Materials, Services, and Labor on a work order

Everything a work order charges for falls into one of three buckets. Getting the bucket right is what keeps your stock counts honest and your invoices readable.

The three buckets

Materials — physical, stocked items you consume on the job: Components (filters, fittings, fuses) and Equipment (a unit you install). Adding a material to a work order draws it down from inventory when the order completes.
Services — non-stock charges: a diagnostic fee, a call-out, transport, a disposal charge, a flat "annual tune-up". A service never touches stock, because there's nothing physical to deplete.
Labor — time on the job, tracked separately (from the mobile timer or entered by hand) and priced from your labor-rate cards. Labor is not part of the Materials & Services list.

Where you see them

On the work-order detail page, the Materials & Services panel lists the first two buckets together, each line tagged as a Material or a Service. Labor has its own section and rolls into the financial summary on its own line:

labor + materials + services + travel + surcharges − discount + tax = total

Adding a line

Click Add on the Materials & Services panel and pick an item from your Catalog. The item's type decides the bucket automatically:

A Component or Equipment item → added as a Material (will deduct stock on completion).
A Service item → added as a Service (no stock movement, ever).

You don't set the bucket by hand — it follows the catalog item, so the same thing is always billed the same way.

Why the split matters

Accurate stock. Only real physical draw-downs hit your warehouse counts. A €90 diagnostic fee doesn't invent a phantom part leaving the shelf.
Cleaner invoices and portals. The customer sees Materials, Services, and Labor as separate subtotals on the invoice and the customer portal — matching how they think about the bill.
Correct reporting. Parts-usage and inventory reports count materials; revenue reports still capture the service charges.

Tips

If you find yourself adding a "part" with 0 stock just to bill for a service, create a Service catalog item instead — that's exactly what it's for.
A time-priced service (see the Catalog) still bills under Services, not Labor.