Preparing dealership records for a CSV import

Before you export

Decide what you actually need to bring over. Old, incomplete records can be cheaper to leave in the old system than to clean up, as long as you still keep them for as long as your record-retention rules require. Import one kind of record per file: customers in one, vehicles in another.

Tidy the spreadsheet

• One header row, one record per row, no merged cells or subtotal rows
• One kind of value per column: first and last name in separate columns
• Dates in one consistent format throughout the column
• Money as plain numbers, without currency symbols or text
• Full 17-character VINs, with no spaces
• Phone numbers and ZIP codes as text, so leading zeros are kept
• Replace formulas with their values; imports read values, not formulas
• Remove obvious duplicates before you start

Keep sensitive data minimal

Only import what the dealership needs. Files with customer details should be handled like the records themselves: kept off shared drives and email, and removed once the import is checked, unless your retention rules say to keep a copy.

How ClozBox checks an import

ClozBox accepts CSV and XLSX files and previews them before anything is saved. Formulas and macros are never run. You match the file’s columns to ClozBox fields, and can save that mapping to reuse next time.

A dry run shows row-level errors and possible duplicates, and you decide what happens to each row. Nothing is written until you confirm the final step. If the appliance’s storage is below 15% free, imports are blocked until space is freed.

After the import

• Spot-check a handful of records against the original file
• Check counts: rows in the file vs. records created
• Fix anything flagged now, while the file is still to hand