Audience: New trial users (14-day free trial), administrators evaluating Hector
Goal: Leave the trial with a working inventory you trust, configured around your actual problems
Companion articles: Work Order module user guide, Zebra device configuration, integration-specific articles
1. How to use this article
Hector is not a single-purpose tool. It manages physical inventory, but the reason organizations adopt it varies enormously — one company cannot find its equipment, another is bleeding money on emergency purchases, a third needs to prove software-license compliance during an audit.
Fourteen days is enough time to prove Hector solves your problem. It is not enough time to configure every module. So this article is built as a diagnostic, not a linear checklist:
- §2 — Answer the discovery questions. Ten questions about your organization. Your answers select which setup tracks you need.
- §3 — Do the foundation setup. Everyone does this. It takes 2–4 hours and nothing else works without it.
- §4–§12 — Do only the tracks your answers selected. Each track is self-contained and states what to configure, where, and what the mobile app contributes.
- §13 — Set up the mobile app. Almost every track has a mobile component. Do not skip this.
- §14 — Follow the 14-day schedule if you want a day-by-day plan.
- §15 — Run the validation checklist before your trial ends.
Two things to know before you start.
- Nothing you choose is permanent. Modules, vocabulary, categories, attributes and notifications can all be changed later. The onboarding wizard says this explicitly: “Don’t worry, the choices below can be changed at a later moment.” Do not stall on a decision.
- Your trial can be pre-populated. The onboarding wizard offers to generate a fictitious inventory for you. Say yes if you want to click around a populated system immediately; say no if you intend to import your real data on day 1. You can do both — generate sample data to learn, then wipe it and import for real.
2. Discovery questions — what are you actually trying to fix?
Answer each question below. Every Yes points to one or more tracks in §4–§12. If you answer Yes to more than four, prioritize: pick the two problems that hurt most this month and prove those first.
| # | Question | If Yes, read |
|---|---|---|
| Q1 | Do you regularly discover that stock on the shelf does not match stock in your records? | Track A — Stock accuracy and counts (§4) |
| Q2 | Do you run out of consumables, or over-order because nobody knows what is already on hand? | Track B — Min/max replenishment (§5) |
| Q3 | Is purchasing informal — emails, spreadsheets, no record of what was ordered or received? | Track C — Purchasing and requisitions (§6) |
| Q4 | Do you struggle to answer “who has this laptop / drill / vehicle right now?” | Track D — Who has what (§7) |
| Q5 | Do your people avoid updating records because the process is too slow or manual? | Track E — Automating inventory transactions (§8) |
| Q6 | Do you need to prove or schedule maintenance, inspections, or calibration on equipment? | Track F — Maintenance (§9) |
| Q7 | Do you lend equipment or book rooms out and back — with due dates and returns? | Track G — Loans and reservations (§10) |
| Q8 | Does inventory data already live in other systems (MDM, ITSM, HR, network, directory)? | Track H — Integrations and a consolidated view (§11) |
| Q9 | Do people need to know before they walk over whether an item is available? | Track I — Availability: in stock vs. not (§12) |
| Q10 | Will the people doing the physical work be standing in a warehouse, on a job site, or in a hallway — not at a desk? | §13 — Mobile app (mandatory, not a track) |
2.1 Follow-up questions that change your configuration
These sharpen the setup. Answer them before §3.
| Question | Why it matters | Where the answer is applied |
|---|---|---|
| Is your inventory managed by unit, or as a lot? Do you track this specific serial-numbered laptop, or 47 boxes of gloves? | This is the single most consequential setup decision in Hector. It is set per category, and it changes the entire behavior of every asset in that category. | Category creation (§3.4) |
| How many physical locations do you store things in? One room, or twelve sites? | Determines how many stockrooms you need, and whether you need rackings (shelves) inside them. | Stockrooms (§3.3) |
| Do you need to know where inside a location something sits? Aisle, shelf, bin? | Turns on rackings on a stockroom. | Stockrooms (§3.3) |
| What information do you need that a generic inventory tool would not have? Voltage, license plate, grant code, room number, hazard class? | Becomes attributes (custom fields). | Attributes (§3.6) |
| Who is allowed to see and do what? Can a technician move any asset, or only the ones in their building? | Becomes roles and permissions, and stockroom staff assignment. | Users and roles (§3.7) |
| Do you already have your inventory in a spreadsheet? | Determines whether you import (fast) or create records by hand (slow). | Data import (§3.8) |
| Does your organization use different words than Hector’s defaults? Site instead of Stockroom, Item instead of Part, Project instead of Place? | Hector’s core nouns are renameable. Rename them before training anyone, so screenshots and habits match. | Vocabulary (§3.2) |
3. Foundation setup — everyone does this
Nothing in §4–§12 works until this is done. Budget 2–4 hours, or one afternoon with a spreadsheet ready to import.
3.1 Understand the four-layer inventory model
Hector organizes physical things in four layers. This is not optional structure — it is how the product thinks, and misunderstanding it is the most common cause of a frustrating trial.
STOCKROOM Where things are physically stored
│ (renameable: Site, Warehouse, Building, Depot, Establishment…)
│ optionally subdivided into RACKINGS (shelves/aisles/bins)
│
CATEGORY What kind of thing it is → Vehicles, Computers, Tools, Gloves
│ Decides: managed by unit, managed as a lot, or a kit
│
PART The specific make/model/description → "Dell Latitude 5540"
│ (renameable: Item, Model, Article, Product)
│ Carries defaults: price, life span, maintenance frequency, warranty
│
ASSET The actual thing you can pick up, assign, lend, maintain, move
Inherits its defaults from its PartWhy the Part layer exists. You define price, life span, warranty and maintenance frequency once on the Part, and every asset created from that Part inherits them. Without Parts you would retype the same data on every asset. This is Hector’s own explanation:
Each time you want to add inventory, you’ll be doing so from an item, and the asset that is created will inherit its properties from the item, like the default maintenance frequency, its price, and lifespan. This saves you time from having to specify this information each time you create an asset.
Practical rule: if two things differ only in serial number, they are two assets of one
Part. If they differ in model, they are two Parts. If they differ in nature, they are two
Categories.
3.2 Choose your modules and your vocabulary
Settings → Modules. Turn on only what you will actually test. Each module adds menus, permissions and settings; turning on all of them at once makes the trial harder, not richer.
| Module | Turn on if | Contains |
|---|---|---|
| Inventory | Always — available by default | Stockrooms, Categories, Parts, Assets, Asset transit management, Physical counts, Associations, Bundles |
| Loaner | Q7 = Yes | Reservations, loaner shipment management, self-service reservation portal |
| Operations | Q2, Q3 or Q6 = Yes | Requisition orders, Purchase orders, Transfer orders, Work orders |
| Software | You need license compliance | Software, purchases, licenses, renewal dates, assignment to users/devices/places |
| Accounting | You will invoice for work or rentals | Invoices, payments |
| Rental Rates | You charge for equipment time | Hourly/daily/weekly/monthly rate matrices |
Hector’s own module descriptions:
- Inventory — “Effective inventory management helps organizations avoid overstocking, which ties up capital and increases storage costs, and understocking, which can lead to dissatisfaction.”
