PDF, CSV or Excel, and when each one is right.

Section 01How to do it

1. 01

   Send a PDF when somebody will read it

   Inspection reports, survey reports, evidence packs, quotes and invoices. Laid out, page-numbered and carrying your terms — a document, not data.

2. 02

   Send a spreadsheet when somebody will analyse it

   An inspection or survey report downloads as a CSV beside its PDF, one row per door or item. A fire door report comes as an Excel workbook too, and a client’s whole site as one file. Analytics, Financials, Activity, inspection history, clients and team each export from their own page. The full door and fire stopping registers come out in the full download of your records. If the reader will sort or total the numbers, do not make them retype a PDF.

3. 03

   Name things so they sort

   Property, document type, date. A folder of forty reports sorts itself if the names are consistent. If they are not, it becomes a search problem.

4. 04

   Let the portal do the sending

   Clients get the current version themselves. They are not holding a copy that went out of date the moment a repair closed.

5. 05

   Export before any handover

   Contract ending, supplier changing, auditor asking: take the reports as PDFs and the records as a full download. There is no request process.

Section 02What the app actually does here

• Inspection reports, evidence packs, survey reports and completion reports are free, however many you issue
• On the Usage plan, quotes, invoices and RAMS carry a per-document fee. Downloading and emailing the same document counts once. On the Seat plan nothing is metered at all
• The fire risk assessment report is the one report charged on the Usage plan. It is charged once per assessment, when its first report PDF is made
• Choose doors for a per-door report by floorplan, or only the failing ones. Download one PDF per door, or one combined report. Two or more single-door PDFs arrive as a ZIP
• An inspection with more than 50 doors, or a survey with more than 50 items, downloads its report in parts of up to 50. Each part covers only the floorplans its doors or items are on
• Reports full of photographs stay small enough to email
• An inspection report and a fire stopping survey report each download as a CSV too. It has one row per door or item, in one file whatever the size
• A fire door inspection report also downloads as an Excel workbook: a summary, every door, what each failed door needs and the repairs, each on its own sheet
• Tick a client’s buildings and download them as one Excel workbook or CSV. Each uses its latest completed inspection, or a visit you choose
• Each client can have their own columns — which ones, what they are called and in what order — on their report spreadsheets and site download
• The repair jobs you are looking at, with your filters, download as an Excel workbook or a CSV
• An inspection’s doors download as a door schedule that loads straight back in for the next visit. Findings and notes are left out
• Every photo in a fire door inspection report downloads as a ZIP, with a folder for each door
• Analytics, Financials, Activity, inspection history, clients and team each export as CSV from their own page
• The full registers come out in a full download of your records (the workspace archive)
• Page numbers stay right however long the report — four hundred doors included
• A completion report can be previewed before it is issued, then downloaded again unchanged
• The full download bundles the CSV files for the workspace you are in — around forty for fire doors, around twenty for fire stopping. It leaves out photographs
• Only the account owner can take a full download. It is always free on the Seat plan. On the Usage plan one a week is free, and another in the same period is priced by size

Section 03What goes wrong

Every one of these has cost somebody real time. They are cheap to avoid and expensive to unwind.

Section 04Questions

Section 05Related