Published
Shared Car Maintenance Log for a Household
A shared car needs one history, not two notebooks. Whoever paid at the pump still writes on the same vehicle. A second car gets a second log.
A household car collects work from whoever happened to be at the counter. One person has the oil invoice. The other has last week's fuel receipts. The inspection date lives in a third text thread. That is how a shared car becomes a mystery.
The fix is one garage for that vehicle, not a shared spreadsheet that nobody opens. Service, fuel, expenses, and documents all point at the same odometer. Two drivers, one timeline.
RPMBase is built as a private garage you sign into. Free covers one car, which is the usual household daily driver. A second vehicle in the same family should be a second car in the app (Premium), not a second unofficial notebook. This note is the sharing habit, not a multi-user chat.
One car, one odometer, two drivers
If you both drive the same hatchback, you do not need two maintenance logs. You need both people to add rows to the same car. A fill-up on Tuesday and a brake job on Thursday still belong on one history.
What you must not do is merge two different vehicles because they 'feel like the family cars.' Car mileage tracker fails the moment two clusters share a column.
Name the car clearly: 'Golf, plate, year.' A nickname only the daily driver understands is how the other person logs on the wrong profile.
Who writes the row
The person who has the invoice writes the row the same day if they can. Three numbers before you leave the workshop still apply: date, odometer, next due. The other driver should not have to reverse-engineer a faded photo three weeks later.
Fuel is the same rule. Whoever filled the tank logs liters, money, and kilometers. Skipping 'because it was only €40' is how the month's economy becomes fiction.
Ask can draft a row from a sentence. Confirm it. A household does not need two people arguing with an unconfirmed draft.
Money, without turning the garage into accounting software
If you split costs, the garage can still hold the total on the car. Who reimbursed whom can live in a notes app. Mixing IOUs into service history makes the log unreadable when you sell.
What car expenses to track is the list. Insurance and parking go there. The oil change cost stays on the service row so it is not counted twice.
Reminders the whole house can understand
A reminder named 'Golf inspection, 14 Oct' is useful to whoever opens the app. A reminder named 'car' is not. Put insurance and inspection on documents with dates. The calendar then shows work that is actually due.
RPMBase does not replace a conversation. If only one person has the login, the other driver still cannot help. Share the account the way you already share a streaming login, or accept that one person is the record keeper. Download is the place that keeper works.