Entity management

Entities are the organizations TrakIT works with: customers, shippers and receivers, carriers, transporters, agents, banks, authorities and others. Jobs, work orders, invoices, bills and quotations all refer to them. The Entity Management page lists them, by type, and is where you create, export and import them.

To open it, select System > Entity Management.

Select an entity in the list to open it on the Entity page, where you see and change its details, documents, contacts and the rest. You can also find an entity from any page with Quick search.

Entity types and tabs

Each entity has one main type, and can have other types as well. The tabs at the top of the page list the entities of one type each: for example Customer, Shipper, Receiver, Carrier, Transporter, Bond Agent, Clearing Agent, Bank, Authority and Other. TrakIT Support sets up the names of the types for your installation, so yours may differ. TrakIT Support also decides, for each type, whether its entities need approval and whether TrakIT numbers their codes automatically.

A type’s tab lists the entities whose main type it is, and those that have it as an extra type. Select Exclude Multi-Type in the filters to list only the entities whose main type it is.

TrakIT remembers the tab you selected. Changing the tab clears the filters.

All entities

The – All – tab lists the entities of every type. You can search and export from it, but not create or import entities: select the tab of a type first.

Which entities you see

You see the entities whose responsible company is one of the companies you have access to, and the entities that are enabled for one of your companies on their Per Company tab. System administrators see all entities.

Find an entity

1. Select the tab of the entity type, or – All –.
2. Select Filters to open the filter panel, if it is closed.
3. Enter or select the filters you need.
4. Select Search.

Reset clears the filters. TrakIT remembers your filters for the next time you open the page.

Filter	Finds
Name / Code	Entities whose name, code or local name contains the text.
Email	Entities with an address in their general, finance or management emails that contains the text.
Status	Active Only or Inactive Only (disabled entities), or — Show All —.
Finance Approval	Approved Only or Unapproved Only, or — Show All —.
Exclude Multi-Type	Only the entities whose main type is the type of the tab. Not on – All –.
Country	Entities of the selected countries. The list shows the countries that have entities of the type. The check icon selects all or none.
Customer Group	Customers in the selected customer groups. On the customer tab only.
Responsible Company	Entities whose responsible company is one of those selected.
TIN, Registration	Entities whose tax identification number or registration number contains the text.
Default Account	Entities whose default account code contains the text.
Company Account	Entities with an account code for a company, set on their Per Company tab, that contains the text.
Document Upload	Has Documents or No Documents: entities with or without documents.
Expiry	Expired or Not Expired: entities with a document whose expiry date is past, or not past yet.
Document Title, File Name	Entities with a document whose title or file name contains the text.
Document Type	Entities with a document of the selected types. Select Exclude Selected to find the entities that have no document of those types instead.
Document Status	Entities with a document in one of the selected statuses, such as Have Original or Requested.
Select Data Field	Entities where an entity data field matches. Choose the field, then a Search Mode: Partial Match, Exact Match, Not Matching, Non-Empty Data, Number Range or Date Range. Select Empty Data Field finds entities where a field is empty.
Tags	Entities with the selected tags. [No Tags] includes entities without tags.

The list

Above the list, the page shows how many entities match, for example 125 Found. The list shows 20 entities per page, in order of name. Select ID, Code or Name in the heading to sort by that column. Disabled entities are shown in red.

Select a row to open the entity.

Column	Shows
ID	The entity’s number in TrakIT.
Code	The entity’s code.
Name	The name, with the local name in grey below it, if there is one.
Type	The entity’s main type.
Multi-Type	The entity’s other types, if any.
Emails	The general email addresses, with the finance and management addresses below them, if they are set.
Status Update	Yes if the customer receives status update emails. On the customer tab only.
Default Account, Currency	The default account code and the base currency. On the bank tab only.
Country	The country, with its flag.
Resp. Company	The responsible company.
Profit Center	The default profit centre, or -.
Changed By	Who changed the entity last.
Approved By	Who approved the entity, if it has been approved.
Data fields	The entity data fields your company has set to be shown in lists, for the type of the tab.
Docs	How many documents the entity has.