- Loaner — “This module enables you to make equipment and room reservations. You can also offer an online portal for stand-alone reservations.”
- Operations — “Users can make requisitions, you can purchase from your vendors, transfer inventory between locations and manage work to be assigned to teams.”
- Software — “Manage your purchases, your license count, upcoming renewal dates, as well as license assignment to users, devices, or places.”
Then rename the nouns. Hector’s core entities carry configurable labels. Stockroom, Part, Place and Racking are all renameable, and the mobile app picks up the same labels — for example the mobile Create a place action renders as Create a building, Create a site, Create a room, Create a project, Create a vehicle, Create a patient, and roughly twenty other variants depending on your chosen label.
Rename before you train anyone. A warehouse team that has learned “Site” will resent being told the button says “Stockroom”.
3.3 Create your stockrooms (and rackings if you need them)
Inventory → Stockrooms → New.
A stockroom is a physical storage location. Onboarding describes them as: “These are the physical locations where you store assets.”
Create one per real location you store things in. Do not create a stockroom per shelf — that is what rackings are for.
Rackings (renameable: Shelf, Aisle, Bin, Zone, Rack) subdivide a stockroom. Enable them on the stockroom when “where in the room” matters. Hector’s own tooltip: “Rackings allow segmentation to give you a better idea of where to physically find your inventory.”
Turn rackings on if Q1 = Yes (counting a large room without shelf-level structure is slow and error-prone) or if picking accuracy matters. Skip them if you have one small storage room.
Stockroom staff. Assign which users are responsible for each stockroom. This drives permission filtering across min/max, counts, and lists — a user only sees the stock they are responsible for.
3.4 Create your categories — and decide by unit or as a lot
Inventory → Categories → New.
Onboarding describes categories as: “Categories will group assets together based on common features. Examples of categories are Vehicles, Computers, Tools, Phones, Cameras, Tables, Chairs, Monitors, etc.”
Each category answers the question Hector asks directly on the asset entry form: “Is it managed by unit or as a lot?”
| Category type | Choose when | What Hector does |
|---|---|---|
| By unit (asset tag) | Each item is individually identifiable and individually tracked: laptops, vehicles, power tools, radios, instruments | One asset record per physical item, each with its own asset tag, own history, own maintenance date, own assignee. Counting the same asset tag twice is flagged as an error. |
| As a lot (lot size) | Items are interchangeable and counted in quantity: gloves, cable, screws, printer paper, reagents | One asset record carries a quantity. Quantities are added, split, consumed and moved. Min/max replenishment is built for this. |
| Kit | A parent item made of tracked components: a camera kit, a tool crib set, a first-aid station | Parent asset with component assets. Hector tracks incomplete kits and can optionally break kits down so components move independently. |
Get this right the first time. Changing a category’s method later is possible but disruptive — Hector sends a dedicated Category method change notification because of the consequences. If you are unsure: individually identifiable and worth chasing down → by unit. Bought in boxes and nobody cares which one → as a lot.
3.5 Create your parts (items)
Inventory → Parts → New.
Onboarding: “Items contain details like a maker, model, description, price and other information.”
Fill in the fields that will save you work later:
| Field | Feeds |
|---|---|
| Maker / Model / Description | Search, catalogs, reports, labels |
| Price | Asset value, inventory valuation, count variance in dollars |
| Life span | Asset obsolescence reporting and the asset list Life span tab |
| Warranty | Warranty tracking and the asset list Warranty tab |
| Maintenance frequency | The next-maintenance date on every asset created from this part (Track F) |
| Default lot size | How many units a new lot asset starts with |
| Vendor / Vendor SKU | Purchase-order line creation (Track C) |
| Default racking | Where new stock of this part is put away |
Parts also carry min/max quantities, loaner rules, and consumption behavior — covered in the tracks that need them.
3.6 Add your attributes (custom fields)
Settings → Attribute.
Onboarding: “Attributes allow you to collect information specific to your organization’s needs, workflows, or reporting requirements… By adding attributes, you can structure data more effectively.”
Available attribute types: Text, Number, Decimal, Date, Timelapse, Checkbox, List, plus record-picker types that link to another Hector record — Stockroom, Category, Part, Asset, User, Place, Customer, Vendor, Contact, Space, Racking, Tag, Department.
Practical advice for a 14-day trial: add the three to five attributes you would miss if they were gone. Not thirty. Attributes are searchable, filterable, reportable and available on the mobile app, so a small, well-chosen set demonstrates the capability better than an exhaustive one.
Note on serial numbers. A Serial Number attribute is automatically associated with every new category that is managed by unit. You do not need to create it.
3.7 Set up users, roles and permissions
Resources → Users, and Settings → Role.
Onboarding: “Users only see and modify what they are authorized to. By compartmentalizing access, the impact of a compromised account or malicious action is minimized.”
Hector ships with default roles. For a trial, do not design a permission scheme from scratch — instead:
- Review the default roles (Settings → Role).
- Invite three real people who represent your three real personas — typically an administrator, a warehouse/technician user, and a regular requester/borrower.
- Give each one the default role that matches, and let them use the system.
That produces far better trial feedback than a perfect permission matrix nobody has tested.
If you have an identity provider, you can skip manual user creation entirely — see Track H (§11) for user synchronization via Microsoft Entra/Azure, Google Workspace, Active Directory, OneLogin, SAML, or SCIM.
3.8 Import your data
Settings → Data Import.
Onboarding: “Instead of manually entering each record into the system, you can populate the provided templates with bulk data, such as categories, vendors, models, quantities and prices, in a single operation. This process not only saves time but also reduces the likelihood of errors associated with manual entry.”
Excel templates are provided for: assets, attributes, categories, customers, loaners, part components, places, purchase orders, software, transfer orders, users, vendors.
Import order matters. Dependencies flow downhill:
1. Attributes (so asset columns have somewhere to land)
2. Categories (with the by-unit / as-a-lot decision already made)
3. Vendors (so parts can reference them)
4. Places / Users (so assets can be assigned on import)
5. Assets (this creates the parts as it goes, if they don't exist)Trial strategy: import a representative slice, not everything. 200–500 assets spanning your three most different categories will surface every configuration problem your full 40,000-row catalog would, and it imports in seconds instead of requiring a week of data cleanup. Import the full set once the configuration is proven.
Data imports are reversible — an import can be reverted if the result is wrong.
3.9 Asset tags and labels
Settings → General (asset tag prefix and auto-generation), Settings → Label (label layouts),
Tools → Create Label (print).
Onboarding: “Using barcodes and QR codes will significantly help improve the accuracy of your inventory by eliminating manual data entry errors… Scanning the labels makes inventory checks and locating assets much faster. Barcodes and QR codes are also inexpensive and easy to implement and require minimal hardware investments.”
Setup steps:
- Set your asset-tag prefix (maximum 5 characters, no spaces). Tokens
{{Year}},{{Month}}and{{Day}}are supported if you want dates embedded in tags. - Turn on automatic asset-tag generation unless you already have a tagging scheme you must preserve.
- Design a label in Settings → Label. Labels can carry the asset tag as a barcode or QR code, the maker/model, a logo, a custom text zone, and a custom image. Avery sheet layouts are available as presets.
