Managing document categories
Document categories are the labels every uploaded file must carry, such as invoice, photo, or receipt. This article shows administrators how to create, edit, reorder, and retire categories, and explains the rules that keep them consistent.
What categories are
Categories are defined once and shared across your whole platform — they are system-wide, not per company. Every upload must reference an active category, so the list you maintain here directly controls what users can choose when they attach files anywhere in the product.
Who can manage categories
Viewing categories requires the settings:view permission; creating, editing, activating, deactivating, or deleting them requires settings:manage. These settings permissions are typically held by SystemAdmin. Custom roles can be granted them too.
Category fields
| Field | Rules |
|---|---|
| Code | The stable identifier used when files are stored. Lowercase; only letters a–z, digits, hyphen, and underscore; 2–50 characters. Must be unique. It is normalized to lowercase automatically. |
| Display name | The human-readable label shown in the picker. Required, up to 120 characters. |
| Sort order | A number that controls list position. Lower numbers appear first; ties are broken alphabetically by display name. |
| Active | Whether the category can be selected on new uploads. |
Create a category
- Open the document categories settings.
- Choose to add a category.
- Enter a code (for example
invoice) and a display name (for example "Invoice"). - Optionally set a sort order and leave it active.
- Save. If the code already exists or breaks the pattern rule, the platform rejects it with a specific message.
Edit, reorder, or rename
You can update any field on an existing category. Changing the display name or sort order is safe at any time. Changing the code is possible but should be rare, because the code is what already-stored documents were saved under.
Warning: Changing a category's code does not relabel documents that were uploaded under the old code. Prefer editing the display name and leaving the code stable.
Deactivate instead of delete
To stop users from choosing a category on new uploads without disturbing existing files, deactivate it. Deactivated categories no longer appear as options, but documents already tagged with them keep their label and remain downloadable. You can reactivate a category later.
Delete a category
Deleting removes the category definition entirely. Use this only for categories that were created in error and never used. For anything in active use, deactivation is the safer choice, because deletion removes the shared label from the system list.
Tip: Keep the category list short and unambiguous. Because every upload across vehicles, damage cases, receipts, and penalty notices draws from the same list, a lean, well-named set makes uploads faster and reporting cleaner.
Related
- How documents work across the platform
- Uploading a document and file size limits
- Supported file types
- Deleting a document
