Fixed Assets
Fixed Assets is the master catalog of your company's long-lived assets: machinery, vehicles, furniture, computer equipment, buildings and any other property your company owns that isn't for sale. Here you register its purchase value, how it depreciates, who's responsible for it and all of its maintenance, insurance and location data, in a single record.
What is it and what is it for?
Each Fixed Asset record has general data (name, code, brand, model, color, serial number, image), financial data for depreciation (purchase value, initial and salvage value, depreciation type and percentage), maintenance data (whether it requires calibration, its equipment class, meter/odometer readings, geolocation) and the ledger accounts used when calculating its depreciation. You can also attach files, warranties, the items/components that make it up, and track notes, tasks and events related to it.
A single Fixed Asset can also be flagged as Is Equipment to enable its maintenance data (equipment class, fuel, readings) without stopping being a Fixed Asset for accounting purposes. If it also needs to be transported or used in production, that fuller tracking is done from the Equipment catalog (a separate menu), designed for machinery and vehicles with maintenance, transportation and manufacturing needs.
Screens in this area
| Screen | What it does |
|---|---|
| List | All your Fixed Assets, with tabs to view active assets (default), all of them, or only the inactive ones. You can filter by subsidiary, fixed asset class, a specific asset, department, location, division, item class or responsible employee, and customize which columns are shown and in what order. |
| Create / Edit | A full form with the asset's general, financial (depreciation), maintenance and accounting data, plus its attached files. Includes a button to capture its GPS location and, when the feature is active, an AI assistant ("Smart Paste") that fills out the form from pasted text or a copied image (a screenshot or a photo), whose text is read automatically. |
| Details | A read-only view of the full record, with a map if the asset has registered coordinates, and tabs for chat, notes, tasks, events, attached files and the security log. |
| Inline Editing | An inline-editable grid to quickly fix the code and name of several assets without opening each record separately. |
| Fixed Assets Report / Valuation | Printable reports (available from the Fixed Assets menu) that list your assets with their key data or calculate their book value as of a cutoff date. These specifically require the Fixed Assets module to be active. |
How to create a Fixed Asset step by step
- Open the list and click New. You need the "add" level of the Fixed Assets permission.
- Enter the name. It's the only required field on the form, for example "Dell Laptop Accounting" or "Delivery Truck #3".
- Enter the code (optional). If your company auto-numbers this catalog you can leave it blank — AdmCloud generates it on save. Otherwise, type a unique one.
- Pick the subsidiary if your company has subsidiaries enabled (required in that case; you won't be able to change it after the asset is created).
- Fill in the general data that applies: brand, model, color, serial number, vendor, responsible employee, department, division, location, image and insurance data.
- Set up depreciation (optional). Turn on Depreciates and define its type (Straight-Line or Declining Balance), the annual percentage (between 0 and 100), the period in months, the purchase value, the initial value to depreciate and the salvage value. If your Fixed Asset Class already has ledger accounts assigned, you can leave this asset's accounts blank to inherit them.
- Fill in maintenance data (optional) if the asset requires calibration, has an equipment class, consumes fuel, or you need to track its geolocation and readings.
- Attach files, warranties or components if applicable, and save.
Key fields
| Field | What it's for |
|---|---|
| Name | The asset's description. The only required field; it cannot repeat with another asset's name when the code is left blank and automatic numbering is off. |
| Code | The asset's identifier. Generated automatically if automatic numbering is active; otherwise you must type it, and it must be unique. |
| Subsidiary | The subsidiary that owns the asset, if your company has subsidiaries enabled. It cannot be changed once the record is created. |
| Fixed Asset Class | The asset's accounting class (see "Fixed Asset Classes"), from which it can inherit its depreciation accounts. |
| Depreciates | Whether this asset should be included in the automatic monthly Depretiations run. |
| Depreciation Type | Straight-Line (a fixed amount each period) or Declining Balance (a percentage of the remaining book value). |
| Annual Depreciation Percent | The percentage of value depreciated each year. Must be between 0 and 100. |
| Depreciation Period (months) | The number of months over which the asset depreciates. Doesn't apply when the type is Declining Balance. |
| Purchase Value / Initial Value / Salvage Value | The amount paid for the asset, the base amount depreciation is calculated on, and the value the asset will retain once fully depreciated. |
| Depreciation Expense Account / Accumulated Depreciation Account | The ledger accounts this specific asset uses when depreciating; if left blank, its Fixed Asset Class's accounts are used instead. |
| Is Equipment | Enables the maintenance fields (calibration, equipment class, fuel, readings) on this same Fixed Asset. |
| Parent Fixed Asset | Lets you group an asset as a component of another one (for example, an accessory that's part of a larger piece of equipment). |
| Tags | Free-form words separated by commas or semicolons to classify and search for the asset later. |
Validations when saving
- Name is required.
- Annual depreciation percent must be between 0 and 100.
- Subsidiary is required if your company has subsidiaries enabled, and cannot be changed once the asset is saved.
- The Depreciation Expense Account, if set, must be a ledger account of the "Depreciation Expense" class.
- Code must be unique: it cannot repeat with another asset already registered.
- Name must be unique when the code is left blank and automatic numbering isn't configured.
- Code is required when editing if automatic numbering is active; and only an administrator user can change it once assigned.
- Length limits apply to name, code, brand, model, color, serial number, reading unit, license plate, registration and fuel efficiency unit.
- You cannot delete a Fixed Asset if it's already referenced in transactions (invoices, payments, tasks), in payroll, in a Bill of Materials routing, in a Maintenance Plan, as another Fixed Asset's parent, or as equipment assigned to a Trip; AdmCloud shows you exactly which documents or records are using it.
Availability, plan and modules
- This catalog requires the Enterprise plan and is shown when your company has the Fixed Assets module active, or the Payroll/HR module active (which needs it to assign assets to employees). If neither is active, neither the menu nor the screen will be visible.
- The Fixed Assets Report and Valuation reports, and the Depretiations calculation, specifically require the Fixed Assets module (having only the Payroll module isn't enough).
- Access is controlled by the "Fixed Assets" permission of your user group, with separate levels to view, add, edit and delete.
- The Create field button on the form only appears if your plan includes Custom Fields.
Tips and common pitfalls
Assign the Fixed Asset Class from the start. If you define the depreciation expense and accumulated depreciation accounts there, you won't have to repeat them on every asset — only set them here for the exceptions that need different accounts.
Check the Initial Value before turning on depreciation. It's the amount that actually gets split across the depreciation periods; if it's left at zero, the asset won't generate any depreciation even with "Depreciates" turned on.
Can't delete an asset? It's because it already has history: transactions, payroll assignments, maintenance plans, trips or child assets. Check the error message to see exactly what needs to be unlinked first, or simply mark it Inactive instead of deleting it.
Don't confuse this catalog with Equipment. Fixed Assets is the general accounting catalog for everything your company owns; if your machinery or vehicles need full maintenance, transportation or manufacturing tracking, register them in the Equipment catalog instead, which shares several of the same fields but is built for that operational tracking.