- Print a test sheet and scan it with your phone before you print 500 labels. This single check catches almost every barcode-scaling problem.
This step is not optional if Q1, Q5, Q9 or Q10 = Yes. Everything fast in Hector starts with a scan.
3.10 Review your notifications
Settings → Notifications.
Onboarding: “Notifications will serve timely reminders, alerts, or updates, ensuring users don’t miss critical information, such as deadlines, maintenance, renewals or other events.”
Hector ships with default notifications. During the trial, open the list and turn off anything you do not want emailing your colleagues, then verify the two or three that matter to your use case actually arrive. A trial that spams a team is a trial that ends early.
4. Track A — Stock accuracy and counts
You are here because: stock on the shelf does not match stock in your records (Q1 = Yes).
4.1 What Hector gives you
An inventory count (physical count) is a structured, auditable reconciliation: Hector generates the expected list, your team walks the floor scanning what they find, and Hector reports the variance and lets you adjust.
A cycle count is the same mechanism on a recurrence — a count that regenerates every N days so you continuously verify a slice of inventory instead of shutting down once a year for a full count.
4.2 Configure counts
Settings → Counts. The settings that change how a count behaves:
| Setting | What it does | Trial recommendation |
|---|---|---|
| Blind count | Hides expected quantities from the counter | On — a counter who can see the expected number tends to confirm it rather than count |
| Require approval / Approvers | Gates the count behind an approval before adjustments post | On if your finance team needs it; off for a first test |
| Skip adjust phase | Applies results without a separate adjustment review | Off — see the variance before you commit to it |
| Electronic signatures (end of count / end of adjust) | Captures a signature with a custom message | On if you need audit evidence |
| Include loaners | Includes assets currently on loan | On if borrowed items should be reconciled |
| Include new assets | Picks up assets created after the count started | On |
| Include out-of-stockroom | Includes assets that should not be in this location | On — this is how you find misplaced stock |
| Include components | Counts kit components individually | On if you use kits |
| Default actions for missing / partially-found / surplus assets | What happens automatically to each irregularity class | Set deliberately; the defaults drive how much manual work follows |
| Allow manual count | Permits typing a quantity instead of scanning | On for lots, off for by-unit categories if you want scan discipline |
4.3 Run the count
Counts → Physical Counts → New.
- Scope the count — by stockroom, racking, category, or sub-category.
- Add a frequency if you want this to be a recurring cycle count.
- Assign it, then count it on the mobile app (§13.3). Counting from a desktop while walking a warehouse defeats the purpose.
- Review the count summary: completion rate, found vs. missing assets and their value, surplus quantities, unrecognized assets, out-of-location assets, on-loan assets, and inventory variance in both quantity and dollars.
- Adjust, sign, close.
4.4 What proves the point during the trial
Run one real count of one real shelf. Compare the variance against what you believed was there. The number of irregularities Hector surfaces on a single shelf is usually the most persuasive result of the entire trial.
4.5 Mobile contribution
Counting is a mobile-first activity in Hector. The mobile count experience includes a To find / Found tab split, filters by category, sub-category and shelf, camera or hardware-trigger scanning, kit-component validation, per-asset info edit during the count, a recently processed asset trail to catch double-scans, and a completion summary with irregularity breakdown.
5. Track B — Min/max replenishment
You are here because: you run out of consumables, or you over-order (Q2 = Yes).
5.1 How min/max works in Hector
You set a minimum and optionally a maximum quantity for a part (or a whole category) at a specific location. Hector then continuously compares that threshold against reality and tells you what to order.
What Hector computes for you, per line:
| Column | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Min qty | The floor you configured |
| Max qty | The ceiling you configured (optional) |
| In stock | Actual quantity on hand at that location right now |
| On order | Quantity already on open purchase-order lines (new, sent, partially received) |
| Requested | Quantity already claimed by open requisition orders and transfer orders |
| Missing | (Max or Min) + Requested − In stock − On order — the quantity you actually need to buy |
That Missing formula is the important one: Hector does not tell you to reorder something that is already on a purchase order, and it does account for demand that requisitions have already created against your stock.
The In stock cell is colour-coded by how deep below minimum you are — amber when you are at 25% or more of your minimum, orange below that, and red at zero.
5.2 Configure it
Min/max is set on the Min/Max Qtys tab, which appears in three places:
- Inventory → Parts → (a part) → Min/Max Qtys — thresholds for one part across locations
- Inventory → Categories → (a category) → Min/Max Qtys — thresholds for an entire category
- Inventory → Stockrooms → (a stockroom) → Min/Max Qtys — everything stocked at one location
A threshold targets one of four destinations: a stockroom, a city (all stockrooms in that city, aggregated), a place, or a user. The user target is how you stock a technician’s van or a field engineer’s kit.
Where to start: pick your ten fastest-moving consumables and set a minimum on each, at your main stockroom. Ten lines is enough to demonstrate the whole loop.
5.3 Close the loop — from shortage to purchase order
This is the part worth testing, because it is where min/max stops being a report and becomes an action:
- Open Inventory → Parts → Min/Max Qtys (the list view).
- Sort or filter to the lines below minimum.
- Select the lines you want, and click Create purchase order.
- Hector opens a new purchase order with one line per shortage, pre-filled with the missing quantity, and pre-selects the vendor that supplies most of the selected parts.
- Review, submit, send.
The same works from a stockroom’s Min/Max Qtys tab, scoped to that location.
Requires the Operations module. Onboarding frames the connection this way: “Requisitions create demand for assets, helping plan the replenishment of your inventory through minimum/maximum levels.”
5.4 Reporting
Two built-in reports exist specifically for this: parts below quantity and categories below quantity. Subscribe to one on a schedule so the shortage list arrives by email instead of waiting for someone to check.
5.5 Mobile contribution
The mobile home screen shows a “To replenish” tile with a count of parts that need replenishment, and tapping it lists them. A stockroom manager sees shortages on the phone as a notification tile, not as a report they have to remember to open — and can create the requisition or purchase order from the same device.
6. Track C — Purchasing and requisitions
You are here because: purchasing is informal, or requests are untracked (Q3 = Yes).
6.1 The two order types, and which you need
| Requisition order | Purchase order | |
|---|---|---|
| Who starts it | Any authorized internal user | Purchasing / stores |
| What it means | “I need this” — internal demand | “We are buying this” — external commitment to a vendor |
| Fulfilled from | Existing stock, or escalated to a purchase order | A vendor delivery |
| Turn on if | Your staff request equipment and someone approves it | You order from vendors and need to track what is coming |
Onboarding on requisitions: “Requests can be made in the application by users, reviewed, approved, and fulfilled by the appropriate teams, preventing unnecessary errors and mistakes. Limits can be set up to prevent overallocation.”
Onboarding on purchase orders: “They help track incoming orders, ensuring timely restocking and preventing over-purchasing or stockouts.”
Most organizations end up using both: requisitions capture demand, and unfulfillable demand rolls into a purchase order. Hector links them — a requisition order can be completed by a purchase order, and notifies the requester when it is.
6.2 Configure
- Settings → Modules → Operations — enable Requisition orders and/or Purchase orders.
- Settings → Operations → Purchase Order and → Requisition Order — approval requirements, approver groups, form templates, catalog behavior, notifications, per-user limits.
