Bringing Your Data Across

Moving from another system? We migrate you - free. Here's how it works.

Switching software usually dies on the data. Ours doesn't. Upload your old system's database and press one button - TowConnect finds your jobs, clients, trucks, drivers and invoices, imports them in the right order, links everything back together, and only stops to ask when a row genuinely needs your decision. Prefer not to touch it at all? Send us whatever you have and we migrate it for you, free.

The one-click way (database exports)

Open Import Data, drop in a .sql export from your old system, and you'll see "We found your data: 6,409 jobs · 3,211 clients …" with a Bring everything across button. A live checklist then does the work - each table imports and links automatically, and the screen pauses only for real questions: rows that clash with existing records, or how tax should be handled when your file has amounts but no tax column. At the end you check a handful of real rows and press Looks right - keep everything. Any table can still be undone afterwards.

Excel workbooks with more than one tab

Upload an .xlsx and we read every sheet in it, not just the first. If it has several, you get a list - sheet name, row count and columns - and you tick the ones you want. Tabs with the same columns (a tab per year is the usual one) can be combined into one import, so you map and review once for the lot. Tabs with different columns - clients on one, jobs on another - each become their own import: press Bring everything across and the same live checklist the database path uses does them in dependency order (clients before jobs, jobs before invoices), or create them and work through them one at a time. Where a column holds another sheet's ID and we recognise it, the mapping step offers to link the two together. A one-sheet workbook behaves exactly as it always has: no list, no extra step.

Running both systems side by side (a parallel run)

Most operators keep the old system going for a week or two and import again as they go. That's the safest way to switch, and re-importing is built for it: a row whose record you've since edited in TowConnect is held for review, marked "changed here", with the exact fields named - the file's older value never silently overwrites your work. You decide per record, or for the lot: Keep what's in TowConnect or Take the file's version. Rows that haven't changed on either side simply skip. And if a re-import does go wrong, Undo puts every updated record back the way it was - except ones you've edited since, which it names and leaves alone.

Invoice files with one row per line

Xero, QuickBooks and MYOB export invoices one line at a time, with the invoice number repeating down the file. We spot that after reading your file and ask a single question: each row is a line (the amounts are added together into one invoice), each row repeats the whole invoice total (it's taken once, not added up), or they really are separate invoices. To help you pick, we show one of your own invoices worked out both ways. Combined rows are kept and labelled with the invoice row they went into, so you can see exactly what was added - and you can change your answer and re-run before anything is committed.

Vehicles still in your yard, and what they already owe

Storage records can bring their balance with them. Map your storage charges accrued column and each balance is kept exactly as it stands - it arrives as a charge on the vehicle called Storage balance brought forward, so it shows on the record, on the release invoice and on the receipt like any other charge. Daily storage then starts adding from the day you import, not back-dated to the tow-in date, so months of history aren't re-priced at today's rate. The two figures go in on different sides of tax, because that's what they are. Storage charges accrued goes in before tax - it's taxed at release the same way charges you raise here are. Storage charges paid goes in as it was actually paid, GST included, because that's the money that came in and it's what settles the release invoice. What's still owing is worked out at release: charges plus GST, less what's been paid. Bringing a settled vehicle across? Map the column with 0 in it - that tells us there's nothing owing, and the daily rate starts from today rather than from tow-in.

Jobs that would land on your dispatch board

Job statuses like incoming, dispatched or on scene mean live work. If your file carries them, those jobs arrive on the dispatch board as things to do - which is right for a live changeover and wrong for years of history. Before the import starts we count them and say so, and you have to tick to accept it.

What we can take

• Exports from your old dispatch system (Towbook or any other) - CSV or Excel
• Accounting exports - Xero, MYOB, QuickBooks contact and invoice files
• Spreadsheets - even messy ones with mixed formats
• Whole database files - .sql dumps and .sqlite/.db app databases upload straight into the importer; SQL Server .bak, Access .mdb or a ZIP of everything come through a support ticket and we convert them
• Nothing at all - Start from a blank template on the Import data screen gives you an Excel or CSV file with the headings ready and one example row to type over

Getting data out of SQL Server, Access or a phone app is a page of its own: Migrating from MSSQL, Access or another database.

How it works

1. Open Admin → Import Data (or Support → New ticket → Data migration)
2. Attach your files and tell us what system they came from
3. We import into your workspace and reply on the ticket when it's done, and tell you the day it will land
4. You check the numbers; anything off, we fix. An import can be undone, and anything used since is kept.

Or import it yourself

Prefer to drive? Import Data also has a guided importer: upload a CSV, Excel or SQL export and it walks you through matching your columns, checking every value and previewing exactly what will be created before anything is written. A whole import can be undone afterwards, and anything you have used since is named and kept.

• Preview first - every row shows what it will create or update; anything questionable is grouped for your review, nothing commits silently
• Undo - an import comes back out, and anything used since is named and kept
• Stuck? Every screen has an Ask us to do it button - we take over from exactly where you left off, free