How to deal with stolen or written off vehicles in Dragon
Though rare, as a car dealer you may at some point be in the unfortunate position of one of your stock vehicles being stolen or damaged beyond repair (written off) and, as a consequence, will no longer be sold on to a customer. In these cases, here are some suggested steps that you could carry out within your DragonDMS to remove the vehicle from your list of Vehicles In Stock.
First Step – Move the vehicle into your Vehicles Sold section
The first step involves changing the Sales Status of the vehicle to something like ‘Stolen’ (or ‘Written Off’) and then filling in the Delivered To Customer date. The vehicle will then move into your Vehicles Sold list, where it would remain until you have received a payment from the insurance company or decided to scrap the vehicle.
You do not need to credit the purchase invoice in this step (or print a sales invoice yet) but you may need to create a new Sales Status from within Settings – Vehicle Sales – Settings – Record Fields – Sales Statuses.
To ensure that the vehicle no longer appears on your stock reports you will also need to mark any new sales statuses as ‘Show on stock reports – No’.
Stolen – Selling the vehicle to an insurance company
This option involves selling the vehicle to the insurance company who are paying out on the stolen vehicle. You would print (or PDF) a sales invoice with the insurance company as the customer for the amount of the pay out and the vehicle would then show as sold within your Vehicles Sold section.
Printing a sales invoice ensures that all the correct stock journal entries are created within Sage, but it would mean that the insurance company shows as a customer on your sales reports and in Sage. You may want to exclude them from mailshots to ensure that no future contact is made to them regarding this vehicle.
Written Off – Selling the vehicle to a trader or a scrapyard
This option involves marking the vehicle as ‘Unroadworthy’ within the Vehicle – Technical – Vehicle Details tab and then selling it to a scrapyard or trader for the amount agreed. You would print (or PDF) a sales invoice with the scrapyard/trader as the customer and the vehicle would then show as sold within your Vehicles Sold section.
Printing a sales invoice ensures that all the correct stock journal entries are created within Sage, but it would mean that the scrapyard/trader shows as a customer on your sales reports and in Sage. You may want to exclude them from mailshots to ensure that no future contact is made to them regarding this vehicle.