- Resources → Vendors — create the vendors you buy from, with contacts and addresses.
- Inventory → Parts — set Vendor and Vendor SKU on each part you buy. Without these, purchase-order lines cannot be pre-filled and vendor selection cannot be inferred.
6.3 The catalog
Both order types can be built from a catalog — a browsable, filterable, scannable list of parts your users are allowed to request. Configure which fields display, and whether users select from the catalog or scan. A well-configured catalog is the difference between “users file correct requisitions” and “users email you instead.”
Software can also be made orderable from the purchase-order and requisition catalogs, if you run the Software module.
6.4 Receiving
Receiving a purchase order is where inventory actually gets created. On receipt you can:
- Receive partially, and receive the rest later (the line status tracks partially received).
- Enter serial numbers and asset tags paired per line, so received units become properly tagged assets immediately.
- Assign a part to a line that did not have one linked.
- Put received stock directly into a stockroom and racking.
6.5 Mobile contribution
The mobile app covers the full purchasing loop: create a purchase order, browse or scan the purchase-order catalog, search existing orders, and receive a purchase order at the receiving dock — scanning items as they come off the truck rather than transcribing a packing slip later.
Requisitions are equally complete on mobile: create a requisition, browse or scan the requisition catalog, view in-progress requisitions with a pick/preparation flow, and edit or detail an existing one. The mobile home screen also surfaces “Requisition orders due today” and “Purchase orders expected” as notification tiles.
7. Track D — Who has what
You are here because: you cannot answer “who has this right now?” (Q4 = Yes).
7.1 Asset states — Hector’s answer to “where is it?”
Every asset is always in exactly one state. This is what makes the question answerable:
| State | Meaning |
|---|---|
| In stockroom | On the shelf, available |
| With user | Assigned to a person |
| With place | Assigned to a location (room, project, site, vehicle) |
| With user + place | Assigned to a person at a location |
| In transit | Moving between locations |
| With contact / With customer / With vendor | Out with an external party (including out for repair) |
| On work order | Committed to maintenance or service work |
| On transfer order | Committed to a transfer between locations |
| End of life / Lost / Consumed | No longer in service |
7.2 Set up assignment
Onboarding: “Tracking the movements of assets in your organization is important as it ensures that assets are always accounted for and can be quickly located, minimizing the time spent searching for items and reducing the risk of loss or misplacement.”
- Populate Resources. Assets can only be assigned to records that exist — create your Users, Places, Spaces, Customers, Vendors and Contacts first. (Users can be synchronized from your directory — see Track H.)
- Decide which destinations are allowed, per role. A technician might be allowed to move assets to users and places but not to customers.
- Move one asset each way and look at the result: the asset’s History tab records who moved it, from where, to where, and when.
- Set up assignment notifications so the person receiving an asset gets an email confirming what they now hold. Hector has dedicated templates for single assignment and batch assignment.
7.3 Signatures and accountability
If accountability is the real problem — people denying they have equipment — capture a signature at assignment. Onboarding: “Assigning assets to individuals creates a clear record of responsibility, encouraging proper care and timely returns.”
7.4 Reporting
The Whereabouts report answers “who has what” across your whole inventory in one page. The Assignment duration report shows how long assets stay out — which is how you find the laptop that has been “temporarily” assigned for three years.
Complementary asset-list tabs give you the same view interactively: In transit, Return, Broken, Life span, Warranty, Duplicates, Associations, History.
7.5 Mobile contribution
Two mobile features matter most here:
- Self-assignment — a user scans one or many assets and assigns them to themselves in a single operation. No form, no admin, no delay. This is the feature that makes “who has what” data accurate, because the person taking the item records it at the moment they take it.
- My content — every user sees My assets and My reservations on their own phone, so “what do I have?” is self-service and never becomes a support ticket.
The mobile app also surfaces “asset in transit”, “delivery today”, and “asset should be returned in 30 days” tiles, and lets any user scan an asset to see instantly who holds it.
8. Track E — Automating inventory transactions
You are here because: people avoid updating records because it is too slow (Q5 = Yes).
This is the track that decides whether your inventory stays accurate after the trial ends. Accurate data is a friction problem, not a discipline problem. Reduce the friction.
8.1 Iris — actions encoded in a scannable code
Settings → Iris.
Iris is Hector’s transaction-automation mechanism. You define an Iris item that pairs an action with a target and optionally a record, and Hector produces a scannable label. When a user scans that label in the mobile app, the action executes — no form, no navigation, no training.
Available Iris actions:
| Action | Effect |
|---|---|
| Move to stockroom | Scanned assets are put away into that stockroom |
| Move to user | Scanned assets are assigned to that user |
| Move to place | Scanned assets are assigned to that place |
| Move to customer / vendor / contact | Scanned assets go out to that external party |
| Consume | Scanned quantity is consumed out of inventory |
| Use | Records usage of the asset (no authentication required — usable by anyone) |
| New asset from part | Creates a new asset of that part |
Concrete example. Print a Move to stockroom → Aisle 3 Shelf B Iris label and stick it on the shelf. Putting stock away becomes: scan the shelf label, scan the items, done. Print a Consume label on a glove dispenser: taking gloves decrements inventory correctly with a single scan, which is the only way consumable tracking survives contact with a real shop floor.
Iris items carry instructions and notes that display to the user, can be state-managed (open/closed), and accept parameters — a date range, a quantity, or a delete type — where the action needs one.
8.2 GS1 barcode parsing
If your inventory arrives with GS1 barcodes (common in healthcare, food, retail and regulated supply chains), enable the GS1 integration. Hector parses the scanned code and fills the asset form from it — GTIN, lot number, expiry date and the other application identifiers your labels carry — instead of requiring manual entry. ISBN parsing is available the same way for libraries and book inventories.
8.3 Batch operations
- Batch upload (Tools → Batch Upload) and bulk actions on lists let you move, assign, tag or retire hundreds of assets in one action.
- Batch merge and batch delete on the parts list clean up duplicate or obsolete catalogs.
- Multi-select on any asset list exposes batch move, batch status change, and batch label printing.
8.4 Automations and notifications
Settings → Automation.
Automations fire on a trigger and perform an action. A trigger is a date field or a field change, with an optional delay (N days before or after the date), and can be filtered to specific users, groups, roles or departments. The action sends an email from a template, optionally repeating on a delay until resolved.
Use these for the reminders you currently send by hand: return dates approaching, warranty expiring, maintenance due, a place’s end date, a license renewal.
Settings → Notifications holds the standard event notifications — approvals, assignments, overdue loans, count approvals, order state changes, delivery dates, limits exceeded, condition changes.
8.5 API
Everything in Hector is reachable through its REST API. If you have an internal tool that already knows something Hector should know, the API is the shortest path — and it is the same API the mobile app uses, so anything the app can do, your integration can do.
8.6 Mobile contribution
Mobile is the automation surface. Every fast path in Hector — Iris, self-assignment, count scanning, catalog scanning, receiving, multi-scan asset moves — is designed for a phone or a rugged handheld held in one hand while the other hand holds the item. See §13.
9. Track F — Maintenance
You are here because: you need to schedule or prove maintenance, inspection, or calibration (Q6 = Yes).
