ERP for motorhome dealers: vehicle, rental, workshop
CARAVAN ONE extends SAP Business One with what a motorhome and caravan dealer needs every day: a vehicle master record where purchasing, sales, stock, workshop, service and documents come together – instead of a vehicle list in a spreadsheet, a rental plan on the wall and workshop notes in a folder.
Developed by init consulting AG together with a dealer from the sector. Built on SAP Business One, the ERP system for midsize companies.
In brief: what is CARAVAN ONE?
CARAVAN ONE is an add-on for SAP Business One. It covers the workflows of a motorhome and caravan dealer: vehicle master data, rental, trade-in, workshop orders, quality assurance and service calls – inside the same database as financial accounting, purchasing, sales and stock.
It is not a standalone ERP system. Without an installation of SAP Business One it does not run. It is developed and maintained by init consulting AG in Kösching near Ingolstadt, Germany, together with a dealer from the sector.
- Type
- add-on
- Base
- SAP Business One
- Database
- SAP HANA or Microsoft SQL Server
- Intended for
- motorhome, caravan and trailer dealers with sales, rental and a workshop
- Vendor
- init consulting AG
- Manual
- documented version 1.0
One record that everything hangs off
The manual contains the sentence that describes the solution best: every piece of information about a vehicle comes together, whether from sales, purchasing, stock, the workshop or documents – and every one of them is reachable through the vehicle's master record. That is exactly the difference from a vehicle list kept beside the ERP system.
The chassis number as the anchor
It is held in the system as the manufacturer serial number and is what makes the valuation of the vehicle in stock correct. Every vehicle is therefore a separately valued object, not one unit out of a quantity.
The transaction number as the bracket
It is created automatically when the vehicle master record is set up and links every purchasing and sales document for that vehicle. Tax postings for margin-scheme taxation and tax deposits are also assigned to the right vehicle through it.
Where processing in a motorhome business breaks down without an industry solution
A motorhome is not an article off the shelf. It has a chassis number, an individual configuration, a previous owner, a rental history, warranty cases and a value that changes with every workshop order. Standard software does not know these connections – and that is why the same gaps keep appearing.
The vehicle lives in four systems
Purchase document in the ERP, rental plan in a spreadsheet, workshop note on paper, vehicle data in the portal. Anyone who wants the current status of a vehicle asks four colleagues.
The vehicle value is wrong
Conversions, accessories and workshop hours do not end up on the vehicle. The margin is only fixed after the sale – and is then often a different one from the plan.
Double entry with every configuration
The same model with the same options is assembled again for the quotation, the purchase order, the portal and the workshop. Every entry is a source of error.
Rental without a link to documents
The rental plan knows when the vehicle is out. It does not know whether the order is confirmed, the invoice issued or the deposit settled.
Tax cases done by hand
Margin-scheme taxation on a trade-in, a tax deposit on a sale abroad: demanding in substance, and in accounting often a side calculation outside the system.
Handovers without evidence
When a rental vehicle comes back it is one person's word against another's. Without a documented inspection with photographs, damage falls to the dealer.
What CARAVAN ONE covers in SAP Business One
The areas below are described in the user manual. They all draw on the same vehicle master record – and that is the real difference from a collection of separate tools.
Vehicle master data
The central record per vehicle
- Vehicle type, body type and vehicle category (new, used, rental)
- Chassis number as the manufacturer serial number in the system
- Transaction number, assigned automatically, linking every document
- Chassis, body, equipment and optional equipment
- Images, documents and transactions on the vehicle
Rental
Planning and documents in one strand
- Web planner with a Gantt board across every rental vehicle
- Quotation and rental contract as the document type „Vermietung“
- Rental period, collection and return time on the order
- Status colours for running, booked and internal rentals
- Rental vehicles are transferred to fixed assets by means of a flag
Trade-in
From the quotation to the valuation
- Runs through quotation, sales order and delivery
- The used vehicle is created in the item and vehicle master
- Tax code for a non-taxable trade-in
- Vehicle valuation directly from the delivery document
- Flagging of transactions under the margin scheme
Workshop order
Orders, resources, vehicle costs
- Created from the sales order through phantom bills of material
- Material and technician times adjustable per line
- Missing parts ordered through the procurement assistant
- Work instructions for the technician at line level
- Completion revalues the vehicle: purchase price plus workshop costs
Quality assurance
Inspections with evidence
- Freely configurable checklists, each with its own checklist ID
- Question sets per inspection and process step
- Check-in and check-out for rentals and new vehicles
- Photographs are filed as documents against the checklist
- Any number of checklists can be predefined
Service call
Customer enquiries and warranty
- One call per customer and incident, with the chassis number
- Repair orders, warranty claims, gas system inspections
- Related documents, activities and solutions on the call
- Technician scheduling through the schedule tab
- History and change log per call
The rental plan hangs off the document, not off the wall
Rentals are shown in the web planner as a Gantt board. Only vehicles flagged as rental vehicles in the master record are displayed. The colour of a bar says what state the associated document is in – planning and order processing are therefore the same information, not two.
