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Created by Dave Kirn
Created on May 9, 2026

Restrict labor type selection per technician

The ask

Ability to restrict which labor types each tech sees when clocking time, so they pick from a curated short list (3-5 options) relevant to their role rather than the full tenant catalog (which can be 50+ entries in a mature shop).

The problem this solves

Tenants with large labor catalogs see techs pick the wrong labor type when clocking in. The wrong labor type means wrong hourly rate, wrong cost rollup to the project, wrong line on the customer invoice. Admins then have to find and correct these entries after the fact — or accept the bad data and lose money on it.

Limiting the picker to types relevant to the tech's role prevents the problem at the source.

Use cases

  • Installer techs see only labor types tied to install work, not programmer or service-call types.
  • Service techs see service-call labor types and travel/diagnostic types, not net-new install types.
  • PMs and supervisors retain access to the full catalog so they can adjust if needed.

Open questions for discovery

Different customers may want different mental models for how this restriction is configured. Voting and discussion on this idea would help us pick the right one:

  • Per-user assignment: admin sets which labor types each named user can see. Most flexible but most overhead.
  • Per-role assignment: labor types tied to a role (e.g., "Installer," "Service Tech"); users inherit via role membership. Less overhead, less flexibility.
  • Per-project assignment: labor types curated per project (some projects only allow specific types). Useful for fixed-price jobs.

A v1 might pick one model; later versions could combine.

Considerations

  • New association entity required (UserLaborType or RoleLaborType depending on model chosen).
  • Admin UI to manage the assignments.
  • Mobile and web time-entry pickers filtered by the new association.
  • PMs / supervisors should be able to override and use any labor type, with optional audit log.
  • Attach files