9.1 How maintenance works today
Onboarding: “Regular maintenance on your assets helps prevent wear and tear, ensuring that they remain functional for longer periods… Well-maintained assets are less likely to break down unexpectedly.”
The mechanism has three parts:
- Maintenance frequency lives on the Part. Set maintenance frequency (and optionally average duration and average cost) on the part. Every asset created from that part inherits it.
- The next-due date lives on the Asset. Each asset carries a next maintenance date. It is audited — changes to it are recorded in the asset trail.
- History lives in the maintenance log. Each maintenance performed records who did it (a user, vendor, or contact), the date, the type (preventive / corrective), the task (clean, inspect, repair, replace, test, measure, calibration), the resulting asset condition, the cost, notes, and attached documents.
Scope note. Today an asset carries one next-maintenance date, with the frequency defined on its part. Multiple independent maintenance plans per asset are a designed-but-unreleased capability — do not plan your trial around it. If you need several distinct recurring maintenances on the same asset today, model them as recurring work orders.
9.2 Configure
- Set maintenance frequency on the parts that need it. Not on the assets — on the parts.
- Set the initial next-maintenance date on your existing assets (importable).
- Configure the three reminder tiers. Hector supports three independent maintenance reminders on the same due date, each with its own threshold in days, its own recipients (owner, stockroom staff, assigned user, or explicit users), and its own attribute filter. A typical setup: 30 days out to the planner, 7 days out to the technician, on the day to the manager.
- Decide loaner behavior. A part can be configured to allow or block loans while an asset is in or due for maintenance — important if you lend equipment that must be certified.
9.3 Work orders for real maintenance work
For anything more structured than “it was serviced”, use work orders (Operations module).
Onboarding: “Work orders clearly outline the scope of work, including tasks, responsibilities, deadlines, and required resources… They can be assigned to individuals, to help prioritize work and avoid confusion.”
A work order mixes four kinds of lines in one record — assets (the equipment being serviced), places (a location being worked on), tasks (free-text instructions), and hours (labour, optionally attributed to a person). It carries an approval step, an owner, scheduling dates, cost and billable flags, and it reserves the assets it covers so they cannot be double-booked against another work order, a transfer order, or a loan.
Completing a work order can consume stock, update the asset’s condition, and advance the asset’s next-maintenance date — which is how the maintenance schedule stays current without anyone editing dates by hand.
For the full lifecycle, states, permissions and form-template configuration, see the Work Order module user guide.
9.4 Reporting
The asset maintenance report lists what is due and what was done. The asset condition report shows the health of your fleet. The obsolescence and life span reports tell you what to replace instead of repair.
9.5 Mobile contribution
- The mobile home screen shows a “Maintenance needed” tile — assets requiring maintenance in the next 30 days — with a drill-down list.
- Work orders are fully mobile: create, assign, scan the assets covered by the order, view details, edit, and run the finish flow with per-line completion.
- Tiles surface “work orders requiring approval”, “work orders whose start date has passed” and “work orders whose finish date has passed”, so overdue work is visible without opening a report.
- A user who finds broken equipment can report a problem from the phone, which raises the maintenance record at the moment of discovery.
10. Track G — Loans and reservations
You are here because: you lend equipment or book rooms, with due dates and returns (Q7 = Yes).
10.1 What the Loaner module does
Onboarding: “Tracking who has borrowed equipment and for how long is essential to efficient asset management… This allows you to monitor how often equipment is borrowed and whether it is being used efficiently. This can highlight underutilized or overburdened assets and plan adequately for replacements and reduces downtime.”
The module covers reservations, checkout, return, overdue tracking, approval workflows, penalties, and an optional self-service portal where users reserve for themselves.
10.2 Configure
Settings → Modules → Loaner, then Settings → Loaner:
| Area | What to set |
|---|---|
| Loaner access | Who can borrow: users, contacts, customers, vendors |
| Item catalog | What is loanable, which fields display, how it is filtered and scanned |
| Catalog types | Loan assets, bundles (pre-assembled sets), or places (room booking) |
| Statuses | Rename and colour the lifecycle statuses to match your process |
| Approval | Whether reservations need approval, and by whom |
| Restrictions | Minimum and maximum loan duration per part; who may borrow what |
| Signatures | Signature capture at checkout and/or return, with a custom message |
| Penalties | Points system for late returns: starting points, penalty per occurrence, blocking threshold, reset frequency, reminder emails, who can unblock |
| Quick actions | Which one-tap actions appear: search, out, return |
| Kits | Whether kit components can be lent independently of the parent |
| Shipment | Whether loans can be shipped to a destination, and which destination entities are allowed |
| Availability calendar | Show a calendar of what is free when |
Then mark the parts and assets that are loanable, and set their default loan durations.
10.3 The self-service portal
The Loaner module includes an online portal where users browse the catalog and reserve equipment or rooms themselves. If your current process is “email the equipment manager”, this is the single change that removes the most work — and it is worth demonstrating in the trial even if you do not plan to enable it on day one.
10.4 What to test during the trial
Run one full cycle with a real borrower: reserve → approve → check out (with signature) → overdue reminder → return → inspect. Then look at the loan history and the loaner usage report. One complete cycle tells you more than reading every setting.
10.5 Mobile contribution
The Loaner module is the most mobile-complete area of Hector:
- Staff flows: new loan, assign on checkout, return to stockroom, exchange a broken asset, edit a reservation, capture a signature on the device, add assets or places to a loan by scanning.
- Borrower flows: loan request, My reservations, loan history, report a problem on a borrowed item.
- Notification tiles on the home screen: new loans, loans not assigned, loans requiring approval, loans ending today, loans ending tomorrow, and overdue loans — each with a drill-down list.
That notification set is the operational value: an equipment manager opens the app in the morning and sees exactly which loans need action today, without running a single report.
11. Track H — Integrations and a consolidated view
You are here because: inventory data already lives in other systems (Q8 = Yes).
11.1 Why this matters more than it sounds
Onboarding: “Integration between applications allows different tools to communicate and share information seamlessly, reducing manual data entry, minimizing errors, and saving time. Integrations also enable organizations to leverage the full potential of their software ecosystem by connecting specialized applications, improving productivity, and providing a unified view of operations.”
The practical version: your MDM knows every laptop’s serial, OS and last check-in. Your directory knows every employee. Your ITSM knows every ticket. None of them know where the laptop physically is, who signed for it, what it cost, or when its warranty ends. Hector is where those facts meet — but only if the device data flows in automatically instead of being typed twice.
11.2 What is available
Settings → Integration.
| Type | Systems |
|---|---|
| Device / endpoint management | Microsoft Intune, Jamf Pro, Jamf School, Google Chrome (ChromeOS) devices, Microsoft MECM, Meraki, Lansweeper, Fortinet (via FortiManager), Smart TV |
| ITSM / service desk | ServiceNow, TOPdesk, GLPI, Ivanti, C2 ITSM, Zendesk |
| Identity / user sync | Microsoft Entra (Azure), Google Workspace, Active Directory, OneLogin, SAML, SCIM |
| Calendar | Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook |
| Accounting / commerce | Zoho Books |
| Discovery agents | Odysseus (network scan), Pheidix (endpoint agent) |
| Barcode / data enrichment | GS1, ISBN |
| Access control / facilities | Salto, Affluences |
| Other | Yapla, Topaz, Visor, Helvetius, and regional systems |
11.3 Set one up during the trial
Pick the one system that holds the most inventory data you would otherwise type by hand — for most organizations that is the MDM (Intune, Jamf, or Google) or the directory (Entra, Google Workspace).
