The Items module is your CRM catalog, where you can keep all the Products and Services your company sells. Once added, you can easily select them in an Estimate instead of entering the same details, price, and tax rate each time.
Good to know: Items is part of the CRM feature set, which is available as a paid add-on. If your company’s plan doesn’t include CRM, you can purchase the CRM add-on from Business → Billing & Payment. Once added, Items and the other CRM features become available.
Where to Find It #
Route: Dashboard → CRM → Items
Before You Start #
Two quick things save you a trip back here later:
- Set up your currencies first. The Currency dropdown on this form only offers the currencies your company has added under Admin → Currency. If the one you need isn’t there, add it there first.
- Add your vendors first, if you buy the item in. The Vendor picker only shows Active, Vendor-type Clients. So, if you plan to record who you buy from, create that Client in the Clients module before you start. You can always come back and add it later.
Product vs. Service #
Every Item is one of two types, chosen when you create it:
- Product — a physical good. Only Product items show Stock Quantity and Stock Unit fields and only Products show an “In stock” / “Out of stock” hint when picked on an Estimate.
- Service — a service your company provides to a customer, such as consulting, installation, maintenance, or design work. Services are not physical items and do not have stock quantities.
Good to know: stock tracking is informational only — Office-X doesn’t automatically reduce Stock Quantity when an Item is added to an Estimate, so it’s up to you to keep it updated.
Who Can Use This Feature #
Subscriber Admin can always create, view, edit, delete, and activate/inactivate any Item, without needing any specific permission.
Employees need one of the permissions below, each controlled independently from Admin → Permission → CRM – Items:
- Create Item
Required action: Create - View All Items
Required action: View - Edit Item (For All)
Required action: Update - Delete Item (For All)
Required action: Delete - Activate / Inactivate Item (For All)
Required action: Update
These permissions can be assigned directly to an employee, or to an entire team at once. See the Permissions Management guide for how to assign permissions.
Creating an Item #
Click Add Item and fill in:
Basic Information #
- Item Type — Product or Service. Defaults to Product.
- Status — Active or Inactive. Defaults to Active.
- Name — required, up to 100 characters.
- SKU — optional, up to 50 characters.
- Description — optional, up to 500 characters.
- Category — optional free text, up to 100 characters. This isn’t a fixed list — type whatever grouping makes sense for you (e.g. “Home”, “Cleaning”).
Pricing & Tax #
- Selling Price — a non-negative number, defaults to 0.
- Currency — picked from your company’s configured currencies (see the Currency admin guide).
- Tax Rate — a percentage from 0 to 100, defaults to 0.
- Billing Method — Hourly, Fixed, or Per Unit. These are the only three options.
- Stock Quantity and Stock Unit — Product only, both optional, Quantity defaults to 0.
Good to know: The Selling Price and Tax Rate saved on an Item are used as the starting values when you add it to an Estimate. After that, the Estimate keeps its own price and tax rate. Changing the Item later will not affect existing Estimates that already use it.
Attributes #
Add any number of custom Key/Value pairs — for example, “Color: Black” or “Weight: 10kg”. Each key allows up to 50 characters, each value up to 100. There’s no limit on how many attribute rows you can add.
Technical Details #
All optional, up to 500/100 characters as noted: Features (500), Specifications (500), Manufacturing Part No. (100), Serial Number (100).
Purchasing #
- Purchased from a Vendor — a checkbox. Checking it reveals:
- Purchase Description — optional, up to 500 characters.
- Purchase Cost — a non-negative number, defaults to 0.
- Vendor — search and pick a Client. Only Active, Vendor-type Clients show up here — see the Clients guide for how to set one up.
Good to know: if the Vendor search comes up empty no matter what you type, it means your company doesn’t have any Active, Vendor-type Clients yet. Go create one in the Clients module first, then come back here.
Notes & Attachments #
- Notes — optional, up to 500 characters.
- Attachments — optional, up to 6 files, JPG/PNG/PDF, up to 2 MB each.
Worked example: “Home Theater System” is a Product, SKU “ABC123”, Selling Price $2000 USD, Tax Rate 10%, Billing Method “Per Unit”, with attributes Color: Black and Weight: 22 lbs, marked as purchased from the Vendor “James Carter” (Precision Audio Supply Co.) for a Purchase Cost of $1800. “Home Cleaning Service” is a Service, Selling Price $300, Billing Method “Hourly”, with a Duration attribute of “2 hrs” and no vendor.
Active vs. Inactive Status #
Use the Action menu’s Activate / Inactivate option to flip an item’s status. An Inactive item no longer appears in the item picker when adding a line item to a new Estimate — but any existing Estimate line item that already uses it is completely unaffected and remains fully editable.
Editing an Item #
Use the Action menu’s Edit option to open the same form pre-filled with the item’s current details. Every field can be changed, including Item Type and Status.
Deleting an Item #
Use the Action menu’s Delete option and confirm. The item and its attachments are permanently removed.
Important: You cannot delete an Item if it is already used on an Estimate. Office-X blocks the deletion to keep existing Estimates intact.
If you no longer want to use an Item, set it to Inactive instead. It will no longer be available for new Estimates, while existing Estimates that already use it remain unchanged and editable.
The Item List #
Route: Dashboard → CRM → Items
The table shows: Item ID, Name, SKU, Type, Selling Price, Category, Status, and an Action column. Any column except Action can be shown or hidden via the Columns option.
- Search — by Item ID, name, or SKU.
- Filters — Item Type (All/Product/Service), Status (All/Active/Inactive), and Category (free text).
- Sort — click most column headers to sort by that column.
Results are paginated (10, 20, or 30 per page), newest first by default.
How Items Connect to the Rest of CRM #
- Estimates — Items are the building blocks of an Estimate’s line items; picking one prefills the description, price, and tax rate, which you can then adjust for that specific Estimate.
- Clients — if you tick “Purchased from a Vendor”, the vendor you pick is a Vendor-type Client. That link also works in reverse: once an Item names a Client as its vendor, that Client can no longer be deleted.
Activity Log #
Creating, editing, activating, inactivating, and deleting an Item are all recorded for you, with who did it and when — and an edit also shows exactly which fields changed, so a surprise price change is easy to trace. Look under Dashboard → Admin → Activity Log, filtered to Item. See the Activity Logs guide for how to search it.
Summary #
Items is your reusable catalog of what you sell, so you’re never typing the same product or service details into an Estimate twice. Prices and tax rates copy onto an Estimate line item at the moment you pick the Item, so later changes to the Item never retroactively alter an Estimate you’ve already sent. And once an Item has been used on even one Estimate, Office-X won’t let you delete it — so Inactive is the option you want for anything you’ve stopped selling: it disappears from new Estimates and leaves your old ones exactly as they were.
