Importing Customers from Techman

Summary

Torqueflow has a dedicated Techman import adapter that knows how to read the standard Techman customer CSV export, clean up UK date formats and boolean strings, detect duplicates, and import customers, vehicles, and notification preferences in a single pass. Imports run in the background with live progress updates, and any batch that fails can be retried without losing the successful ones. This article walks through the full end-to-end process for Techman migrations. For non-Techman sources, see data-import/importing-customers-and-vehicles.

Prerequisites

• You must be signed in as an owner or admin with the settings.import.manage capability.
• You have a Techman customer CSV export. The adapter has been tested against real P&P export files with 5,500 records.
• Your Torqueflow organisation is set up and you understand which locations the imported customers should be assigned to.

Steps

Export data from Techman

1. Log into your Techman installation.
2. Go to the customer export function and export all customers to CSV.
3. Verify the file includes at minimum: CustomerNumber, CustomerName, Phone / PhoneLandline, Email, address fields, CustomerGroupName, CustomerOnStop, VehicleRemindersEnabled, NotificationsEnabled, and vehicle details.
4. Save the file somewhere you can access from the Torqueflow web app.

Upload the file

1. In Torqueflow, go to Settings > Import Data.
2. If the page is missing, your role does not have the settings.import.manage capability - ask an owner to grant it.
3. Click Upload File (or drag and drop your CSV onto the upload area).
4. In the Source System selector, choose Techman.
5. Torqueflow validates that the file has the expected Techman columns. If any required columns are missing, the upload is rejected with a message telling you which columns are absent. Fix the export and retry.
6. On successful upload, an Import Job record is created with status pending and you are taken to the import detail page.

Review the cleanup preview

1. Torqueflow parses up to 100 records into a preview and applies cleanup rules:
   • UK dates (DD/MM/YYYY HH:MM:SS) are converted to ISO 8601.
   • Boolean strings (True/False) are converted to real booleans.
   • Phone numbers are normalised to E.164 format.
   • Customer group names are mapped where possible.
   • Notification preferences are stored as JSON.
2. The preview table shows you each record as it will be imported. Flagged issues appear as warnings or errors per row.
3. Duplicate detection runs automatically. For each incoming record that matches an existing Torqueflow customer (by name, phone, or email), you see a duplicate flag with options: Skip, Merge, or Create new.
4. Review the first 100 records carefully. If patterns of problems appear (wrong date format, phone numbers stripped of leading zeros), fix the source file and re-upload before continuing.

Choose duplicate handling

1. For each flagged duplicate, pick an action:
   • Skip - do not import this record.
   • Merge - update the existing Torqueflow customer with the Techman data. New fields are populated without overwriting existing non-null values.
   • Create new - import as a separate customer despite the match.
2. Use the Apply to all duplicates button if you want the same choice applied across the whole import (common for bulk imports).

Trigger the import

1. When the preview looks correct, click Run Import.
2. The import job status changes from ready to importing. The job runs in the background, processing records in batches of 100.
3. A live progress bar shows “X of Y imported” updated within 2 seconds of each batch completing. You can navigate away and come back - progress resumes from the current state.
4. Typical throughput: the full P&P export of 5,500 records completes in under 60 seconds.

Understand what is imported

For each Techman customer record, the import creates:

• A Customer record with name, email, phone, landline, VAT/account flags, credit hold flag, customer group, and notification preferences.
• The original Techman CustomerNumber is preserved in the external_customer_number field so you can trace back to the source system later.
• CustomerAddress records for the customer’s addresses (billing, shipping).
• Any vehicle rows linked to the customer (separate Vehicle records).

Review the import summary

1. When the import completes, the summary shows:
   • Total imported - successful new records.
   • Skipped (duplicates) - records matched an existing customer and you chose Skip.
   • Skipped (user choice) - records you explicitly chose not to import.
   • Failed - records that could not be imported, with per-row reasons.
2. Click Download error log CSV to get a file listing every failed record with the row number and the field that caused the problem.
3. An audit log entry is created for the import.

Handle partial failures

1. If a batch fails during import, previous successful batches are preserved - you do not lose everything. The import continues with the next batch.
2. Failed rows are listed with per-row reasons in the error log CSV.
3. Fix the rows that failed (in the source data or the CSV) and re-import just those records as a smaller file.
4. The import is safe to retry - each batch is idempotent, so retrying never creates duplicates.

Expected Outcome

• All your Techman customers and their vehicles are in Torqueflow with names, contact details, and account flags intact.
• Original Techman customer numbers are searchable via external_customer_number for audit purposes.
• Notification preferences are preserved as JSON and honoured by the communications system.
• Duplicates are handled explicitly so you do not end up with phantom customers.
• Any failures are documented in a downloadable error log for follow-up.

Troubleshooting

Problem: Upload fails with “Missing required column” error. Cause: The Techman export is missing a column the adapter expects. Usually this happens when Techman export settings are customised. Fix: Open the CSV in a spreadsheet and check the header row. Add any missing columns (blank values are fine for most fields) and re-upload.

Problem: Dates in the preview are showing as text instead of dates. Cause: The date format in your export is not the standard UK DD/MM/YYYY HH:MM:SS that the adapter expects. Fix: Reconfigure the Techman export to use UK date format, or convert dates in the CSV before uploading.

Problem: Phone numbers show as duplicates that are not actually duplicates. Cause: Phone normalisation to E.164 can collapse distinct numbers that differ only in formatting. Fix: Review each flagged duplicate in the preview and choose Create new for the ones that are genuinely different.

Problem: Import is stuck on “importing” for a long time. Cause: A large batch is still processing. 5,500 records typically take under 60 seconds - if it has been several minutes, there may be a platform issue. Fix: Refresh the page. The progress bar should update. If it still looks stuck, check Settings > Audit Log for an import error entry, or contact support with the import job ID.

Problem: The error log CSV shows “Phone normalisation failed” for a lot of rows. Cause: The phone numbers in the source data are in an unusual format (international without +, with extensions, etc). Fix: Clean up phone numbers in the source file before re-importing. E.164 format (+447...) is always safe.

Problem: I ran an import and now I want to roll it back. Cause: Import was wrong or test run went to production. Fix: See data-import/reviewing-and-rolling-back-an-import for the reconciliation and rollback process.

Problem: Techman option missing from the Source System dropdown. Cause: The adapter is enabled but the import page is cached. Fix: Refresh the page. If Techman still does not appear, contact support.

Notes

• The Techman adapter was built and tested against a real 5,500-record P&P customer export. It handles the quirks of Techman exports (UK dates, boolean strings, customer groups, notification JSON).
• Imports run in the background so you can close the browser tab and come back later.
• The progress bar updates within 2 seconds of each batch completing via a real-time channel.
• Transient errors retry automatically. Individual batch failures do not cascade to the whole import.
• The external_customer_number field is indexed so you can cross-reference Techman customer numbers later via search.

Permissions

• settings.import.manage - required to access Settings > Import Data and run imports. Assigned to owners and admins by default.