- Settings → Integration → New, choose the system, and supply credentials.
- Map the fields. Decide which source fields populate which Hector fields and attributes. Take this seriously — field mapping is where an integration becomes useful or becomes noise.
- Decide the asset-tag policy. You can always use the source system’s tag, or use Hector’s own generation rules for new devices while preserving existing tags. Choose deliberately; this controls whether synced devices match the labels on your shelves.
- Configure location automation if the source can tell you where a device is. A stockroom can be mapped from an IP range, a Google OU, or a Jamf location, so synced devices land in the right stockroom automatically instead of a catch-all.
- Run it, then check the sync log and the integration inconsistencies report. The inconsistencies report is the one to watch: it shows where Hector and the source system disagree, which is where duplicates and orphans come from.
11.4 The duplicate-device warning
The most common integration failure is duplicate assets — the same physical device arriving twice because the matching key (usually serial number) differs between systems, or a device is recreated after being retired. Before you import 5,000 devices:
- Verify that the field you match on is genuinely unique and consistently formatted in the source.
- Run the sync on a small subset first if the integration supports scoping.
- Check the Duplicates tab on the asset list after the first sync, and the integration inconsistencies report.
Catching this on 50 devices is a five-minute fix. Catching it on 5,000 is a project.
11.5 Software licenses
If software compliance is part of your consolidated view, enable the Software module. Onboarding: “Proper tracking helps ensure compliance with software licensing agreements, reducing the risk of legal fines or lawsuits for unauthorized use. Using our software module, organizations can quickly provide proof of compliance during software audits.”
Device-management integrations can populate installed software and usage automatically, which turns license reconciliation from a spreadsheet exercise into a report.
11.6 Mobile contribution
Integrations are configured on the web, but their value shows up on mobile: a technician scans a device in the field and sees the complete record — the MDM’s serial, OS and check-in, plus Hector’s location, assignee, purchase price, warranty and maintenance history — in one screen. That combined view is not available in any of the source systems individually.
12. Track I — Availability: in stock vs. not
You are here because: people need to know whether something is available before they walk over (Q9 = Yes).
12.1 What “available” means in Hector
Availability is not a single flag — it is derived. An asset is available when it is in stockroom and not committed to anything. It is unavailable when it is with a user, with a place, in transit, out with an external party, reserved by a loan, committed to an open transfer order, or reserved by a work order.
Hector enforces this: the same asset cannot be committed twice for overlapping periods. A work order will not reserve an asset already on a transfer order or a loan, and the loaner conflict check accounts for maintenance windows.
12.2 What to configure
| Need | Configure |
|---|---|
| “Is this specific item free right now?” | Nothing — the asset’s state answers it. Scan it and look. |
| “Is this item free next Tuesday?” | Loaner availability calendar — turn it on in Settings → Loaner |
| “How many of these do we have at this site?” | Min/max thresholds (Track B) give the in-stock quantity per location, colour-coded against your minimum |
| “What is available to borrow?” | Loaner catalog — configure which fields and which availability information display |
| “What’s arriving, and when?” | Purchase order expected dates and transfer order estimated delivery dates |
| “What should be coming back?” | The asset list Return tab, plus return-date notifications |
12.3 Transfer orders — stock in motion
If you have more than one location, availability breaks without transfer orders. Onboarding: “Keeping track of inventory transfers between locations ensures that inventory levels are accurately updated across all locations, preventing discrepancies… It can also help optimize inventory distribution by identifying when certain locations have surplus stock and others are low.”
Enable Operations → Transfer orders, and use the In transit asset state so stock in a van is neither counted as available at the origin nor missing at the destination.
12.4 Mobile contribution
- Scan any asset to see its current state, location and holder instantly. This is the fastest availability check that exists — and it works for anyone with the app.
- The loaner catalog on mobile shows availability while you are standing in the stockroom.
- Transfer orders are fully mobile: create (classic or advanced multi-destination mode), run the preparation (picking) flow, deliver, change owner, and create return orders. Home-screen tiles show assets in transit, deliveries today, transfer orders requiring approval and expired transfer orders.
- The “To replenish” tile puts the availability question in front of the stockroom manager before anyone has to ask it.
13. The mobile app — do not treat this as optional
If the people who touch your inventory are not at a desk, the mobile app is not a companion to Hector. It is where Hector is used, and the web application is where it is configured.
13.1 Install and connect
- Install Hector from the App Store or Google Play.
- Enter your instance name (your Hector subdomain), then your email and password. Users with SSO sign in with Microsoft Entra/Azure, Google, or your SAML provider instead.
- Accept biometric authentication when offered — Face ID, Touch ID, or fingerprint. Warehouse staff who have to type a password every time will stop using the app; this matters more than it sounds.
- On the home screen, tap the notification-tile settings to choose which tiles appear for that user, and use Edit shortcuts to arrange the actions they use most.
13.2 Configure the scanner — the most-skipped setup step
Settings → Scan mode in the mobile app.
| Mode | Use when | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Camera | Phones and tablets, low-to-medium volume | Works on any device. Default. |
| Zebra | Zebra rugged handhelds | Uses the device’s hardware trigger. Requires DataWedge configuration — the app links to the Zebra device configuration KB article directly from this screen. |
| Chainway | Chainway and Axem Technology handhelds | Two sub-modes: Barcode 2D (imager) or UHF (RFID). UHF adds a configurable read power level and single vs. continuous scan mode. |
Hardware trigger keys are supported, so the physical scan button on a rugged device works throughout the app.
If you are counting more than a few hundred items, get a hardware scanner. The difference between camera scanning and a hardware imager over a 2,000-item count is hours. If you are evaluating RFID, the Chainway UHF path reads many tags per trigger pull — set the read power deliberately, because too much power reads the shelf behind the one you are counting.
Recommendation for the trial: start with camera mode to prove the workflows, and request a hardware device only once you have confirmed the workflow is right.
