Set up your organisation before you start selling

Create another workspace

Go to /organisations and choose Create new organisation. The form creates a fresh workspace and automatically makes you an admin in that organisation.

Switch between organisations

The organisations page lists the workspaces you belong to. Your original sign-up workspace is highlighted as the Founding workspace, and each card opens that organisation's dashboard.

Add one customer manually

Open Customers and use Add customer to create a new record. You can capture the core details straight away, including customer name, business name, email, telephone, mobile, address, postcode, county, country, and website. Either a customer name or business name is required, and BeagleCRM assigns the current user as account manager unless you choose someone else.

Import customers in bulk

Use Download template to get the current spreadsheet, complete it, then open Import customers and upload the file. Imports use Excel .xlsx files up to 5MB, with a maximum of 250 customers per file — split larger lists into batches.

Details, identifiers, and custom fields

The customer form has tabs for Details, Identifiers, and, when configured, Custom Fields. Use Identifiers for VAT number, Companies House number, and DUNS number. Custom field values save with the customer, so required custom fields must be completed before the record can be saved.

Validation and duplicates

BeagleCRM checks email format, phone numbers, website URLs, county, Companies House number, VAT number, and DUNS number. Email addresses and business names must be unique within the organisation, so duplicate customers are caught before save or import.

Upload, preview, then import

After upload, BeagleCRM validates the rows before anything is created. The preview shows row numbers, key customer details, how many rows are valid, and which rows need attention. Only rows marked Ready are included when you confirm the import.

Download failed rows for review

If any rows fail validation in the preview, use Export errors to download a spreadsheet of the problem rows and error messages. The file is delivered as customers-import-errors.xlsx so you can correct the source data and re-upload it.

Import progress and partial success

Once you confirm, the import runs with a live progress indicator. Valid rows can be imported even if other rows fail, so a bad record does not block the whole batch.

Custom field columns

The customer template includes the standard columns plus one column for each active customer custom field, labelled CF: Field Label. Re-download the template after adding or archiving customer custom fields so the spreadsheet stays in sync with your organisation.

Search, filter, and export

The customer list searches name, business, phone, and postcode. Filter by Active, All, onboarding status, and, for admins, Anonymised. Use Columns to show or hide table columns, sort the list, change page size, and export the current filtered view as CSV.

Active, anonymised, and deleted customers

Admins can mark customers inactive when a relationship pauses. Admins can also anonymise a customer for data-protection requests; anonymised records are hidden from normal lists but can be viewed through the admin-only Anonymised filter and restored by an admin if needed. Permanent deletion is admin-only and has its own confirmation screen.

Bulk actions

Select one or more customers from the list (checkbox column on the left, or the header checkbox for "select all on this page"). When at least one row is selected a sticky bar appears above the table with four actions:

• Assign owner — reassign the account owner across every selected customer. Manager or admin.
• Add to campaign — push every selected customer as a campaign member. Idempotent: re-running on the same set won't create duplicates.
• Archive — set every selected customer to inactive. Reversible from the customer's edit screen.
• Delete — permanent removal. Admin-only and requires a typed confirmation.

Batches up to 25 rows run in the foreground and the page refreshes when done. Larger batches queue a background job; a flash banner reports progress and a final summary with the success/failure split. Selection clears whenever you change a filter, sort, or paginate.

Heads up: permission gates apply per row. If a row fails authorization mid-batch the foreground path rolls the whole batch back; the background path skips that row and keeps going.

Marketing consent

Each customer record carries per-channel marketing consent: email, SMS, and post. Editing the customer surfaces a Marketing Consent panel with the three toggles, a Lawful basis dropdown (Consent, Soft opt-in, Legitimate interest, or Contract), and a free-text Consent source / provenance field. The provenance label is required whenever any channel is opted-in — if you leave it blank, the system auto-fills staff: <your name> @ <ISO timestamp> on save and writes that label into the per-event audit trail.

