Import Your Clients Updated November 22, 2024 21:03

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. 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. The file types that can be imported into Jobber are CSV, TSV, and PSV. Of these three, CSV files are the most commonly used.

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.

Only admin users are able to import and export clients. However some client data can be exported by team members with the Reports permission setting. Learn more about user permissions. 

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 as and 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 (separate multiple email address with a comma)
• Street or anything beginning with Address
  Note: If your CSV does not contain anything in the Street column, no property will be created for the client during the import process. 
• 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
• Account 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 importing many clients at a time, but your spreadsheet must be under 2.5MB for the import to be successful. If you have more than 2.5MB worth clients to import, multiple spreadsheets can be uploaded until every client has been added. For reference, 2.5MB is approximately 5000 rows in your spreadsheet.

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 selecting Add file.

Next, is a prompt to make sure that the headings in your CSV file match the fields that are supported in Jobber. The matching is done automatically, however if there is a discrepancy, you can select the correct field from the dropdown menu or choose to add data as a custom field.

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 a preview of the values that are filled in for this column so you will be able to confirm that it's the correct column. If the headings look correct, select Continue.

The next step is to review the data you've inputted so far. If there are any problems with the import data, this is where you can make edits to ensure everything is imported correctly. Any errors will be highlighted in red and can be filtered using the Invalid filter selection.

There is validation that happens in this step to ensure that the data being imported doesn't contain any errors. The fields that are validated are:

• Name - there is a check to make sure a full name, first name, last name, or company name exist
• Email - must be proper format. If there are multiple email addresses they must be separated by a comma.
• Account balance - must contain a number and use accepted separators (periods, commas, or single quotes) 
• Title - must map to one of the title options in Jobber (Mr, Ms or Mrs)
• J_ID - this field appears when you are importing clients previously exported from Jobber. This number must be two numbers separated by an underscore. For example, 3434_5434.

When you're ready to bring this data into your Jobber account, select Import.

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 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. Then when you get to the Map fields page of the import process, locate the custom field name (it may have CFT added to the title in this screen). From the dropdown menu, scroll to the bottom and select Add as new 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.

If you are doing a client import to add new information to an existing custom field, select Add as new field. If a matching field already exists, the data from your spreadsheet will be mapped to the existing custom field. If the field doesn't exist, a new custom field will be created.