13.3 What the mobile app can do
| Area | Mobile capability |
|---|---|
| Search & scan | Global search; single scan; multi-scan; scan-to-list; asset details on scan; handling for unrecognized codes |
| Assets | Create asset, create category, create part, create place; edit; view details, history and attributes; add or split lot quantities; choose a lot; consume one or many; move to any allowed destination; edit an in-transit asset; list assets by part |
| Self-assignment | Scan one or many assets and assign them to yourself in one action |
| Counts | Physical counts and cycle counts: filter by category, sub-category and shelf; To find / Found tabs; blind counting; kit-component validation; edit asset info mid-count; recently-processed trail; completion summary with irregularities, variance quantity and variance value |
| Loaners | New loan, loan request, assign on checkout, return to stockroom, exchange a broken asset, add assets or places to a loan, edit reservations, My reservations, signature capture, report a problem |
| Purchase orders | Create; browse or scan the catalog; search; receive |
| Requisition orders | Create; browse or scan the catalog; in-progress picking; edit; view details |
| Transfer orders | Create (classic and advanced multi-destination); check inventory; preparation/picking; deliver; change owner; create return orders; filter and search |
| Work orders | Create; assign; scan the covered assets; view and edit; finish with per-line completion |
| Iris | Scan an Iris code to execute a configured action — move, consume, use, create — with batch scanning |
| Min/max | “To replenish” list of parts below minimum |
| Notification tiles | New loans, unassigned loans, loans requiring approval, loans ending today/tomorrow, overdue loans, maintenance needed in 30 days, returns needed in 30 days, parts to replenish, assets in transit, deliveries today, purchase orders expected, requisitions due today, transfer orders requiring approval, expired transfer orders, work orders requiring approval, work orders past start date, work orders past finish date |
| My content | My assets, my reservations and loans |
| Personalization | Language (English/French), date format, notification tile selection, shortcut editing, scan mode, biometric login |
13.4 What to check before you decide
- Permissions drive the home screen. A user only sees the modules and actions their role allows. If a tester says “I can’t find purchase orders”, check their role before you check the app.
- The app needs connectivity. Verify Wi-Fi coverage in the parts of your warehouse where you intend to count and pick. This is the most common operational surprise, and it is a facilities problem, not a software problem — find it during the trial, not after.
- Test with the actual people and the actual devices. An administrator testing on their own iPhone in an office proves nothing about a technician wearing gloves in a cold storage room.
14. A 14-day schedule
| Days | Do this |
|---|---|
| 1 | Complete the onboarding wizard. Choose modules and vocabulary (§3.2). Add your logo. Optionally generate the sample inventory to explore. Answer the §2 discovery questions and write down your two priority tracks. |
| 2 | Create stockrooms and rackings (§3.3). Create your categories, deciding by-unit vs. as-a-lot for each (§3.4). Create 10–20 parts (§3.5). Add your 3–5 attributes (§3.6). |
| 3 | Import a representative slice of real data — 200–500 assets (§3.8). Fix what the import reveals about your categories and attributes. This day always finds something. |
| 4 | Asset tags and labels: set the prefix, enable auto-generation, design a label, print and scan a test sheet (§3.9). Install the mobile app on the real devices and configure scan mode (§13.1–13.2). |
| 5 | Invite your three real personas, assign default roles (§3.7). Review notifications and turn off the noise (§3.10). |
| 6–9 | Build and test your first priority track end to end. Use real data, real people, real devices. |
| 10–12 | Build and test your second priority track. If Q8 = Yes, this is when to connect one integration (§11.3) — it needs a few days of sync history to be meaningful. |
| 13 | Run the validation checklist (§15). Pull the reports your management will ask for. Collect your testers’ complaints — they are your real configuration backlog. |
| 14 | Decision day. Book a call with the Hector team for the questions the trial raised, and discuss what a full rollout would look like for your data volume. |
If you only have one afternoon: do §3.2, §3.3, §3.4, create five parts and ten assets, print labels, install the mobile app, and scan an asset. That minimal path demonstrates the core loop.
15. Validation checklist — is your trial actually a success?
Work through this before day 14. Each item is a thing you can do, not a thing you can read about.
Foundation
- ☐ Every category has a deliberate by-unit / as-a-lot / kit decision, and you can explain why.
- ☐ Searching for a real item by maker, model, asset tag or attribute finds it.
- ☐ Scanning a printed label opens the right asset on the mobile app.
- ☐ Three real users with three different roles have logged in and each sees an appropriate view.
- ☐ An asset’s History tab shows a complete, correct record of the moves you performed.
Your priority tracks
- ☐ Track A: You ran a real count of a real location and the variance report matched what you physically found.
- ☐ Track B: A part fell below minimum, appeared in To replenish on mobile, and you created a pre-filled purchase order from the Min/Max Qtys list.
- ☐ Track C: A requisition was submitted by a non-admin, approved, and fulfilled; a purchase order was received with serial numbers captured.
- ☐ Track D: You answered “who has this?” for a real asset in under ten seconds, from a phone.
- ☐ Track E: A non-technical user completed a transaction by scanning, with no training.
- ☐ Track F: A maintenance reminder arrived on schedule, and completing a work order advanced the asset’s next-maintenance date.
- ☐ Track G: One full loan cycle completed — reserve, approve, check out with signature, overdue reminder, return.
- ☐ Track H: An integration synced, and the inconsistencies report is clean (or you understand every line on it).
- ☐ Track I: A user determined availability without asking anyone.
Organizational
- ☐ You know which of your current spreadsheets or email threads Hector replaces.
- ☐ Your testers’ objections are written down and you know which are configuration and which are genuine gaps.
- ☐ You have a rough number for full data volume and rollout scope.
16. Common mistakes during a trial
| Mistake | Why it hurts | Do this instead |
|---|---|---|
| Turning on every module on day 1 | Six modules of menus, permissions and settings is overwhelming, and you end up evaluating navigation instead of value | Enable only the modules your priority tracks need |
| Importing all 40,000 rows immediately | Data-quality problems become 40,000 problems, and the trial becomes a data-cleanup project | Import 200–500 representative rows, fix the configuration, then scale |
| Getting the by-unit / as-a-lot decision wrong | Changing a category’s method later is disruptive and triggers a dedicated notification | Decide per category before importing, using the test in §3.4 |
| Skipping label printing | Every fast workflow in Hector starts with a scan; without labels you are evaluating a slow version of the product | Print and scan a test sheet on day 4 |
| Evaluating only on the web app | The people who will actually use Hector daily are not at a desk | Put the app on the real devices, in the real environment, with the real users |
| Only the administrator testing | Administrators have all permissions and infinite patience. Neither is true of your team | Invite three real personas on day 5 |
| Leaving default notifications on for everyone | A trial that emails a team unwanted alerts ends early | Review Settings → Notifications on day 5 |
| Configuring perfect permissions before anyone uses the system | You will design for a workflow you have not observed yet | Start with default roles; refine after observation |
| Not renaming the vocabulary | Your team learns Hector’s words, then has to relearn yours | Rename in Settings on day 1, before any training |
| Syncing thousands of devices from an MDM before checking the match key | Duplicate assets at scale, which is a cleanup project | Sync a small subset, check the Duplicates tab and the inconsistencies report |
17. Glossary
| Term | Meaning | Renameable |
|---|---|---|
| Asset | An individual physical thing you track, assign, lend, maintain, or move | — |
| Part / Item | The make-model-description definition an asset is created from; carries defaults inherited by its assets | Yes |
| Category | The grouping that decides whether assets are managed by unit, as a lot, or as a kit | — |
| Stockroom | A physical storage location | Yes |
| Racking | A subdivision inside a stockroom — shelf, aisle, bin, zone | Yes |
| Place | A flexible location or context an asset can be assigned to: room, building, project, event, worksite, vehicle, client, patient. Supports start and end dates, a second hierarchy level, and can itself be reserved | Yes |
| Space | A subdivision of a place | Yes |
| Bundle | A pre-assembled set of assets that can be reserved or moved as one | — |
| Kit | A parent asset with tracked component assets | — |
| Lot size | The quantity carried by a single asset record in a lot-managed category | — |
| Attribute | A custom field. Types include text, number, decimal, date, timelapse, checkbox, list, and pickers for other Hector records | — |
| Min/max | A minimum and optional maximum quantity for a part or category at a specific stockroom, city, place, or user | — |
| Physical count | A structured, auditable reconciliation of expected vs. actual inventory | — |
| Cycle count | A physical count on a recurrence, so a slice of inventory is verified continuously | — |
| Requisition order | An internal request for inventory, subject to approval | Yes |
| Purchase order | An external order to a vendor, with receiving | Yes |
| Transfer order | A movement of inventory between locations, with preparation and delivery | Yes |
| Work order | A numbered record of maintenance or service work, mixing asset, place, task and hours lines | Yes |
| Loaner | A reservation and loan of an asset, bundle, or place, with due dates and returns | Yes |
| Iris | A scannable code that executes a pre-configured action — move, consume, use, create — when scanned in the mobile app | — |
| Automation | A trigger (date or field change, with optional delay) paired with an email action | — |
| Asset state | Where an asset stands: in stockroom, with user, with place, in transit, with contact/customer/vendor, on work order, on transfer order, end of life, lost, consumed | — |
18. Frequently asked questions
Do I have to decide everything now? No. Modules, vocabulary, attributes, notifications, roles and thresholds are all changeable later. The two decisions worth care up front are the by-unit vs. as-a-lot choice per category, and your asset-tag scheme — both are disruptive to change after you have imported data and printed labels.
