Scheduled CSV Export

The scheduled CSV export builds a zip of your report data every day, week or month, and emails you a link to download it from the portal. The zip holds the report data behind the Reports page, in more detail: the seven datasets of the Reporting API, as CSV files you can open in Excel or load into your own tools. They are not copies of the Reports page's card downloads.

It is included on every plan (Shared, Dedicated and Enterprise), with no add-on to buy, and it works the same way on every plan.

Where to find it#

In the portal, open Integrations, then Reporting, then Scheduled CSV export (the tile's button is Open Scheduled CSV export). The Reports page links to it too: Get this report data by email on a schedule.

The scheduled export is part of OpenBoxes Lift. The Reporting menu inside OpenBoxes does not send reports on a schedule.

Setting it up#

The account owner and admins set it up. They switch on Build a scheduled export for this account and choose how often. Everyone else on the account sees the settings but cannot change them ("The account owner or an admin can change this.").

Each account has one schedule. Choose one of:

Daily: every morning, covering the day before.
Weekly: every Monday, covering Monday to Sunday of the week before.
Monthly: on the 1st, covering the month before.

An account gets at most one export a day.

Exports are built from 07:00 in your instance's timezone (the one set under Settings, General), normally after that morning's daily stock check. Our maintenance windows can push an export later that morning. The panel's Next export line shows the day and time of the next one. You cannot choose the time.

Who gets the email#

The email goes only to people on your account's team, and nobody gets it until it is turned on for them:

Each person turns it on or off for themselves with Send me the export.
The account owner can also turn it on for a teammate with Send them the export, but not for someone who turned it off themselves.

It never goes to an outside address (an accountant or a shared mailbox, for example), and never to Slack, Microsoft Teams, PagerDuty or a webhook. If someone outside your team needs the file, invite them as a teammate. See Managing users.

Every email has an unsubscribe link. It stops only the scheduled export email for that person, not the daily stock alert.

The email links to the portal#

The file is never attached to the email. The email has a Download from the portal button. Each time someone downloads, we check that they are still on your team and make a short-lived download link at that moment. A teammate who is removed from the account cannot download from the moment they are removed.

What is in the zip#

Each export is one zip file with seven CSV files, plus two files that describe them:

Summary: the one-row summary of your stock, as on the Reports page.
Stock on hand: what is in stock, by product and location.
Stock history: stock by product and location over the export's period.
Stock value history: the value of your stock over time.
Expiring lots: lots nearing expiry, using the expiry window you set on the Stock alerts panel.
Open purchase orders: purchase orders that are still open.
Activity: stock activity over the export's period.
manifest.json: machine-readable facts about each file.
README.txt: a plain description of the export.

The CSV files use the same columns and format as the Reporting API's CSV: one header row, UTF-8 without a byte-order mark. The columns are listed in the Reporting API field reference. Every CSV file is in the zip even when it has no rows.

Which period each file covers#

Stock on hand, expiring lots and the summary come from the latest daily check, normally that morning's.
Stock history and activity cover the export's period: the day, the week or the month.
Stock value history is the whole stored series: daily for 90 days, then monthly.
Open purchase orders come from the latest purchase-order check.

Stock values and prices#

Stock values, prices and order amounts are included for the account owner and admins. Everyone else gets the same files with those cells empty, unless the account owner has switched on Show stock and order values to all teammates on the Reports page (see Who sees values).

This is decided for each person at the moment they download, not when the email is sent.

Recent activity can change#

Activity for the last 8 days can still change when entries are edited, added late or backdated in OpenBoxes. Each file is correct as of the day it was built. Later exports and the Reports page show the updated figures.

How long exports are kept#

Each export can be downloaded from the panel's Recent exports list for 7 days after it is built. Then it is deleted. The list shows the last 90 days, with expired exports greyed out.

Exports are stored in Google Cloud Storage in the United States (us-east1), and deleted after 7 days and when your account is closed.

If an export cannot be built#

When an export cannot be built, no email is sent. The Recent exports list says why, for example "This export could not be built." or "This export was too large to build. The downloads on the Reports page still work."

While an account is suspended, no exports are built and downloads are refused.

API limits and keys#

The scheduled export does not use your plan's API limit or the Reporting API's allowance of 600 requests an hour, and it needs no API key.

It is not a backup#

The scheduled export is seven report datasets from the daily stock check. It is not a backup and not a full export of your data. For a full copy of your instance's data, see Backups and Can I export my data?.

Opening the files in Excel#

To make sure accented names display correctly, open a CSV file in Excel with Data, then From Text/CSV, rather than double-clicking it.

Not available#

These are not part of the scheduled export:

More than one schedule per account.
Choosing which datasets or which location go into the export.
Choosing the time it is sent.
Sending it to outside addresses, Slack, Microsoft Teams, PagerDuty or a webhook.
An email when an export fails. The Recent exports list says what happened.
An export now button. For a file right away, use the CSV downloads on the Reports page.

Reporting overview: the Reports page, the Reporting API and the scheduled CSV export on one page.
Reports: your report figures on screen, with a CSV download per card.
Reporting API: the same datasets for your own software, with an API key.
Stock alerts: a daily email about stock below minimum or nearing expiry.
Integrations overview: what is available today and what is coming.