What the planner shows
A period from one day up to a year, optionally all rentals. Hovering over a bar shows the customer name, the order or rental contract number, the rental period and the time of collection and return. The view can be printed or saved as PNG, JPEG, PDF or SVG.
What comes out of it in the ERP
The quotation is created in sales with the document type „Vermietung“, and the rental contract as a sales order of the same document type. The fields for the rental process appear in the header of the quotation, sales order and outgoing invoice as soon as that document type is chosen. Return and condition are documented through a checklist, and photographs hang off the checklist.
Margin-scheme taxation and tax deposits: documented procedures instead of side calculations
Two situations occur constantly in vehicle trading and are rarely handled cleanly in standard systems. For both, the manual describes a fixed procedure with its own tax codes, items and accounts.
Margin-scheme taxation on resale
Where a vehicle is taken in trade and resold, the difference between purchase and sale is taxable. The query manager produces the list of affected transactions. The tax is posted as a journal entry with a tax key set up for the purpose, and every posting carries the vehicle's transaction number. The item is then flagged as taxed under the margin scheme, so that it stays visible what has already been posted. If the sale proceeds fall below the cost of the trade-in, margin-scheme taxation does not apply.
The procedure is described and prepared; the posting itself remains a deliberate step by the accounting team – not an automatic posting in the background.
Tax deposit on a sale abroad
On a sale to a country inside or outside the EU, the VAT due on the net value is shown as a tax deposit and retained through a separate tax deposit invoice with its own layout. The vehicle itself is sold under a separate tax code without tax. Once the buyer proves that the tax has been paid in their own country, the deposit invoice is credited and the net value of the vehicle is reposted to the final tax code. The link to the vehicle master is again made through the transaction number.
This requires a setup in the project: tax codes, accounts, items and the layout are created once.
Trade-in: five steps from the quotation to the invoice
The sequence shows what comes together on a vehicle master record. Two vehicles, one transaction, one invoice – as described in the manual, section 2.3.
Terms that keep coming up in projects
This is how they are used in the product documentation.
- Transaction number
- An internal project number created automatically when a vehicle master record is set up. It is what displays every purchasing and sales document for the vehicle – and what assigns tax postings to the right vehicle.
- Chassis number
- Held in the system as the manufacturer serial number. It is what makes the vehicle valuation post correctly.
- Model
- A vehicle offered by the manufacturer that can be procured in that specification without further configuration items. Created as an item, with serial/batch valuation.
- Configuration item
- An item per manufacturer for configuring a vehicle. A purchasing and sales item, but deliberately not a stock item. The manufacturer's article number is held as the business partner catalogue number.
- Vehicle valuation
- The valuation of the vehicle in stock. On completion of a workshop order, the new vehicle price is made up of the purchase price and the cost of the workshop order.
- Service call
- A transaction per customer and event for recording customer enquiries, repair orders, warranty claims and inspections, with the chassis number, related documents, activities and history.
- Checklist ID
- The identifier of an inspection list in quality assurance. Questions are defined for each checklist, and photographs are filed as documents against it.
Grown out of a dealer's day-to-day business
Developed jointly with Heck Caravan & Reisemobile
CARAVAN ONE was developed by init consulting AG together with Heck Caravan & Reisemobile GmbH & Co. KG and shaped around the workflows of motorhome dealers. The requirements therefore do not come from a specification drawn up at a desk but from a business with sales, rental and a workshop.
That explains why details such as the transaction number, the revaluation of a vehicle after a workshop order or the flagging of margin-scheme transactions are in the module at all: they are missed immediately in daily work if they are not there.
What CARAVAN ONE covers – and where it needs additions
No module solves everything. We are not saving this breakdown for the first meeting.
| Topic | In the module | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Vehicle master data, configuration, valuation | included | the core of the module, fully described in the manual |
| Rental with the web planner | included | Gantt board through the Coresuite connector, set up in the project |
| Workshop order and resource planning | included | builds on production and resources in SAP Business One |
| Quality assurance with checklists | included | checklists freely definable, photographs as documents |
| Service calls and warranty processes | included | warranty procedures per manufacturer are documented separately |
| Workshop and service planner with appointment booking | third-party service | appointment scheduling through the external service eTermin; keys and calendars are set up in the project |
| Till system for the shop | add-on module | offered separately, not part of the core module |
| Document management | add-on module | through B1ECM, extending document filing on the vehicle |
| Connection to sales platforms | in the project | an interface to mobile.de is provided for; scope and fields are agreed per project |
| Vehicle finance administration | open | set out as a chapter in the manual but not yet implemented – please raise it in the meeting |
| A standalone ERP without SAP Business One | no | CARAVAN ONE requires an installation of SAP Business One |
Frequently asked questions about CARAVAN ONE
What is CARAVAN ONE?
