield, the moulding and the rain-sensor gel pad from Mygrant, then Order these 3 parts and pick the vendor once. Parts that need ordering come already ticked.

Ordering doesn't place the order itself. It puts the parts on purchasing's list of order requests, and your purchasing team places the order with the vendor. Parts for the same vendor go on one purchase order.

You don't have to decide every part at once. Send the glass to purchasing now, and come back for the moulding once you've checked the van. The job stays on the Parts step until every part has a source. Once purchasing has a part on an order, change it through them. The Parts step won't reorder it or take it from stock instead.

Review and confirm covers the rest: the parts coming from stock, and anything marked to order that you haven't sent yet. It shows exactly what will happen before anything moves. If anything is ordered, the job goes on hold as Waiting for Parts to Arrive. So does any appointment already booked, so it doesn't sit on the calendar looking real.

When purchasing gets a ship date, the job shows it. When the parts arrive, the hold lifts, the customer gets a "your glass has arrived" text, and the job appears on the Work Queue for scheduling, with any note from purchasing ("Glass lands Thursday morning, book the afternoon or later").

6. Schedule

Pick a day, a time window (Morning 8-12, Afternoon 12-4 or exact times), where the work happens (At the customer or In our shop) and the technician, then Book it. The customer gets an appointment text.

Static calibration usually needs a level bay, so the screen reminds you to book those In our shop.

Parts still on order? The step tells you so: You're done here for now, with what's still coming and, once the vendor has the order, when it's expected. Press Done for now and get on with the next job. The job returns to the booking queue by itself when the parts arrive, or when purchasing has a ship date if your shop books against ship dates (Auto Glass settings, When ordered parts arrive). Nobody has to remember to come back to it.

If the customer wants a date now, press Book it anyway. The appointment is held with the job and goes live when the parts arrive.

7. Install

The technician works from a checklist that works well on a phone. It's also on My Day, their list of today's jobs.

  1. On my way: texts the customer that you're coming.
  2. Before photos: damage, VIN plate, odometer. These settle "that scratch was already there".
  3. Work authorization: the customer signs on the screen.
  4. Materials and safety: the urethane used, its lot number and the outside temperature. The screen works out the safe drive-away time from your urethane's rules and tells the customer. Don't guess this one.
  5. Camera calibration: the result, with the calibration report and photos. If the customer declines calibration, The customer declines calibration records their signed decline.
  6. After photos.

Mark the install complete finishes the appointment and creates the invoice. If something required is missing, such as the signature or the photos, it tells you exactly what.

8. Billing

The invoice is a straight copy of the approved estimate, with the same lines and prices. Nobody re-keys anything.

  • Customer or fleet: one invoice.

  • Insurance: two invoices, both in the customer's name:

    • a deductible invoice for the deductible plus anything marked Customer pays;
    • an insurance invoice for the rest, which stays pending until the claim is settled.

    Keeping the insurance invoice on the customer's account is deliberate: if the claim is denied, the balance is theirs. Most glass claims have no deductible, and then there's just the one insurance invoice.

Want payment before the install? Invoice now to take payment early (or Bill the deductible now on an insurance job) creates the invoice as soon as the estimate is approved. Completing the install won't bill twice.

9. Payment and closing

Record a payment takes cash or check here. Card payments go through the invoice's normal pay screen. While money is owed the job sits on hold as Pending Payment, or Waiting for Insurance while the claim is open, so it shows on the right lists.

When every invoice is paid, the job closes itself, the invoices are closed, and the review request goes out if you've turned it on.

Comebacks

A leak or a wind noise two weeks later? On the closed job, Start a comeback. You pick the cause and who was responsible, and a new job opens with the same vehicle, marked as a warranty job and priced at no charge. The Performance dashboard counts comebacks by cause and technician. That's how you find the urethane that's failing in cold weather.

The board

Auto Glass → Board shows every open job, grouped by step, with what each one is waiting on and how long it's been there. Jobs running late are highlighted, and the tiles along the top filter it: running late, waiting for parts, ready to schedule, waiting for payment and insurance.

Common mistakes

Choosing the glass before the vehicle is matched. Without a catalog match the part list is a guess. Get the VIN.

Editing labor hours to hit a price. Change the labor rate or the payer agreement instead. Insurers compare your hours to NAGS, and the edited marker shows them you went off it.

Taking a verbal OK without recording it. If it isn't recorded, it didn't happen, and a disputed windshield is $400 you'll never see. Recording the approval takes ten seconds.

Booking an install before ordered glass has a date. Book it if the customer wants a date, since the appointment is held until the parts arrive. But tell them it depends on the glass arriving.

Skipping the photos to save a minute. The photos are what win the dispute months later.

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