The top-level kinds of thing a business tracks vary enormously. A plant-hire firm thinks in machines and attachments; a caterer in equipment and stock; an electrician in tools, test gear and consumables. A system that forces everyone into the same fixed set of “types” feels alien from the first day, and the mismatch shows up everywhere — in clumsy categorisation, in IDs that don’t read naturally, and in a general sense that the software wasn’t built for you.
Asset types let you define those top-level kinds of asset for yourself, so the system speaks your language. Each type carries its own ID format, which means your references read sensibly the moment you create them — and, helpfully, telling the system what kind of item it’s looking at also sharpens the AI’s suggestions.
Make the system speak your language
Setting up your own types brings the structure of the software into line with the structure of your business:
- Your own types — create the kinds of asset you actually own, and hide the ones you don’t.
- Per-type ID formats — tools become TOOL000001, plant becomes PLANT000001, vehicles become VEH000001, so a reference tells you at a glance what sort of thing it points to.
- Sharper AI — because the type is part of the context, the AI leans towards sensible categories and details for that kind of item.
Tidy from the very first asset
The value of getting your types right early is that every asset you add afterwards slots into a clear, consistent structure automatically. There’s no retro-fitting and no clean-up, because the framework was in place before the data went in. New staff inherit that structure too, adding items into the same well-defined types rather than inventing their own.
A sensible setup sequence is:
- Decide on the handful of top-level types your business genuinely needs.
- Give each one an ID prefix that reads naturally.
- Add assets as usual; each is automatically stamped with the right type and ID.
Best Practice: Keep types high-level and few. The fine detail of what something is belongs in categories; asset types are for the broad classes — tools, plant, vehicles, consumables — that deserve their own ID series.
For more, see Managing Asset Types and Customizing Asset ID Formats.