Every flip (opt-in or opt-out) writes an append-only row to the consent audit log with channel, action, lawful basis, IP, user-agent, actor, and the source label. Audit rows are never updated or deleted — the database role prevents it. This is what you'd show a regulator if asked to prove how consent was captured.

Double opt-in (optional). Turn on Settings → Marketing consent → Require confirmed opt-in for a stricter, provably-consented list. With it on, anyone newly marked as email opted-in is sent a one-off confirmation email and is held back from campaigns until they click the link; people who haven't confirmed are skipped. Off by default — soft opt-in is lawful under UK PECR for existing-customer relationships.

CSV import: the customer import template has five additional columns — Marketing Email Consent, Marketing SMS Consent, Marketing Post Consent, Marketing Consent Basis, Marketing Consent Source. The Source column is required for any row with a true opt-in or the row is rejected at preview time (no silent fallback). Filename + row number are recorded into the audit evidence.

Tags

Tags are a shared per-organisation pool of labels that flow across customers, contacts, and leads — one chip, one colour, one rename point. Use them for whatever the fixed columns don't capture: industry vertical, office region, campaign cohort, "needs onboarding call". From the bulk action bar pick Add tags or Remove tags to apply to many rows in one go.

Admin: tag CRUD lives at Settings → Tags. Pick from a 10-colour palette, add an optional category to group related tags, archive to hide without losing history, delete (admin-only) cascades through every tagged record.

Duplicate detection

Same customer entered three different ways (web form, CSV import, "couldn't find it in search so I re-created it") is the most common cause of stale activity and triple-sent marketing emails. BeagleCRM flags possible duplicates as you type and surfaces an admin scan list of pairs already sitting in the database.

Four match strategies run on every check: exact email (case-insensitive), name similarity (fuzzy trigram match on business or person name), phone number (compared on the last 10 digits, so +44, 020, and 02079460958 all collide), and postcode + name (a strong UK B2B signal for "same office of the same company"). Each match shows up as a coloured badge with a confidence score.

Admin: Settings → Duplicates lists every customer or contact pair the engine spots in your org. Click Compare & merge to open the side-by-side view: pick the winner's value for each field where the two records differ, hit confirm, and the loser is deleted with every child record (leads, quotations, sales orders, invoices, notes, tasks, consent events, taggings, custom fields) re-parented to the survivor. Merges write a dup_merge audit row with the full pre-delete snapshot. Manager + admin can view the scan; admin-only can confirm a merge (because the loser record is deleted).

Add a contact manually

You can add contacts from the global Contacts area, from a customer record, or from a supplier record. When creating the contact, you can optionally link the person to a customer account, a supplier, or both at the same time.

Contact details you can store

Contacts can include salutation, first name, last name, job title, department, primary email, primary phone, mobile phone, and role.

Filter and open contacts

The global Contacts page lets you search by name, email, or phone, then narrow the list by role and by whether the contact is linked to a customer, supplier, both, or neither. Team members with contact permissions can open a contact for editing; other users are taken to the related customer record when one is linked.

Import contacts in bulk

Use the global Contacts page to download the import template and upload a completed Excel .xlsx file up to 5MB. The import follows an upload, preview, then confirm flow and shows live progress while valid rows are being imported.

Preview and error export

The import preview shows which rows are ready and which rows contain errors before anything is created. If some rows fail validation, use Export errors to download contacts-import-errors.xlsx for review and correction.

Linking after import

The import template does not assign customer or supplier links. After import, open the contact and connect it to the right customer, supplier, or both.

Add one supplier manually

Open Suppliers and use Add supplier. Capture supplier name, address, country, county or region, postcode, email, telephone, mobile, and website. In edit mode, changes save in place while you work, and you can mark a supplier inactive without removing historic records.

Import suppliers in bulk

Download Template, fill the .xlsx, then choose Import. Supplier imports follow the same upload, preview, and confirm flow as the other import tools, with live progress during import.

Search and status filters

The supplier list can be searched by name, supplier name, email, or postcode. Filter the grid by Active, All, or Inactive suppliers so paused relationships stay visible without cluttering the main working list.

