The short version
A repair entry is worth writing if it answers the questions your future self will ask. In practice that is nine fields, and two of them are the ones people skip.
The fields
1. Date
Non-negotiable, and more useful than it looks. The date is what turns three separate entries into "this has failed every four months since spring". It is also the first thing a warranty claim or an inspector asks for.
2. The item
Not "the compressor" — the specific unit, with its model number, serial number, and where it lives. If you have two similar units, a repair recorded against the wrong one is worse than no record. Manufacturer, model, serial, and an asset ID or tag number are worth capturing once on the item itself rather than repeating in every entry.
3. The symptom
What you actually observed, in the words you would use out loud. "Tripping the breaker after about ten minutes of run time" is a useful sentence. "Broken" is not. The symptom is how you will recognise the same failure next time, and it is the field most likely to be missing.
4. What you tried
The other commonly skipped field, and the one that saves the most time. If you spent an hour ruling out the thermostat and the wiring before finding a clogged drain line, write down all three. Otherwise the next person — possibly you — spends that hour again.
5. What fixed it
The resolution, stated plainly. Replaced, cleaned, adjusted, reset, tightened, recalibrated. If a setting changed, record the old value and the new one.
6. Parts
Part number, size, quantity, and where you bought it. This is the single detail most likely to have taken real effort to find and most likely to be needed again. A photo of the part's label works as well as typing it.
7. Cost
Parts plus labour, as a number rather than a description. Individually every repair looks reasonable; the total across a year is what tells you whether to keep repairing the thing.
8. Who did the work
You, a staff member, or an outside provider. If it was a vendor, keep their contact details somewhere reusable rather than in the body of one entry — the reason you want them is to call them again.
9. Photos and paperwork
A photo of the failure, a photo after the fix, and the invoice. Photos do the job that careful writing cannot: they show the actual configuration, the label you cannot read from memory, and the condition of the part when it came out. The invoice is your proof for warranty and tax questions.
What to leave out
Do not build fields you will not fill in. Elaborate categorisation, priority levels, and downtime calculations look responsible and are abandoned within a month in most small operations. A record that gets written every time beats a richer record written occasionally.
Two things that belong on the item, not the entry
Some details are properties of the equipment rather than of a particular repair, and repeating them in every entry is wasted effort: purchase date and purchase cost, replacement cost, warranty expiration and warranty provider, the manual, and the vendor you bought it from. Record those once on the asset and every future entry inherits the context.
How this maps to FixLog
A FixLog maintenance entry carries a title, a date, an entry type (repair, replacement, cleaning, and others), a linked service provider, a cost, and notes — the symptom, what you tried, what worked, and the part number go in the notes and photos. The asset itself holds name, asset ID, status, place, location, manufacturer, model number, serial number, vendor, purchase date, purchase cost, replacement cost, warranty expiration with an attached PDF, notes, and custom fields for the things specific to your equipment. Photos and documents attach to the asset, so the invoice and the picture of the failed fitting sit with everything else that unit has ever needed.
