Choose how strictly your shop records what a customer approves, and what that changes on the estimate and the work order.
Each shop picks one setting. It decides whether staff record what the customer approved, and which work reaches the invoice.
Four settings below carry a walkthrough. Each video repeats what the text beside it already covers, so you never need sound or picture to follow this page.The screens come from a demo shop that has not finished its payment setup. A red Payment setup needs attention banner sits above some of them, and has nothing to do with authorizations. Their order numbers start with STAGING-, which the demo system adds. Your own order numbers do not carry it.
You need the Admin permission for this shop to change the setting. Admin for the dealer alone is not enough: the form opens, and TireTutor then refuses Save.
Everyone else sees the setting but cannot change it. TireTutor shows Only a dealer or store admin can change this setting.The setting changes what staff see next time they open an estimate. It does not change an estimate that carries a sealed authorization.Customers do not answer for themselves. The public estimate page carries no approve or decline control, so staff record every answer.
Only Don’t ask changes whether TireTutor prompts. The other three all prompt; they differ in what reaches the invoice.A new shop starts on Record what the customer declines.
On every setting except Don’t ask, staff record the customer’s answer from the estimate or the work order.
1
Open the estimate
Select Approve on a draft estimate.
Before any answer is recorded, each service sits on Pending approval.
2
Answer for each service
The dialog asks What did the customer approve? Select Approve or Decline beside each service. Select Approve all to approve every service at once.
One row per service, each with Approve, Decline, and Pending.
3
Continue to the second screen
Select Continue.
4
Record how and when
The dialog asks How did they approve it? Choose In person, Phone call, Text message, or Email. Then answer When did they approve it?
5
Seal the record
Select Save authorization.
TireTutor asks Start the work order? Select Convert to work order to turn the approved work into a job, or Not now to stay on the estimate.
The dialog then shows Work order created. Select View work order to open the job, or Close to stay on the estimate.A service left on Pending has no answer recorded. What happens to it depends on the setting.To correct an answer, select the chip beside the service. It reopens the dialog. TireTutor keeps the earlier record and seals a new one over it, so the history stays intact.
TireTutor turns the prices in this dialog on per dealer, and leaves them off to begin with. The price below each service, and the authorized amount it totals, reach a shop only once TireTutor turns them on for that dealer. Until then the same dialog lists the services without money beside them. Ask support to turn them on.
Withheld work does not drop off the paperwork. The printed work order and
the printed invoice each fence it into its own block. The technician sees
what not to touch. The customer sees what the shop offered.There are two blocks. Which one appears depends on why the work is
withheld.
Detail
Work the customer declined
Work nobody asked about
Heading
Declined by customer — do not perform
Do not perform until approved
Border
Solid
Dashed
Signature line
Yes
No
Appears on
Any setting, once staff record a decline
Approval before billing, and California BAR
The border carries the difference on a black and white printout, where
the two blocks otherwise look alike.Both blocks follow the sealed record, not the setting the shop is on
today. An order sealed under an older setting keeps the blocks it was
sealed with.
The block reads Declined by customer — do not perform, above this
line:
The customer was offered this work and declined it. Putting it back on
the job needs a new customer authorization.
It ends with its own signature line. The document reads I decline the
work listed above, and labels the rule beneath Decline, beside a
Date.The customer signs it. The shop keeps that page as its record that it
offered the work.
The declined block on the printed work order, inside a solid border.
The block reads Do not perform until approved, above the line “The
customer has not approved this work, so it is not on the bill. Performing
it needs their approval first.”This block carries no signature line. Nobody has told the shop anything
to sign for.
The unapproved block, inside a dashed border and with no signature line.
The printed work order gives each withheld service its hours or quantity,
and nothing else. It carries no DONE column for that work, so nobody
can tick it off.The printed invoice adds PRICE and SUBTOTAL, struck through. The
customer sees what the work would have cost. Neither figure reaches the
order total.
The same declined work on the printed invoice, priced and struck through.
Unapproved work on the invoice, priced the same way and fenced by a dashed border.