What is the difference between a Category, a Part, and an Asset? A Category is a kind of thing (Computers). A Part is a specific make and model (Dell Latitude 5540). An Asset is one physical unit (the Latitude with asset tag AB-00417). Categories decide tracking behavior, Parts hold shared defaults, Assets are what you actually handle.
Can I try Hector without entering my own data? Yes. The onboarding wizard can generate a fictitious inventory so you can explore a populated system immediately. You can wipe it and import your real data afterwards.
How do I track consumables like gloves or cable? Create a category managed as a lot, create parts for each item, and set min/max thresholds per stockroom (§5). Then make consumption a single scan using an Iris consume label (§8.1) so the count stays accurate without paperwork.
How do I know who has a piece of equipment? Scan it, or look at its state and its History tab. Across your whole inventory, use the Whereabouts report. To keep that data accurate day to day, use mobile self-assignment so the person taking the item records it themselves (§7).
Can Hector tell me what to reorder? Yes. Set minimum quantities per part per location, and Hector computes the missing quantity while accounting for what is already on order and what open requisitions and transfers have already claimed (§5.1). From the Min/Max Qtys list, select the shortages and click Create purchase order to get a pre-filled order.
Does the mobile app work offline? The app is designed to work online. Verify Wi-Fi or cellular coverage in the areas where you intend to count and pick before you plan a large count — this is the most common operational surprise during a trial.
Do I need a barcode scanner, or is a phone enough? A phone camera is enough to prove every workflow, and is fine for routine day-to-day scanning. For high-volume counting, a hardware imager (Zebra, Chainway, Axem) saves hours over a large count. Start with a phone; buy hardware once the workflow is proven.
Can I use RFID? Yes, on supported Chainway and Axem devices via UHF mode in the mobile app’s scan settings, with configurable read power and single or continuous scanning.
Can I import from a spreadsheet? Yes. Excel templates are provided for assets, attributes, categories, customers, loaners, part components, places, purchase orders, software, transfer orders, users, and vendors. Import in dependency order (§3.8), and revert the import if the result is wrong.
Will Hector pull data from our MDM or directory automatically? Yes, for a long list of systems including Intune, Jamf Pro, Jamf School, Google ChromeOS, MECM, Meraki, Lansweeper, ServiceNow, TOPdesk, GLPI, Ivanti, Entra/Azure, Google Workspace, Active Directory, OneLogin, SAML and SCIM (§11.2). Check the match key on a small subset before syncing at scale.
Can we rename things to match our own vocabulary? Yes. Stockroom, Part, Place, Space and Racking all carry configurable labels, and the mobile app uses the same labels. Rename before training anyone.
Can one asset be on a work order and a loan at the same time? No, and this is deliberate. Hector prevents double-booking: an asset committed to an active work order, transfer order, or loan cannot be committed elsewhere for an overlapping period.
How do I schedule recurring maintenance? Set a maintenance frequency on the part; assets created from it inherit a next-maintenance date. Configure up to three reminder tiers with different lead times and recipients. Completing a work order can advance the next-maintenance date automatically (§9). For several distinct recurring maintenances on one asset today, model them as recurring work orders.
What should I test if I only have one afternoon? Choose modules and vocabulary, create one stockroom, two categories (one by-unit, one as-a-lot), five parts and ten assets, print labels, install the mobile app, and scan an asset. That covers the loop everything else builds on.
19. Other ways people ask these questions
Organizations describe the same problem in very different words. If any phrasing below sounds like something you or a colleague has actually said, the section beside it is where to start.
| If you’d put it this way… | Start at |
|---|---|
| “We keep running out of gloves / cable / supplies.” | §5 — Min/max replenishment |
| “We buy things we already own.” | §5 — Min/max replenishment, §12 — Availability |
| “Nobody knows what we actually have in stock.” | §4 — Stock accuracy and counts |
| “Our count never matches the system.” | §4 — Stock accuracy and counts |
| “Who has this laptop?” / “Where did that drill go?” | §7 — Who has what |
| “People take equipment and never bring it back.” | §7 — Who has what, §10 — Loans and reservations |
| “We can’t find our own equipment.” | §3.3 — Stockrooms and rackings, §7 — Who has what |
| “I need a report of who has what.” | §7.4 — Reporting |
| “Nobody updates the spreadsheet.” | §8 — Automating inventory transactions |
| “Is this tracked by unit or as a lot?” / “Serialized vs. bulk?” | §3.4 — Categories |
| “How do we track consumables?” | §3.4 — Categories, §8.1 — Iris |
| “How do I get started?” / “What do I set up first?” | §3 — Foundation setup, §14 — 14-day schedule |
| “Can I import from Excel?” | §3.8 — Data import |
| “Do I need a barcode scanner, or is my phone enough?” | §13.2 — Configure the scanner |
| “Can we use RFID?” | §13.2 — Configure the scanner |
| “Does the app work offline?” | §13.4 — What to check, §18 — FAQ |
| “We need to schedule preventive maintenance.” | §9 — Maintenance |
| “We have to prove an inspection or calibration happened.” | §9 — Maintenance |
| “We lend equipment out and need it back on time.” | §10 — Loans and reservations |
| “People need to book rooms.” | §10 — Loans and reservations |
| “Our data is already in Intune / Jamf / ServiceNow.” | §11 — Integrations |
| “We got duplicate assets after syncing.” | §11.4 — The duplicate-device warning |
| “We need to prove software license compliance.” | §11.5 — Software licenses |
| “Purchasing is just emails and spreadsheets.” | §6 — Purchasing and requisitions |
| “We need approvals before people order things.” | §6 — Purchasing and requisitions |
| “Stock moves between our sites and we lose track of it.” | §12.3 — Transfer orders |
| “Can people check availability without asking us?” | §12 — Availability |