Creating Customer Records

Use the Customer Maintenance screen to create and maintain records for customers that identify customer-specific details such as freight, credit specifications, and detailed pricing information. If the customer has different billing and shipment addresses, create a separate record for each, and you must create the bill-to record first. For more information, see Defining Parent Companies and Dependents.

You can restrict access to fields and menu items on the Customer Maintenance window by setting the following control maintenance records and authorization keys:

• Customer Maintenance Authorization Levels - This control maintenance record assigns security levels to each field available for editing in Customer Maintenance.

• Customer Maintenance Authorization Levels For New Customers BT/ST - This control maintenance record restricts editing access to the Bill To and Job or Ship To fields in the Customer Maintenance window when creating new customers.

• Respect User's Branch Authorization - This control maintenance record to allow users full branch access to certain windows in the system, such as Terminal Setup.

• Restrict Access to Customer Maint Based On User Authorized Branches - This control maintenance record to indicate if you want to limit users to viewing only those records for customers whose branches are listed in the user's User Accessible Branches.

• CUSTOMER.MAINT - Assign Level 1 for view-only access, or Level 2 for editing access to Customer Maintenance.

• CUSTOMER.MAINT.LEVEL - If a user has CUSTOMER.MAINT Level 2, the system uses the levels assigned in control maintenance records listed above and the user's levels assigned in CUSTOMER.MAINT.LEVEL to determine whether the user can edit fields in Customer Maintenance. A user must have the same level or higher as assigned in the control maintenance records to edit the field in Customer Maintenance.

To create a customer record:

1. From the Maintenance menu, select Customer to display the Customer Maintenance window.

2. Click the New Customerbutton and enter the customer's name in theNamefield; or select File > New Wizard to quickly set up new customer information using the wizard.

The system generates a unique customer number, which displays in the lower-left corner of the window.

Note: To edit an existing customer record, enter that customer's name in the Customer field.

3. Complete the fields, as needed:

   Field	Description
   Name	Enter the customer's name as you want it to appear on documents. If this is the customer's bill-to record, use the customer's legal name.
   Address	Do one of the following: If this is the bill-to address, enter the address to which to send correspondence. If this is the ship-to address, enter the address to which to send product shipments. Note: If you need additional lines to complete the address, select Additional > Additional Address to enter the remainder of the address.
   City	Enter the name of the city that corresponds to the address entered above. The system displays a selection list. Select the state and zip code from the list and press Enter to populate the Zip, State, and Country fields. For international addresses, refer to Handling Postal Codes for International Addresses.
   Sort by	Enter alphanumeric characters of the most significant word in the customer name, or any combination of numbers or letters for the system to refer to when sorting customers in alphabetic order.
   Bill-To	If this is a ship-to customer, enter the customer's bill-to record name. The bill-to customer record must already exist in the system.
   Index	Enter additional words for the search index to use when searching for this customer. This field is required. The system uses the words in this field as tokens in the search index. You can add any information in this field that might be useful for a search. For example, If you know your customers by their customer number on your old system, enter that number in this field; or if the customer name is long, enter an abbreviation for the name.

4. Click the Phones tab, and enter the customer's primary phone and fax numbers. For example, in the Type column enter Fax1 for the primary fax number, and Main for the main office number, and enter those numbers in the adjacent Number column.

If you do not enter the fax code, faxed invoices, statements, and memos go to the main fax number.

5. Click the Contacts tab and enter the name, title, and phone number of employees at the customer with which you regularly do business.

Note: Use these tabs as a quick-reference list. This information is not directly connected to the information entered through the Create NewContact button on the Contacts tab, where you can add detailed contact information in a Contact record. However, by enabling the Validate Name In 'Ordered By' Field Against Customer Contactcontrol maintenance record, the system can use this list to check user authorization for taking credit card orders.

