How to Manage Inspections?
Trust is good, but proof is better. Inspections give you a digital paper trail of every scratch and dent before gear leaves your shop and after it comes back — so you never get stuck paying for a client’s mistake. This page is your map to the Inspections hub, where every check-out, return, and recurring inspection lives in one place.
Where to Find It
Open Inspections from the main menu (at /inspection). This is the single home for all inspection activity — not a tab buried under Assets. From here you can see what needs checking, schedule new inspections, and pull reports on finished ones.
Access to Inspections depends on your role’s Operations permissions. If you don’t see the menu item, ask an admin to grant it.
The Five Tabs
The hub is organized into five tabs so you always know where an inspection stands:
| Tab | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Active Dispatch | Orders going out that still need (or are mid-) check-out inspections |
| Active Return | Orders coming back that need return inspections |
| Active Recurring | Ongoing/periodic inspections for gear that’s out on long rentals |
| Scheduled | Ad-hoc inspections you’ve booked for a future date |
| Completed Inspections | Everything finished — with Dispatch and Return sub-tabs |
Each tab has its own search box and status filter (Scheduled, In Progress, Completed, and so on), plus a progress bar on every row so you can tell at a glance how far along an order’s inspections are.
The Two Key Moments
Most inspections happen at a handover. Focus your attention there:
- Check-out (Dispatch) — prove the gear was working when it left. See Pickup & Delivery.
- Return (Check-in) — catch damage the moment it comes back, so you can bill the client or send it for repair. See Returns.
For gear out on long-term rentals, you can also set up recurring inspections that repeat on a cadence — see How to Schedule and Recur Inspections?.
Scheduling an Inspection
Need a one-off or periodic check that isn’t tied to a handover? Click Schedule Inspection to open the wizard. You can build it two ways:
- By Order — pick an order, then tick which asset stocks to inspect.
- By Asset — search by tag, serial number, or name and inspect a specific unit.
Then choose a template (or leave it on Auto (from category) to use the mapped default), set a recurrence — one-time, weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly — and a scheduled date. Full walkthrough in How to Schedule and Recur Inspections?.
A Mobile-First Workflow
You’re rarely at a desk when checking gear — you’re in the warehouse with a case open. Rentablez is built for that:
- Open an order from the hub to see its inspection detail page — a completion ring plus a per-item table.
- Tap Start Inspection on a stock row to kick it off.
- Fill the actual checklist on the mobile app, tapping through each item as you pack or unpack.
Complete the checklist on mobile. Once an inspection is underway, its row shows a Via mobile badge — the web app is for starting inspections, watching progress, and pulling reports, while the hands-on checklist is filled on the phone or tablet.
Handling Damage
If you find a crack, dent, or missing piece during an inspection:
- Log a Defect — record a title, description, and severity (critical, high, medium, or low).
- Create a Maintenance Job — from that defect, kick off a repair so the unit isn’t rented out again by mistake. This is a deliberate button press, not automatic. See How to Handle Damaged Gear?.
Reports and Proof
Every completed inspection can be turned into a shareable record. Open a finished inspection and use Download Report (or Print) to save a PDF for your files or to back up a damage claim. See How to Download and Print Inspection Reports?.
Want inspections to be unskippable? An admin can turn on Enforce mandatory inspections, which blocks dispatch or return when a required inspection isn’t finished. Pair it with template category mapping — see How to Assign Templates and Make Inspections Mandatory?.