Shops that keep separate templates for general repair, tires and bodywork end up maintaining three documents and updating one. The truth is that the shape is the same for all of them and only a few lines change: what gets described, which fees appear, and who is paying. This page sets out the one shape, the handful of differences that genuinely matter between a mechanical ticket and a body ticket, and the discipline that stops your template collection multiplying until nobody knows which one is current.
One shape, three jobs
Header, customer, vehicle, complaint, cause, correction, parts, labor, supplies and fees, tax, total, paid, balance. A general repair fills the correction lines with what was replaced. A tire ticket adds a disposal fee and treats fitting and balancing as labor. A body ticket adds materials as their own line, because paint and consumables are neither parts nor supplies and burying them in either one hides the cost. Everything else is identical, which is why one template is enough.
What is different about a body ticket
Two things. Materials, which behave like parts but are consumed rather than fitted, and deserve their own line so the margin on them is visible. And the payer, because on a collision job the money often comes from an insurer with its own documentation requirements. Where an insurer is paying, the invoice has to satisfy the insurer's process as well as the customer's understanding, and that is worth finding out before the work rather than after.
Stopping the templates multiplying
The rule that works is one shape, one file, one owner, and any variation handled by leaving a line blank rather than by making a new version. The moment there are three files there will be five, and the rate change will reach two of them. If your templates have already multiplied, the fastest fix is to stop maintaining files and start computing the document, because a builder has one set of inputs and no copies to fall out of date.
Where the template ends and the record begins
A template produces a document. It does not tell you what you invoiced this vehicle last year, what was declined at the time, or which customer has three cars with you. Those are record questions and no template answers them at any price. The free builders on this site do the document; Lugtorq Pro keeps the record, at $79 a month for the whole shop, with the invoice filed against the customer and the plate.
Questions people ask about automotive invoice template
Should tires have their own template?
No, one shape with a disposal line covers it. What a tire ticket does need is the fitting and balancing shown as labor rather than folded into the price of the tire, so the customer can see what they are paying for and you can see the margin.
How do we invoice when an insurer is paying?
Ask the insurer what they require before the work, because their supplement process usually dictates the documentation. Your own invoice should still exist in your normal shape, so your records are consistent whoever paid.
Do we need the VIN on every invoice?
It is not always required and it is always useful, particularly on anything that might come back under warranty or be sold with a service history. A plate changes; a VIN does not.