Import error export

If any supplier rows fail validation in the preview, use Export errors to download suppliers-import-errors.xlsx for correction and re-upload.

Create a category first

Open Categories and add the high-level groupings you sell. Categories can be created one by one or imported in bulk from an Excel .xlsx file with the same upload, preview, confirm, and error-export flow used elsewhere in BeagleCRM. Imported error rows can be exported as categories-import-errors.xlsx.

Add products manually

In Products, choose Add product. Capture the product name, SKU, category, supplier, unit price, and VAT rate. If your organisation does not yet collect VAT, products default to 0% VAT until you add the VAT number in Organisation Settings.

Import products in bulk

Use the product import template to bring an existing catalogue across in one upload. Categories must already exist before products that reference them are imported. The product import uses the same upload, preview, and confirm flow, and failed rows can be exported as products-import-errors.xlsx.

Search, categories, and suppliers

The product list can be searched by product name, SKU, or supplier. When adding a product, you can search for an existing supplier and, if needed, jump out to add a new supplier before returning to finish the product. You can also create a new category directly from the category picker in the product form.

Adjust stock & see history

Each product has a stock panel showing on-hand, reorder level, and a low-stock badge when it is at or below reorder. Use the adjust form to add or remove stock (a positive quantity adds, a negative removes) with a reason — stocktake, write-off, return, and so on. Every adjustment is listed in the movement history beneath. Negative stock is allowed but flagged.

Record supplier bills

On a supplier profile, the Bills & spend panel lets you record what you are billed. The hero shows spend this year, average bill value, and the date of the last bill, mirroring the figures you already get for customers — but in reverse, for money going out.

The purchasing dashboard

The top of the Purchase Orders page shows at-a-glance tiles: spend this month and this year, outstanding bills, low-stock items, draft purchase orders, and your total stock valuation (on-hand × cost price). A top-suppliers-by-spend list sits alongside so you can see where your money goes.

Low-stock alerts

Once a day BeagleCRM checks your tracked products. When any fall to or below their reorder level, it leaves a quiet note on the relevant supplier — the one you would reorder from — listing the affected items. No inbox noise; the reminder is waiting where you act on it.

Creating a lead

Choose Add lead, pick a customer, set the source and status, and link one or more existing contacts from that customer. If the customer does not exist yet, you can create it inside the lead flow. Mark one linked contact as Primary — that contact becomes the default quotation recipient later.

Next action & follow-ups

Set Next Action Type, Action Due and notes so the lead appears on your tasks/follow-up list. Adding a note can also push the follow-up date forward.

Lead health & risks

BeagleCRM scores every active lead from 0–100% based on commercial-quality and follow-up risks. The lead detail view shows the score plus the exact gaps to close. The leads grid also gives you quick risk filters with live counts for overdue, stale, missing contact, missing follow-up, and quotation follow-up gaps. See the deep-dive below for the full mechanics, weights and thresholds.

Filters, notes & export

Use the grid to search and filter by status, source, assignee, potential, and risk. Open a lead to add notes, review linked quotations, and export the current lead list to Excel or PDF with the active filters applied.

Bulk actions on leads

Select one or more leads from the list view (checkbox column on the left, or the header checkbox for "select all on this page"). A sticky action bar appears with five options:

• Assign owner — bulk reassignment across reps.
• Change status — move every selected lead to a new pipeline stage.
• Add to campaign — push every selected lead into a campaign as a member.
• Archive — set status to Lost with reason other. Reversible.
• Delete — permanent removal, admin-only. Cascades to lead notes, lead contacts, and quotations per the DB schema.

Batches up to 25 rows run synchronously and refresh the list. Larger batches queue a background job with a progress flash and a final summary. Selection clears on any filter, sort, or page change.

Marketing consent on leads

Same per-channel opt-in, lawful basis, and provenance label as customers and contacts. The lead form renders the Marketing Consent fieldset; flipping any channel writes an append-only audit event. Required for any GDPR-compliant outbound to lead-stage prospects.

