Import Your Clients Updated October 04, 2022 14:40

Overview

Keep track of important client details whether you’re at the office, on the way to a job, or out in the field.

You can bring your clients into Jobber quickly by doing a CSV import, rather than manually adding clients one-by-one. CSV (which stands for Comma Separated Values) and TSV (which stands for Tab Separated Values) are two types of spreadsheet file which are supported in a client import with CSV files being more common. Our import process takes the data from your spreadsheet, then walks you through steps to make sure all your information formats correctly in Jobber so you aren't left hanging with missing information.

This article covers how to import clients from a CSV spreadsheet. However, it is also possible to sync clients into Jobber from QuickBooks. If you already have clients in QuickBooks, to avoid creating duplicate clients it's best to first do a sync with QuickBooks to bring those clients into Jobber rather than uploading a CSV file with the same clients that you already have in QuickBooks. Afterwards, additional clients can be brought into Jobber with a CSV import.

Note: The client import cannot be run if your browser is in incognito or a private browsing session. 

How to save a CSV

To start with, you'll need to have a CSV file full of your client information to import into Jobber. It's common to have a CSV file as an export from a software such as QuickBooks Desktop, however you can also create your own CSV files in programs like Excel, Sheets, and Numbers. In these programs you'll want to make sure that you are saving your file type as .csv. Here's how to do this in each program:

Excel

Once you have your document formatted in Excel, you can click File > Save as. From the file type drop down, you'll need to select .csv.

Sheets

To export a spreadsheet in Google Sheets, you'll need to click File > Download asand select a file type (in this case, pick .csv). Then select Save.

Numbers

In Numbers, you can click File > Export to > CSV. This will select CSV for you as the file type that this document will be saved as.

Supported column headers

These are the fields that we can import via CSV. Set up each of these fields as a column header to import data into these fields:

• First name or Given name
• Last name or Family name
• Title (Mr, Ms or Mrs)
• Company name or Company or Organization name or Org.
  
• Is Company? (If the client is a company this column should say TRUE. If they are not, then it should say FALSE)
• Name
• Main Phone
• Home Phone
• Work Phone
• Mobile Phone
• Fax Phone
• Other Phone
• Email
• Street or anything beginning with Address
• City
• Province or State
• Country
• Postal Code or Zip Code
• Billing Street
• Billing City
• Billing Province or Billing State
• Billing Postal Code or Billing Zip
• Billing Country
• Balance
• Text Message Enabled Phone Number 
• Receives automatic visit reminders? 
• Receives automatic job follow-ups? 
• Receives automatic quote follow-ups? 
• Receives automatic invoice follow-ups? 
• Archived
• Note
• Tags (each tag being imported must be separated by commas)

These are the headings that we support, but if any of your column headings don't match these names we'll prompt you to select a heading that we can map this information to. You can also choose to create a text based client custom field with that heading as well.

The CSV importer can handle up to 1500 rows in your file at a time. If you have more than 1499 clients to import, you will need to separate your CSV into multiple files and upload them separately.

Importing a CSV client list

To import your CSV Client list, go into Clients and in the top right corner, click the More Actions button. From this dropdown, there will be an option to import your clients.

This will open the Import Clients window. To continue with this process click Begin Import.

The next step is uploading your CSV file from this screen by clicking Upload Data from File.

You will be asked if in the file you have uploaded if the first row contains column names. Select either Yes or No depending on what this row shows. If the answer is no, in the next step you'll be prompted to select what appears in each heading.

Next, is a prompt to make sure that the headings in your CSV file match the fields that are supported in Jobber. If there is a discrepancy (let's say a heading in your file says Business Name rather than the Jobber supported Company Name), this is your chance to look over all the headings and make sure that they are mapping to the correct place. If we are unable to match the heading to the correct field, you can select from the drop down the field that best matches.

To the right of the column headings, there is a section that shows which field in Jobber the column was matched to. This section also shows the percentage of rows that are filled in for this column, so you will be able to tell if some rows are empty. This section also shows if the information in each row was able to be validated. If there are values that don't pass validation, there is likely a mistake in this section or something appears under this heading that we are unable to support. For example, under the email address heading we make sure that all the email addresses being imported are valid. If there are values that don't pass validation here, it might be that an email address has a typo.

If the headings look correct, click Confirm mapping. If there is a heading that you decide not to import, or has irrelevant information to Jobber you can select the option to Ignore this column.This will skip importing this particular field. Once all the mappings have been confirmed, you can click Review.

The review screen is a chance to look over all the data that you are importing. If there are any problems with this import, it is also where you can repair them.

If there are any problems, they will appear in red on this screen. In this example, there is a problem with the Title column. The values highlighted in red aren't supported in Jobber. Here if you click on the titles, it will prompt you to select a value that is supported. You can also select to leave this field blank. Once the problems have been addressed, click Complete.

The next screen will show the import progress. You can navigate away from this page and still use Jobber while the import is happening!

And that's it! Once the import is complete the newly added clients will appear in your client list.

Importing multiple properties for the same client

To create multiple properties for a client, add a new row in your CSV for each property you'd like to create for the client.  Each row for the client should have the same client details like name and billing address with the only difference being the service address. To save time, you may want to add a new row, then copy and paste the row above into the new row so you don't have to re-type all the same fields.

If you are adding a property to a client that already exists in your Jobber account, export your client list from Jobber, then add a new row for each additional property and enter the new service address. Delete the J-ID that was copied from the existing client and leave the J-ID field blank for each new property.

If you would like to create more than one property for the client, enter as many rows as they have properties, then update the service address details in each row to correspond to their properties.

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Mass updates to clients using the import process

If you want to save some clicks and time, there are some changes to clients that you can make in bulk by taking advantage of the client import process. In particular, automated notifications for clients and archived status can be changed with this method. Using this process saves you from having to navigate in and out of individual clients to make these changes.

Items that can be changed with the client import process are:

• If a client's phone number can receive text messages
• If a client can receive automated visit and assessment reminders
• If a client can receive automatic job follow-ups
• If a client can receive automatic quote follow-ups
• If a client can receive automatic invoice follow-ups
• Archived status
• Tags

Learn more about how How to Make Mass Updates to Clients.

Importing custom fields

You can also import custom fields by doing a CSV import.

Note: Only text based client custom fields can be imported, this does not include drop down custom fields. 

On your CSV, title the column heading what you want to name your custom field. When you import a heading that is not recognized as one of our supported fields, click Include as custom field to bring this heading into Jobber as a client level text custom field. The custom field will be imported with the same title as your column heading, but you can still edit the custom field name on this screen if you need to change the name.

If you are doing a client import to add new information to an existing custom field, make sure to chose this same option to Include as custom field.