This is the quiet version of Record what the customer declines. Staff can still record an authorization, but TireTutor stops asking for one.A service nobody answered for shows no Pending chip, so an order stays clean at a shop that records approvals only now and then.Staff can still record one when a customer volunteers an answer. More Options on the order carries a Record customer authorization item, which opens the same dialog. The item sits on a draft estimate and on a work order in progress, once the order carries at least one service. An order that already carries a record still shows it, and each recorded verdict keeps its chip. Work the customer declined still drops off the invoice.Select Approve on an estimate and TireTutor converts it to a work order straight away, without asking first. The Approve button then becomes View Work Order.
No dialog appears. Approve has become View Work Order, and the estimate is already approved.
The work order carries no authorization chips.
Choose this setting when the shop wants the record available but not the prompt.
This is the setting a new shop starts on.Work the customer turned down stays off the invoice. Work nobody asked them about is billable.On the estimate, an approved service keeps an Approved chip. A declined one moves into a Declined by customer — do not perform section, struck through and marked Rejected by customer. The subtotal, fees, and tax all follow the answers.
The estimate once the answers are sealed. The declined service has left the subtotal.
The work order repeats the split on screen, so whoever performs the job sees what not to touch. The printed copy fences it — see What the printed documents show.
The work order shows what to perform and what not to.
Choose this setting when the shop wants a record of refusals, and treats silence as permission.
Everything from Record what the customer declines, and one addition: work the customer never answered stays off the invoice too.That closes the gap where a service nobody raised with the customer reaches the bill by accident. A service left on Pending is withheld exactly as a declined one is.The estimate and the work order look the same as on the previous setting. The difference is in the total.
One service approved, one still waiting on an answer.
Choose this setting when the shop bills only what it can show the customer agreed to.
Everything from Approval before billing, and two additions.Mileage In and Mileage Out are required. Staff cannot complete a work order until they record both readings on the vehicle. TireTutor blocks completion and shows Mileage In and Mileage Out are required before completing this work order.TireTutor stops asking on two orders that have no vehicle to read: an order with no vehicle on it, and a delivery order. It still refuses to complete either one until both readings exist. Each one gets out a different way — see When it does not work.
Completing without the readings is refused.
TireTutor discloses the authorized amount. The dialog totals the services the customer approved, wherever TireTutor has turned the prices on for that dealer. The printed invoice and the printed estimate carry that disclosure. The printed work order does not.The authorized amount covers the approved work only. TireTutor adds shop fees to the order total, so they sit outside it.
The dialog shows the amount the customer authorized.
The work order shows what moved after the customer agreed. The Payment Summary carries an Authorized total row. Open it to see the change snapshot.The snapshot lists every service, the customer’s decision on it, and whether it has moved since. TireTutor groups later additions under Added since authorization and marks them Not authorized.The Authorized total sums the approved services only. The line under it repeats that taxes and fees sit outside that figure.Settings opens the authorization rules in a new tab, so the order stays where it is.
The change snapshot, reached from the Authorized total row.
Choose this setting when the shop is subject to the California Bureau of Automotive Repair.
The work order stays In Progress after the customer has paid. On Approval before billing, California BAR, TireTutor takes the payment and still refuses to complete the job while a reading is missing. Record Mileage In and Mileage Out on the vehicle. The work order then completes. To reach a job that has already closed, see Reopening work orders.The message asks for a VIN as well. A shop connected to CARFAX sees VIN, Mileage In, and Mileage Out are required before completing this work order. Record the VIN on the vehicle alongside both readings.A reading of 0 does not count. TireTutor treats zero as no reading at all, and asks again. Record the reading as it shows on the vehicle.The order has no vehicle on it. A work order with no vehicle cannot take a reading, so a California BAR shop cannot complete it. Add a vehicle to the order. Staff can then record both readings against it.A delivery order does not complete. A California BAR shop needs both readings on a delivery order too, and TireTutor never asks for them. Where the order carries a vehicle, record them as usual. Where it carries none, and the order takes no vehicle, contact support: the job cannot close on its own.