See the Customers section for the full audit + tokenised unsubscribe behaviour.

Create a quotation

In normal use, quotations are raised from a lead so the customer, lead link, and primary contact are already in place. Set Valid until, then add line items. Search the catalogue to add product items with preset pricing, or add free-text service lines.

Health, expiry & archived quotes

The quotations list lets you search by quote number or customer, filter by status, customer, ownership, and quote health, and separate out expired or expiring-soon work. Admins can also review archived quotations from the archive view.

Send by email or PDF

Send emails the customer with the PDF attached and stamps the quote as sent. Download PDF generates the document without emailing. Re-sending tracks how many times the quote has been sent.

Accept, reject or revise

On a sent quote, mark Accepted to move it forward (you can generate a sales order or invoice from it), or Rejected with a reason. Use Revise quotation to create a new revision while keeping the previous version and sent history.

Status flow

The normal forward path is Pending → Confirmed → Processing. Once invoiced, the order moves to Invoiced and can then be marked Completed. Historic records may also show Shipped or On Hold.

Search, filter & archive

The orders list lets you search by order number or customer, filter by status, switch to Assigned to Me, and admins can open the archived sales orders view to restore older records.

Convert to invoice

Use Create invoice from a sales order in Processing to copy line items, customer billing details and pricing into a draft invoice ready to send. The sales order then links back to the created invoice.

PDFs, cancellation & audit trail

Open an order to download its PDF, review the linked quotation and invoices, or cancel it with a reason. Admins can also archive completed or cancelled orders when they no longer need to stay on the main list.

Create a draft invoice

Start from a quotation, a sales order, or a customer. BeagleCRM can carry over the customer, line items, notes, and ownership for you, and draft invoices can use an alternate delivery address when needed.

Sending invoices

You can Mark as sent without emailing, or use Send to email the customer with the PDF attached. The customer must have an email address on file. Reply-to is set to the user sending the invoice; the from-name is your organisation.

Payment terms & due dates

Default payment terms come from Organisation Settings. Once an invoice is past its due date and not paid in full, it flips to Overdue automatically.

Recording payments

Use Mark as paid to record settlement. The invoice keeps paid, credited, and outstanding totals visible on the detail page, so partially paid invoices remain easy to chase.

Recurring invoices

Open a draft invoice to enable recurring billing. You can repeat it daily, weekly, monthly or yearly, set the next run date, optional end date or occurrence limit, and switch on Auto-send for generated invoices.

Reminders

Use Send reminder from the invoice when it is eligible for chasing. The invoice detail page keeps the reminder history, including when it was last reminded and who sent it.

Credit, void and recovery actions

You can create a credit note from the invoice, apply available account credit to reduce the outstanding balance, or Void a sent invoice with a reason. The invoices list also shows credited amounts and the last reminder date.

Choose the credit mode

You can create a Full Credit, credit selected invoice lines, or enter a Custom Amount with its VAT rate. BeagleCRM shows the maximum creditable balance before you confirm.

Paid vs unpaid invoices

For unpaid invoices, the credit normally applies back to the invoice balance. For paid invoices, you choose whether the issued credit becomes Account Credit or a Refund.

Refund details & account credit

Refund credits can store a refund method, reference number, and refund date. Account-credit resolutions increase the customer's available balance so it can be applied to a future invoice.

Numbering, history & voiding

Credit notes have their own prefix and next number in Organisation Settings. The credit notes list links each note back to its invoice, and an Issued credit note can be voided with a reason to restore the invoice balance.

Inviting members

Admins can open Invite member, enter an email address, choose a role, and send a secure registration link. If the person is already in the app, they can be added straight to the organisation.

Roles and controls

The team list shows who is an Admin, Manager, or Member, plus pending invitations awaiting acceptance. Admins can change roles and remove members, with extra protection around the original founder account and last-admin scenarios.

Conversation types

Start direct messages, create channels, or open group conversations with members from the same organisation. Your first available conversation opens automatically when you land in Chat.

