A pre-use inspection log for Excel and Google Sheets that keeps a whole mixed fleet on one register - pickups and box trucks beside forklifts, aerial lifts, mowers and generators - and then works out the things a blank checklist can never tell you: which scheduled inspections were missed, which defects are still open, and which assets should not be running right now.
It is built for the person who owns the inspection paperwork without owning a fleet department: a crew lead, a shop or facilities supervisor, a grounds manager, or the owner of a small contracting business. It is a record-keeping aid, not legal or compliance advice. It organizes the inspections you choose to keep; your own rules, your manufacturers’ manuals and your state’s requirements still govern.
One register for vehicles and equipment
Many inspection templates assume one kind of asset. A real yard has a van on an odometer, a forklift on an hour meter, a trailer that is checked before each pull, and a generator that is checked once a week.
The Asset Register holds up to 40 assets, each carrying its own meter kind, its own inspection frequency - every shift, daily, weekly, or before each use - and its own checklist. From those, and from the log, the register computes one status per asset:
- OUT OF SERVICE - an open critical defect is holding it
- PARKED - deliberately out of the rotation
- MISSED - a scheduled inspection was not logged
- SERVICE OVERDUE / STALE - past its service meter, or past the maximum days you allow between checks
- INSPECTION DUE - due today and not logged yet
- READY
MISSED and DUE show together when both are true, so a missed check never hides behind “due today”.
Which inspections were actually missed?
The Missed Inspections tab is a 14-day grid, one row per asset. Each cell compares what that asset’s schedule expected against what the Inspection Log actually holds: OK where the check was done, MISS where it was not, PART where only one of two shifts logged, OOS for days the asset was held out of service, and a dash on days it was not due. Each row ends with its on-schedule rate, whether it missed anything in the 7 days before today, and whether it is due right now.
The Dashboard turns that into a fleet-level missed-inspection rate, so “we inspect everything every day” stops being an assumption.
A defect becomes a work order, not a note that gets lost
Log a FAIL against a checklist item and the workbook numbers it as a work order the moment it is entered. Defects & Work Orders pulls all of them out of the log - open ones first, 1,000 rows of capacity - with the asset, the item code, who found it, who owns it, the age in days and a status: UNASSIGNED, OPEN, AWAITING REVIEW or RETURNED.
If the failed item is marked Critical, the asset’s status flips to OUT OF SERVICE immediately, and getting it back takes two signatures, both tracked in the log:
- Maintenance certifies the repair - Repaired, or Repair unnecessary, with a name and a date.
- The next operator reviews the report and the certification, and signs.
Until both are recorded, and until the line’s own entry check reads OK, the asset stays flagged. A non-critical FAIL still opens a work order; it just does not stop the machine. The same loop is printed on the out-of-service tags, which state in writing that the tag comes off only when every work order on it is returned.
Odometer and hour meter, with a check on the reading itself
Every inspection line takes a meter reading, and the workbook compares it against the highest earlier reading for that asset:
- REGRESSION - the reading is lower than one already logged, which is usually a typo
- BIG JUMP - the reading outpaces that asset’s normal use over the operating days since its last inspection
- USED WHILE OOS - the asset was logged as inspected after a critical defect had already taken it out of service
Each asset also carries its service interval and its last service reading, so the register shows what it will be due for next, and how far it has to go.
Coded checklists, and pads that match them
Checklist Templates ships 7 checklists - pickup and van, box truck / CMV, trailer, forklift, aerial lift, mower and generator - with 100 items in total and 48 of them marked critical. Every item has a code, and every item counts its own failures, how many are open now, and when it last failed, so a part that keeps failing stops looking like bad luck.
The printable pads use those same codes. The operator circles a code on paper; the office logs the code in the workbook. Nobody has to decipher a sentence written on a hood in the rain.
What the rules say - and what this does not claim
The guide has a section on this, written plainly and cited:
- For commercial motor vehicles, the workbook follows the shape of the driver’s report, the repair certification and the next driver’s review in 49 CFR 396.11 (opens in new tab) and 396.13 (opens in new tab). Following its shape is not the same as being compliant - that is on your operation.
- For powered industrial trucks, 29 CFR 1910.178(q)(7) (opens in new tab) requires the examination before use, and 1910.178(p)(1) (opens in new tab) requires a truck found unsafe to be taken out of service until it is restored to safe operating condition. OSHA has said in a letter of interpretation (February 7, 2000) (opens in new tab) that the examination does not have to be documented - so keeping a written forklift log is your choice, not something this workbook can require of you.
- For aerial lifts, mowers and generators, follow the manufacturer’s own guidance; the checklists here are a starting point to edit, not a standard.
Own it, don’t rent it
Fleet-inspection software is often priced per asset per month, which means the twelfth mower costs you every month it exists. This is one file. Add a truck, a forklift or a mower and the price does not move; there are no seats, no logins and nothing that renews. It opens in Excel 2019 or Microsoft 365, in LibreOffice Calc 5.2 or newer, and - through the included one-click link - as a native Google Sheet in your own Drive.
It arrives pre-filled with a fictional example fleet: 12 example assets, 374 example inspections and 24 example work orders, frozen at a fixed date so every formula is already computing when you open it. Clear the example, set your own assets, and print the pads.
Try the free version first
If you run one pickup or van and want to see the habit before you buy the fleet version, the free daily vehicle inspection checklist is the same 14 coded checks on a printable page, shown filled in twice. It has no register, no missed-inspection grid, no work orders and no dashboard - it is one vehicle, one page, one day.