6. Click the WWW tab, and enter the customer's e-mail and internet information.

7. In the Customer Type area, check any of the options that apply to this customer record.

   Select this option...	if...
   Bill-To	this customer's name and address is the one used for billing purposes. You can flag the customer as both a bill-to and a ship-to.
   Ship-To	this customer's name and address is the one to which you ship product. You can flag the customer as both a bill-to and a ship-to. If the customer is a ship-to but not a bill-to, enter the bill-to customer associated with this ship-to in the Bill field. Note: You can set a ship-to only customer's price class to null on the Customer Pricing/Printing screen, so that the ship-to inherits the bill to's price class.
   Ship-To Address Changes Restricted	you want to limit who can change ship-to addresses on sales orders. Users with the SOE.ALLOWED.ADDR.CHANGE authorization key can change a ship-to address when this is selected.
   Branch	the entity is a branch of your company, so the branch activities can be tracked and you can use the branch for transfer orders. If this is a non-stocking branch and you will never order from this branch, activate No Order Entry in customer credit control parameters.
   Branch Cash Account	you do not want A/R to accumulate in this account. When you flag this option, also flag the Bill-To and Job or Ship-To fields. Use this type of customer to: Enter cash sales for people who are not regular customers Create a generic customer record for cash sales.
   Prospect	this is a prospective customer who has yet to place an order with you. Prospect customers do not require a bill-to or ship-to association.
   Customer P/O Required	you want to require a purchase order number regardless of the transaction.
   Auto-Delete	the system should delete this customer AFTER all associated history, open bids/orders and closed invoices are purged. You can delete a customer only if there are no ledger, PSUB, or A/R records associated with it. Note: To keep the unused customer from displaying on reports, set the home branch to a dummy branch, and do not include that branch on the report.
   Customer Release Number Required	Select from the following options: None - Neither a purchase order number nor a release number is required. P/O - A purchase order number is required. Release# - A release number is required. Both - Both purchase order number and release number are required. Note: The system prompts for these numbers in order entry if you select any option except None.

8. In the lower right area of the Customer Maintenance window, complete the fields, as needed.

   Field	Descriptions
   Backorder Status	Do one of the following: Enter a sales order entry default status for backordered items for this customer.Descriptions of statuses: L - (Call When Available) The order is displayed in the Call When Complete Queue when any item on that generation (even a partial quantity of that line item) is available. A - (Ship When Available) The System ships items on the generation of an order as they become available even if the total quantity of that line item is not available. C - (Call When Complete) The order is displayed in the Call When Complete Queue when the entire generation of the order is available. H - (Ship When Complete) The System ships the entire generation of the order when it is complete. M - (Ship Item Complete) The System ships total line item quantities on the generation of an order as they become available. It does not ship partial quantities of line items. B - (Bid) Bid status is assigned to the item, which does not commit inventory. X - (Cancel) Indicates you do not want to allow any back orders to be placed. Leave the field blank to use the setting in the Customer B/O Action Defaultcontrol maintenance record. If that record is blank, then an order writer can decide the status at the time the order is taken.
   Outside Salesperson	Enter the user ID of the default outside salesperson for this customer. If split commissions are in effect for this customer, and you enter a salesperson who is not included in the split commission percentage, the Salesperson Split Commission Percentage screen displays. You can then update the split commissions settings to reflect your change. Note: If you change the outside salesperson, the system prompts you to ask if you want to change the salesperson in all open orders and/or bids. You must be assigned the SOE.SALESPERSON.EDIT authorization key to make these changes.
   Inside Salesperson	Enter the user ID of the default inside salesperson for this customer. If split commissions are in effect for this customer, and you enter a salesperson who is not included in the split commission percentage, the Salesperson Split Commission Percentage screen displays. You can then update the split commissions settings to reflect your change. Note: If you change the outside salesperson, the system prompts you to ask if you want to change the salesperson in all open orders and/or bids. You must be assigned the SOE.SALESPERSON.EDIT authorization key to make these changes.
   Ship Via	Select the default method of shipment this customer uses. For more information, see Adding a Customer to a Ship Via Delivery List.
   Freight In Exempt	To exempt the customer from incoming freight charges, enter Yes, otherwise leave No in the field. If you enter Yes, when you enter a freight charge on the Order Entry Total window or on the OE Freight Distribution window, a message displays confirming that this customer is exempt.
   Freight Out Exempt	To exempt the customer from outgoing freight charges, enter Yes, otherwise leave No in the field. If you enter Yes, when you enter a freight charge on the Order Entry Total window or on the OE Freight Distribution window, a message displays confirming that this customer is exempt.
   Export Only	Select one of the following depending on how often this customer creates orders that are exported from the current country: No - Customer never exports material. Yes - Customer always exports material. Prompt - Customer exports material often enough that users should be prompted if the order is an export order or not.

More Options for Creating Customer Records

The following are some common options you might use while creating customer records.

See Also:

Contact Maintenance Overview

Customer Maintenance Overview

Defining Customer Branch Override Capabilities