Skip to content
$200 a month, everything included30 days free

SMS mid-job authorization

Authorize the extra work by text. No phone tag.

Half of the day a service advisor used to spend on the phone was spent re-explaining things the customer had already seen. Pitlane collapses that. The tech finds something on the job, adds the line, taps send. The customer sees the new items on their phone, taps authorize or decline on each one, signs with a finger. The RO updates. The tech keeps working.

9:41
P

Pitlane Garage

Marcus, new work found on your Camry

Rear brake pads

$240
Authorize

Serpentine belt

$160
Authorize

Wiper blades

$34
Decline

Sign to approve

~30 sec

Customer round-trip

Tokenized

One-time link, hash-only DB

Signed

Finger signature on the line

Per-line authorize or decline. With a signature.

The customer sees each new line with description, price, and Authorize / Decline buttons.

  • Per-line authorize / decline (not all-or-nothing)
  • Finger signature on a canvas, stamped to the line
  • Declines park on the vehicle record with a PitCrew recovery draft ready
  • Turn on owner alerts and a text hits your shop number the second the response lands

Tokenized links that expire.

The link the customer taps is one-time and tokenized.

A text hits your shop number the second the response lands.

Turn on owner alerts and every authorization or decline sends a text to your shop number with the tally of lines authorized.

Runs on your shop's own number.

Pitlane owns the A2P 10DLC carrier registration and provisions a per-shop Twilio subaccount, so your shop sends from your own dedicated local number.

How it works.

01

Tech finds the extra work, adds the line

Mid-job. The tech is under the car. Drops the new finding into the RO as a line with a price.

02

Send the request

One tap. Pitlane sends the SMS from the shop's own number with a tokenized link to a customer-facing approval page.

03

Customer authorizes, signs, work continues

Per-line buttons, finger signature on a canvas. The decision lands on the RO. The tech keeps going. The owner gets notified.

This runs on a 30-day free trial.

Every feature on this page is in the trial. No credit card, live in under 10 minutes.

Start 30-day free trial See a live demo

Questions about sms mid-job authorization.

Does the customer need to install anything?
No. The text contains a link that opens in any phone browser. No app, no account, no password. They see the line items, tap to authorize or decline each one, sign with a finger. That's the whole flow.
Is the signature legally binding?
It's a signed electronic record on a timestamped RO line, captured per the E-SIGN Act and most state UETA equivalents. Most shops use it the same way they'd use a customer initialing a paper RO. Talk to your attorney if your state has specific rules about electronic signatures for auto repair authorizations.
What if the customer doesn't respond?
The link expires 24 hours after it's sent. If the customer hasn't responded by then, the request expires and the line stays in pending status. The advisor can resend, call, or hold the work. Pitlane doesn't auto-charge or auto-approve anything.

Related reading.

All articles
Operations

How to Get Customers to Approve Repairs Faster (Without Being Pushy)

Slow approvals clog the bay and kill throughput. The playbook for shortening approval cycles from hours to minutes. By changing presentation.

Operations

From Phone Tag to Text: Modern Customer Communication for Repair Shops

Old-school shops lose customers to newer ones over how they communicate, not the quality of their work. What modern shop comms look like.

Compliance

SMS Compliance for Auto Shops: TCPA, A2P 10DLC, and What You Must Know Before You Text

A plain-English guide to the laws and carrier rules that govern texting customers. What's required, what's recommended, what gets you fined.

More features.

Customer memory

A CRM that remembers the car, not just the customer.

Bay

The view a tech actually wants. One clock, one line at a time.

Shop floor

A dispatch board that shows what's in the shop right now.

Run your next job on one work order.

Start free for 30 days. No credit card, no setup fee, no per-transaction platform fee.

Start 30-day free trialWalk the live demo