Help center › Set up
Importing from Incident IQ or a spreadsheet
Everything comes in through Admin › Import, a three-step wizard: choose the dataset and the source, check the column mapping and options, run. The import runs in the background; the page shows live progress, counts, unmatched values and a downloadable list of row errors, and every job is kept under Import history. The Incident IQ import page walks through the three exports in detail, and Beacon as an Incident IQ alternative lists what carries over and what does not. Coming from Quest KACE? Switching from Quest KACE has the exports, what carries over, and how a later export updates tickets.
What never happens during an import
Nothing is emailed to the people in the file, no automations run, no SLA clocks start, no AI triage runs, and old resolved tickets arrive closed, quietly. Re-running a file is safe: users and devices are updated in place, tickets that were already imported are skipped.
Order: users, then devices, then tickets
- Users. Matched by email. From an Incident IQ export, Agent/Technician becomes an agent, Admin/Administrator an admin, everyone else a requester. Imported accounts have no password: they sign in with single sign-on or use Forgot password. A roster with no email column can build addresses from an ID or name column (for example
{User ID}@students.yourdistrict.orgfor rows with a grade,first.last@yourdistrict.orgfor staff); the mapping step offers the rules and shows what each one produces before anything is written. - Devices. Matched by asset tag, or by serial number if you choose that. Missing asset types are created. Statuses are read from the file: Incident IQ's In Service stays In service; Assigned becomes Assigned when the row names a holder who is in Beacon, otherwise In service with the site and room kept; Out of Service becomes In repair, or Retired or Disposed when a Status reason column says so; Lost/Stolen becomes Lost; Storage becomes In storage; Retired stays Retired; Beacon's own names (In repair, In storage, Loaner, Stolen, Disposed) are read as they are. The wizard's Statuses card lists every value in the file with the status it becomes, and you can change one for the run. Holders are matched by email in the column mapped to Assigned user email. Unknown holders become requester accounts when Create requester accounts is on; otherwise the device is left without a holder and the address is listed under unmatched values. This is why people go first: a devices file imported before its people gives nobody a device.
- Tickets. Created with their original created, modified, resolved and closed dates and their due date. Requesters and assignees are matched by email, or by exact name when the file has no email column; categories by name (also
Parent > Child, created with their parents if you turn that on); devices by tag or serial. Incident IQ and KACE statuses and priorities are mapped to Beacon's; anything unrecognised gets the wizard's default status and a line in the unmatched list. Keep the exported ticket numbers reuses the old numbers when they are free; otherwise tickets get the next Beacon number and the old number stays on the record. The comments column becomes one internal note titled Imported history, a resolution column one titled Resolution, and any other column you tick is kept on the ticket under its own name.
Sites are created from the Location column as needed, or add them first under Admin › Sites so names and codes match exactly.
Sources
- Incident IQ export. Columns are recognised automatically. Ask your Incident IQ administrator for the Users, Assets and Tickets exports with all columns shown before exporting.
- Quest KACE export. Columns from the KACE Systems Management Appliance's Users, Assets and Tickets lists are recognised; submitters, owners and holders are matched by display name, categories are created as paths, and a later export updates tickets by number. Switching from Quest KACE.
- Generic CSV. Any file with a header row; you map the columns by hand. Templates with Beacon's own column names, which map themselves, are on the first step. Other help desks (Spiceworks, Freshservice, Web Help Desk) export CSV that works here.
- Paste from a spreadsheet. Select the cells in Google Sheets or Excel, including the header row, copy, and paste into the box on the first step. The box says what it sees (“142 rows, 5 columns, tab-separated”) before anything is sent. A bare column of serial numbers or asset tags, with no header, is recognised and the mapping step asks which it is. Typical use: a sheet of serials and tags from the receiving dock.
Limits and errors
- Up to 5 MB per file, about 20,000 rows. Split larger exports (by school year, for example) and import the parts one after another.
- A row with a problem is skipped and listed with its line number and reason; fix those rows and import only them again.
- A running job can be cancelled from Import history; it stops after the current chunk and keeps what was already written.
Switching from another system
Keep the old system read-only for a few weeks: new tickets go to Beacon, historical lookups can still use the old one. Then export the tickets changed since the cut-over and import that file; only the new ones are created. Attachments are not in CSV exports; email us if you need history with files.