Custom Fields Import Guide

Data Imports which may contain Custom Fields include Contacts, Fuel Entries, Issues, Parts, Service Entries, Expense Entries, Vehicles, Vehicle Assignments, Vehicle Renewal Reminders, and Vendors.

This article explains the format requirements for the data you wish to import to Custom Fields in any of these record types and how to handle required custom fields through imports.

Fleetio offers four different data types for the Custom Fields you create:

• Text
• Checkbox
• Date
• Drop-down

The data type determines how Fleetio expects to see the data formatted in the source file. Any values that do not follow the required format will result in Import Errors.

Text

Text is the most flexible data type, and simply allows the user to type a free text value.

Checkbox

The Checkbox data type field displays as a checkbox, which the user may check or uncheck, where a checked box equals true.

The switches are represented in the database as TRUE and FALSE, where TRUE displays as CHECKED and FALSE displays as UNCHECKED.

Data import thus requires Checkbox Custom Field values to be entered in the source file as TRUE or FALSE.

Date

Custom fields with Date data type are stored in the Fleetio database as YYYY-MM-DD.

For consistency and accuracy, format your source data in this same YYYY-MM-DD format.

Although this is the recommended format, Fleetio will accept input in a variety of formats, which correspond to the Short Date Formats available in Account Settings:

• YYYY-MM-DD
• MM/DD/YYYY
• DD/MM/YYYY
• DD.MM.YYYY
• YYYY.MM.DD
• YYYY/MM/DD

Drop-down

For a Drop-down data type, the values that have been configured for the Custom Field are displayed in a drop-down choice list. This limits the choices a User may enter when manually adding or editing a record and also limits the data which can be entered via import.

Data import requires Drop-down Custom Field values to be an exact match for one of the choice list options.

Required Fields

Custom Fields can be set as required individually through Account Settings. Fleetio provides the ability to import Required Custom Fields in the following ways:

Adding New Records via Import

• Imports will always be validated for new records. If an import doesn't contain a required custom field, users will receive an error message (see below).
• If any record in an import is considered “new”, meaning it does not have a fleetio_id field mapped, then the Required Custom Fields must be mapped and must have a value present.

Updating Records via Import

• Once a Custom Field or Required Custom Field is added to the system, the empty and prefilled Import templates will include the column when downloaded.
• The import process will only validate what is changing. Unlike with NEW data imports, you do NOT need to include required fields if you are updating existing data records that are identified by the presence of a fleetio_id.
• The only circumstance where an error would be identified is if an invalid change to a Required Custom Field takes place.
• If a Required Custom Field does not include a value, there will be no change for that field for that record.