Export the list

Select Export to download the entities that match the filters, on all pages, as an Excel file. It appears when the list is not empty. The file has two sheets:

• The entities, with their ID, Code, Name, Local Name, Type, Multi-Type, their email addresses, Postal Address, TIN, Registration, Phone Number, Contact Person, Responsible user, Remarks, Customer Group, Status Update, Default Account, Currency, Country, Responsible Company, Profit Center, Active, Changed By, Docs, Created By and Created On, followed by all the entity data fields of the type.
• Per Company: one row for each of your companies the entity is set up for (for a system administrator, each company), with the company’s Company Account, Credit Days and Currency, and Disabled for a company where the entity is disabled. An entity set up for none of your companies has one row, with these columns empty.

An export can hold up to 5,000 entities. With more, TrakIT says Cannot export more than 5000 rows. Please filter your selection.

Create an entity

1. Select the tab of the entity type, for example Customer.
2. Select Create.
3. Fill in the entity’s details, described in Entity fields. Entity Code, Entity Name, Country and Responsible Company are required.
4. Select Create.

The new entity opens on the Entity page. Its responsible company is enabled for it on its Per Company tab; to let other companies use it, enable them there. Cancel goes back to this page without creating anything.

For the order in which to set up a new company’s entities, see Setting up a company.

Import entities

Import adds and updates many entities at once from an Excel file. The simplest way to get a file in the right format is to export the entities first.

1. Select the tab of the entity type. New entities are created with this type.
2. Select Export to download the entities, and open the file in Excel.
3. Change the data:
   • To update an entity, change the cells and give each changed cell a yellow background, using Excel’s standard yellow. Only yellow cells are read for existing entities; other shades are ignored.
   • To add an entity, add a row and leave its ID empty. All the filled-in cells of a new row are read, whatever their colour.
4. Save the file in Excel format (.xlsx).
5. Select Import.
6. In Import Entity, choose the file under MS-Excel File Upload.
7. Select Allow overwriting with blanks if empty yellow cells should clear the entity’s value. Otherwise empty cells are skipped.
8. Select Upload.

The import runs in the background, and TrakIT says You will receive import results by email. The email lists how many rows were added, updated, unchanged and rejected, with the reason for each rejected row, and the same counts for data field values.

How the file is read

• Only the first sheet is read. The first row holds the column headings, and the first column must be ID, Ent ID or Entity ID.
• A row whose ID is the ID of an existing entity updates that entity. Any other row creates a new entity, and a value in its ID cell is used as the new entity’s code. A new entity is active, and its responsible company is your own company unless the row names another.
• These column headings are recognized, in any order and in upper or lower case: Code, Name, Local Name, Postal Address, Country (name or code), Contact Person, Phone Number, General Email, Finance Email, Management Email, Remarks, TIN, Registration, SCAC, Default Account, Currency, Responsible Company (company name), Profit Center (a profit centre of the responsible company), Responsible (user ID or name), Customer Group, Status Update, TrackLink and Enable API (Yes or No), Active (Yes or No, for existing entities), and Multi-Type.
• Multi-Type lists the entity’s other types by name, separated by commas. It replaces the entity’s other types; an empty yellow Multi-Type cell removes them.
• Entity data fields are read from columns headed with the field’s name and code, as the export writes them, for example Credit Rating [CRDRT]. Separate several values of a multi-select field with semicolons. Computed fields cannot be imported.
• Other columns are ignored.
• Each row is checked as if it were saved on the Entity page. A row that fails is rejected, and the email gives the reason.
• Unless you are a system administrator, a row is rejected with The responsible company is not one of yours if the entity’s responsible company, or the company the row names in Responsible Company, is not one you have access to. Its data field values are not imported either.

The file can be up to 2 MB.

Message	What to do
Select a file to import or Selected file is empty	Choose a file that is not empty.
MS-Excel 2007 or higher file format is required.	Save the file as .xlsx.
File size exceeds 2 MB	Remove rows and import in several files.
First column must be the Entity ID (in the email)	Make the first column the ID column, headed ID.
Nothing to upload. No fields highlighted. (in the email)	Give the changed cells a yellow background.
The responsible company is not one of yours (in the email)	Leave out the entities of companies you don’t have access to, and name a company you have access to in Responsible Company. A system administrator can import the others.

Who can use this page

Your role needs these permissions in the Entity Management section:

Permission	Allows you to
Read	Open the page and see the entities.
Create	Create entities with Create.
Import	Import entities with Import. Adding entities also needs Create, and updating them needs Update. Unless you are a system administrator, only entities of companies you have access to.
Export	Export the list.

On some installations, only system administrators can create entities of some types.