Working inside chat

Chat supports live unread counts, online presence, replies, pinned messages, member management, and file uploads. If you need a separate communication space for a practice team, use Chat inside that second organisation rather than your live one.

Where tasks come from

Create tasks manually, or BeagleCRM creates them from lead next-action dates and overdue invoices via automations. Tasks can also belong to customers, projects, and project phases, so the same work item appears in the right operational context.

Recurring tasks

A task with the Recurring status repeats on a schedule so housekeeping work (weekly check-ins, end-of-month review) stays on the list.

Board, calendar, and list views

The Tasks page has three working modes. Board groups tasks by status and supports quick filtering by search, assignee, and due window. Calendar shows due work by month, week, or day, including timed tasks. List gives a compact table for scanning, sorting, and opening tasks quickly.

Inside a task

The task form separates essentials from schedule and context. Use it to set owner, assignee, customer, project, project phase, start date, due date, due time, reminder, repeat pattern, and whether weekends are allowed. After saving, add notes and one or more checklists; checklist items can be ticked off and reordered.

Built-in rules

Open Automations from organisation settings to enable or disable the standard rule templates and edit settings such as delay days, stale-day thresholds, and notification behaviour.

Recent automation runs

The sidebar shows recent successful and failed automation runs so you can confirm that rules are firing against the right records and spot problems quickly.

Inbound email → case

Configure your support inbox in Organisation Settings. Emails received there can create support cases, with the original subject, message body, sender, channel, originating email, and inbox account saved onto the case.

Log a case manually

Use New Case in Service Desk when the issue starts by phone, chat, or an internal handover. Set the subject, category, priority, summary, owner, and then link the case to either a customer or a supplier.

Queues and ownership

The main case list includes preset queues for Active, New, My Open, Waiting and Closed. Assign an owner when somebody is responsible for the next step, or leave the case unassigned until it is picked up.

Notes and customer replies

In the case workspace, add notes as either Internal or Customer. Customer-visible notes are emailed out, and replies to those emails can be added back onto the same open case automatically.

Case detail workspace

Open a case to edit the subject, category, priority, status, owner, and account links. A case can link to one customer or one supplier, not both. The workspace shows summary, details, linked account, opened/resolved/closed dates, notes, and related projects where available.

Priorities and categories

Priorities are Low, Normal, High, and Urgent. Categories include general query, complaint, billing query, delivery issue, product issue, order change, return or refund, appointment change, account query, and feedback.

Search, filter, and triage

The Inbox supports free-text search, quick filters for All, Unread, and Starred, plus account filtering when more than one inbox is connected. Open an email to mark it as read, star it, mark it unread again, or delete it.

Reply, reply all, forward, and compose

Use Compose for a new outbound email, choose the sending account, and optionally add CC and BCC recipients. From an open thread, you can Reply, Reply All, or Forward without leaving the inbox view.

Link emails to customers

If an email is not linked yet, you can create a customer directly from the sender and attach the email to that new record. Linked emails show the customer badge and let you jump straight to the customer record or unlink it later.

Clean up in bulk

The list view supports multi-select so you can select all visible emails and bulk delete them when tidying the inbox. From a support inbox, you can create a Service Desk case from the message and continue the support workflow in the Service Desk section above.

Sales pipeline and quotations

Reports include lead funnel totals, pipeline value by stage, win/loss rate, quote win rate, average deal size, average days to close, and monthly quotes sent, won, and lost.

Revenue and invoice health

Revenue reporting includes monthly revenue trend, recurring versus one-off revenue, outstanding and overdue invoices, invoice aging, pending orders, awaiting invoicing, and cancelled orders.

Customer growth

The customer section shows new customers per month, active versus inactive counts, and top customers ranked by paid invoice revenue, with direct links back to those customer records.

Forecast

Use the linked forecast view for next-quarter, 6-month, and 12-month projected revenue totals, plus a month-by-month forecast chart based on open pipeline and quotation data.

