Dealership software data migration planning

What to check before you decide

Clean before you move. Merge duplicates, fix bad addresses and phone numbers, retire old open items and decide which inactive records to leave behind. Moving dirty data moves the problem, and it costs more after the move.

Map the fields. For every field in the old system, name the field in the new one, and note what happens to values that do not fit.

Get the vendor's mapping in writing. Ask what it will not convert.

Run test loads. Load a copy of your data into the test system, then check it: record counts, ledger balances, open items, a sample of customers with history and attachments.

Reconcile to your last statement. Repeat until differences are explained.

Plan the cutover. Choose a date away from month-end, freeze changes in the old system for a stated period, run the final load and verify before anyone works in the new system.

Keep an archive you can read. The old system's history may be needed for years for warranty, legal and tax reasons. Agree how long the old system stays readable, or how its data is stored.

Assign someone to own the issues log for ninety days after go-live.

Ask a person who does not work on the project, such as the controller or a service manager, to spot-check the migrated data against their own knowledge of ten customers and ten repair orders, because project staff see what they expect, and an outsider who knows the store will notice what is wrong within minutes.

Ask the vendor how it will treat open items on cutover day, such as repair orders in progress and deals not yet funded. Those records are where mistakes happen, because they change while the data is being moved.

Keep the test loads and the reconciliation sheets after go-live, so that if a number looks wrong months later you can see what it was when the data first arrived.