Fuel Station Management is for a fuel station that sells fuel on credit to client organizations that use OCTO Ops. The attendant scans the QR label on a client's vehicle, sees at once whether that vehicle may fuel (the client's quota and your credit terms decide), records the litres, and the dispense appears in the client's own Fuel Management as a fill. Later you invoice the client for its dispenses, the invoice arrives as a bill in the client's Finance, and the client's payments come back to you to confirm.
The module is separate from Fuel Management, which is the client's side. A client sees the invoices and dispenses of its station; a station sees only its own clients and what it needs of them: the client's name, the credit account and its terms, the dispenses at your station and, at the pump, whether a vehicle may fuel. A client's vehicles, drivers and quotas stay private to the client.
Who gets the module
Fuel Station Management is not switched on like other modules. A platform administrator marks a team as a Fuel station when it is created or with the Team type choice in the Superadmin team forms (see Team type); the team then gets the module and its Fuel station settings. Any other team, whatever its module list says, cannot open the pages: "This team is not a fuel station."
A station cannot go back to a standard team while it has a credit account with a client that is not closed: "This station still has open credit accounts." When it does become a standard team, the module is switched off.
Finance is needed for invoicing. Issuing an invoice raises it in your team's Finance, and confirming a payment records it there. Without the Finance module you can still run the pump and see sales, but the Invoices and Payments work is refused: "Invoicing needs the Finance module. Ask your administrator to turn it on." Ask your administrator to enable Finance first, and set the accounts in Fuel station settings.
What you can do
- Set up your products, prices and sites. See Station setup.
- Agree credit accounts and terms with clients. See Credit accounts and clients.
- Scan a vehicle and record a dispense at the pump. See Dispensing.
- Review and void sales. See Sales.
- Invoice a client for its dispenses and answer disputes. See Invoicing.
- Confirm clients' payments, record payments received and print a client's statement. See Payments and statements.
- Run the five station reports. See Station overview and reports.
Before you start
- Ask a platform administrator to mark your team as a Fuel station, and make sure Finance is enabled.
- Open Station setup and add your products with their prices and your sites (with their pumps). See Station setup.
- Review the Fuel station settings: whether a photo and the meter reading are required, the default credit terms, the invoice layout and tax, and the Finance accounts invoices post to.
- Select Create station permission groups in the settings to add the Pump attendant, Station manager and Accounts groups, then add your staff to them under Settings › Permissions. Creating the first group makes the team governed: members who are not owners or admins and are in no group lose access at once, so add them straight afterwards.
- Open credit accounts with your clients. See Credit accounts and clients.
Permissions
In an organization that uses permission groups, Fuel Station Management has seven rows in the matrix. Owners and Admins have every permission, and in an organization with no active permission groups every member has full access.
| Row | Permissions offered | What they open |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | View all | The station overview. Each card also needs the permission for what it counts. |
| Dispense | Create, View (all or own) | Create opens the pump page. The View choices are offered but nothing in this version needs them. |
| Sales | View (all or own) | The sales list and the sales reports. View (own) shows only the dispenses you recorded. |
| Clients | Create, View all, Edit all | View all opens the client list, each account and its statement. Create and Edit all are offered but nothing needs them: the actions on an account use the special tick below. |
| Invoices | View all | The invoice list, each invoice and its print, and the invoice reports. |
| Payments | Create, View all | View all opens the payments page. Create is for recording a payment you received yourself, and also needs the confirm tick below. |
| Setup | Create, View all, Edit all, Delete all | Station setup: products, prices and sites. |
Four more permissions sit under their rows as separate ticks:
| Permission | Under | What it allows |
|---|---|---|
| Void a dispense | Sales | Void a dispense. |
| Offer, accept and change credit account terms | Clients | Link a client by code, accept a client's request, change the terms, put an account on hold, release it or close it. |
| Issue invoices to clients | Invoices | Issue an invoice and answer a client's dispute. |
| Confirm or reject payment advices | Payments | Confirm or reject a payment a client advised. |
Notes on the matrix:
- Invoices offers only View all; issuing is the special tick.
- Settings are for Owners and Admins only, whatever the permission groups say. Site limits in the settings can also confine a member to certain sites.
- Neither a station nor a client can see the other's Finance records: the invoice you issue stays in your Finance and the bill it becomes stays in the client's.
Notifications
You choose how each reaches you (in the app, email, push) under Settings › Notifications; see Preferences.
| Notification | Sent to | When |
|---|---|---|
| A fuel credit account was requested or changed | Everyone holding Offer, accept and change credit account terms | A client asks for, accepts, suspends, resumes or closes an account. |
| A client disputed a fuel dispense | Everyone holding Sales › View | A client disputes a dispense that is not yet invoiced. |
| A client disputed a fuel invoice | Everyone holding Invoices › View | A client disputes lines of an invoice. |
| A client advised a payment on a fuel invoice | Everyone holding Confirm or reject payment advices | A client pays your invoice's bill in its Finance. |
| A fuel invoice to a client is overdue | Everyone holding Invoices › View | An invoice is still owed after its due day. The nightly run sends it once a day. |
Business units
When your team uses business units, the invoice you issue takes the business unit you choose on the Issue invoice page (the main business when you leave it), and its number carries the prefix of that unit's legal entity. The invoice list, the invoice reports and the receivables ageing have a Business unit filter and column. A dispense belongs to no unit until it is invoiced. Without business units nothing changes.
Number formats
Litres, prices and amounts follow the team's number settings. Litres show two decimal places.
Current limitations
- The station's pages are for teams marked as a fuel station only.
- Prices are per litre in the team's currency; there are no gallons.
- A dispense is not checked for unusual fuel economy or size: the client can dispute it instead.
- A payment recorded straight in Finance › Invoices shows on the client's statement only after you record it through Payments.