Trending products & customers

Two ranked tables list your top products and customers by revenue in the selected period. Each row shows the current value, the previous period for comparison, and a growth badge: a green ▲ for rising, a red ▼ for falling, and a grey dash for flat. A brand-new product or customer (nothing in the prior period) shows as +100% rather than an unhelpful “infinite” figure. A small sparkline on each row shows the recent month-by-month shape.

Drill into a single product or customer

Click any row in either table to open a detail panel with that product's or customer's monthly revenue chart over the last year. It's the quickest way to check whether a strong month was a one-off or part of a sustained trend. Close the panel by clicking away or the × button.

Trend charts

Four time-series charts cover the headline areas of the business: Sales revenue, Pipeline (open value plus won deals), AR aging (outstanding debt split into current, 1–30, 31–60, 61–90 and 90+ day buckets), and Activity (tasks completed and campaign emails sent, opened and clicked).

Date-range presets

Use the same presets as the rest of Reports — last 30 days, 3 months, 6 months, 12 months, or year to date. The chosen range sets the current window, and the growth figures compare it against the previous window of equal length, so “this period vs last” is always like-for-like.

Trends at a glance on the dashboard

Admins and managers also get a Trends at a glance panel on the main dashboard: compact revenue, pipeline and outstanding-debt cards, each with its own sparkline and growth badge, plus mini lists of the top trending products and customers. Use the View all trends link to jump straight to the full Trends tab.

How the numbers are kept up to date

Trend history is summarised once a night, so figures reflect activity up to the previous day; the current day is included live. When the feature is first switched on the history is back-filled, so a brand-new organisation may see the tables and charts fill in shortly after setup rather than instantly. All figures are scoped to your own organisation only.

Dashboard cards

The dashboard links directly to customers, contacts, leads, quotations, sales orders, inbox, suppliers, products, invoices, reports, and forecast. Admins and managers also see live summary figures for pipeline value, sent quotations, monthly orders, outstanding invoices, overdue amounts, and forecast totals.

Notifications and task prompts

Workspace notifications appear at the top of the dashboard and can be opened or dismissed. If there are unassigned tasks, the dashboard shows a highlighted prompt so work can be claimed quickly.

Activity feed

The Activity page is an organisation-wide event stream. Filter it by area such as leads, quotes, orders, invoices, payments, tasks, contacts, customers, or notes, and page through the timeline when you need a broader view.

Audit trail

The Audit page records detailed create, update, archive, restore, and delete changes across supported sales records. Filter by entity type, event type, user, or reference, then expand an entry to see before-and-after field values. Admins can also purge old audit records using the retention controls.

Where to find it

Open the organisation menu in the top-right of any page and choose Custom Fields. The link is visible to admins and managers. Direct URL: /orgs/<slug>/settings/custom-fields.

Who can do what

• Admin — create, edit, archive, hard-delete, fill in values.
• Manager — create, edit, archive, fill in values. No hard-delete.
• Member — read-only on values.

Filling in values

On the customer form, switch to the Custom Fields tab (only shown when at least one field exists for customers). On a lead, scroll to the Custom Fields section near the bottom of the form. Save persists the values transactionally with the parent record — if a value fails validation, the whole save rolls back.

Detail pages

Customer and lead detail pages show an Additional Information panel with the configured custom values. Empty Important fields render with an amber label as a soft prompt to fill them.

Customer list columns

Tick Available as list column on a definition to surface the field in the customer grid. Each column gets a built-in filter typed for the field (text, number, date) and you can pick the same filters as for built-in columns.

Imports

The customer import template includes one column per active customer custom field, prefixed CF: <Label>. Re-download the template after creating new fields. Bad values surface as per-row errors so the rest of the import keeps running.

Archive vs delete

Archive hides the field everywhere but keeps stored values in case you need them. Delete (admin only) permanently removes the field and every value attached to it; the confirmation prompt warns you. Use the Stats button first to see how many records hold a value.

GDPR / anonymisation

When an admin anonymises a customer, all custom field values for that customer are cleared in the same transaction as the built-in personal fields. Field definitions are unaffected; other customers’ values remain.