CARAVAN ONE is an add-on for SAP Business One. It covers the workflows of a motorhome and caravan dealer: vehicle master data, rental, trade-in, workshop orders, quality assurance, service calls and the associated reports. It is developed and maintained by init consulting AG.
Do I need SAP Business One for it?
Yes. CARAVAN ONE is not a standalone ERP system; it extends an existing installation of SAP Business One. Financial accounting, purchasing, sales, stock and service come from the standard, and the module adds the vehicle logic on top. If you do not yet have an ERP system, SAP Business One is part of the same project.
Which businesses is the solution suited to?
Dealers where several of these areas come together: sales of new and used vehicles, trade-ins, rental, an own workshop, service handling with warranty claims and an accessories shop. The more of those that run in separate tools today, the bigger the difference.
What does an implementation cost?
That depends on the number of users, the licence model, the deployment and the scope of the setup. The price calculator gives you a first estimate of licence and service costs, training, maintenance and support: calculate project costs. A dependable quotation follows a conversation about your workflows.
How long does an implementation take?
Nothing serious can be said about that in general. The duration depends on the number of sites, the data migration, the special cases in accounting and on how many configurations and models have to be built. We settle these points in the first meeting – with a rough range that is refined after the review.
Can our existing vehicle and customer data be migrated?
A migration is part of every implementation project. How far it goes is decided by the quality and structure of the existing data – vehicles with a chassis number, business partners and open transactions are the usual candidates. Bring an extract of your current vehicle list to the meeting and the effort can be estimated concretely.
Cloud or our own data centre?
For CARAVAN ONE the deployment of the underlying SAP Business One installation applies. The system can be run in house or used as a hosted environment; SAP HANA or Microsoft SQL Server are the database options. Which variant makes sense depends on your IT, your sites and how much support you want.
How are rentals planned?
Through the web planner, a Gantt board showing every vehicle flagged as a rental vehicle. Periods from one day up to a year can be chosen, and a line marks the current day. Hovering over a bar shows the customer, the order or rental contract number, the rental period and the collection and return times. The colour says whether the vehicle is out, firmly booked, scheduled internally or the transaction is complete.
How does workshop effort get onto the vehicle?
The workshop order is created from the sales order. Material and technician times can be adjusted in the order without changing the sales contract; missing parts can be ordered from the supplier directly through the procurement assistant. On completion the vehicle is revalued: the new vehicle price consists of the purchase price and the cost of the workshop order.
How are handover and return documented?
Through checklists in quality assurance. Every checklist has its own identifier and a defined set of questions, for check-in and check-out on rentals or for taking delivery of new vehicles, for example. Photographs are filed as documents against the checklist. The lists are freely configurable and can be extended at will.
Is margin-scheme taxation posted automatically?
No, and that is deliberate. The system provides the list of affected transactions through the query manager; the tax is posted as a journal entry with a tax key set up for the purpose, carrying the vehicle's transaction number. The item is then flagged as taxed under the margin scheme, so that it stays traceable what has already been posted. If the sale proceeds fall below the cost of the trade-in, margin-scheme taxation does not apply.
Is there a connection to mobile.de?
An interface to mobile.de is part of the solution scope; the mapping of vehicle type, body type, manufacturer, equipment features and further fields is set up in the project. Which fields are transferred in your case and at what interval is something we establish from how you list vehicles today – please raise it specifically in the meeting.
Can I try SAP Business One beforehand?
Yes. An online trial access can be requested through the customer area of the website: register, select trial access, enter your user details. The trial shows standard SAP Business One; the vehicle logic of CARAVAN ONE is best seen in a guided demonstration.
Who looks after us after the implementation?
init consulting AG covers consulting, implementation, training, maintenance and support from one house, with personal contacts and offices in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The module itself is also developed and maintained here – questions about the vehicle logic do not end up with a third party.
Related topics on business-one-consultancy.com
First the price range, then the conversation
In the calculator you set the number of users, the licence model and the level of support yourself and see the range that licences, implementation, training and maintenance fall into. If the range fits, we talk about your workflows: bring a typical vehicle configuration, a rental contract and a workshop order.
Direct contact
- Phone
- +49 8456 2 78 04-0
- Head office
- Ruppertswies 14
85092 Kösching, Germany - Offices
- Ingolstadt · Munich · Regensburg · Remscheid · Hanover · Rheine · Limburg an der Lahn · Innsbruck · Vienna · Switzerland