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How do I Maintain Customer Master Records?

1. Introduction.
2. Adding New Customers.
3. Actions.

1. Introduction: Before you begin processing transactions through your Sales System, you
must first set up your Customer Master records. These records hold static information about each of
your Customers - some of which data may change from time to time and need to be kept up to date.
And, of course, as you engage with new Customers, you will need to add their records to the system.

The Customer creation and maintenance program has a number of pre-requisite files containing
associated data which will be used in this program. These include quite a number of the tables
documented in the article “How do I Use Code Maintenance to Control the Behaviour of the
System?” and include Currencies, Tax and General Ledger Codes. So if you haven’t populated these
tables already, you should do so before proceeding here. Another file which is required by this
program is the table of Bank Accounts. These will subsequently be needed for Customer Receipts
purposes and their setup and maintenance is detailed in the Article “How do I Manage my Bank
Accounts, Cash and Company Credit Cards, etc.?”.

As well as providing Financial Reporting (Profit & Loss, Balance Sheet, etc.) for the Company as a
whole, the System also provides similar reporting for component parts of the company like Divisions
and/or Departments. These sub-company components are defined in the tables set out in the
Articles entitled “How do I Implement Extended Business Analysis?”. You only need to set these
tables up if you are going to use Departmental Analysis and Reporting.

And finally you may also need to set up “Price Lists” if you want to implement different prices for
different Products and Services for different Customers – but it’s probably best to add these later on.

2. Adding New Customer Records: To add a new Customer go to the Sales Tab followed by
the Customers Tab and Click on “New Customer”. To call up an existing Customer for maintenance
and update purposes, click on any of the Customer Codes listed in the grid.

This will result in the following window being presented;

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The Account Details Tab: The first Tab you need to complete is the Accounts details Tab;

The Customer Account Code can be any length and comprise alpha and numeric characters. The
three fields highlighted in yellow here are inherited from the Defaults Table (see Paragraph 3. of the
Article “How do I Review the Company Details & Settings”) and can be over-ridden with different
values from the Drop Downs.

The rest of the fields on this Tab are self-explanatory, but should you need assistance you can click
on the “Help” button at the top right hand corner of the window which will bring up an overlay
window like this;

Alternatively, clicking on these blue buttons will provide help on a field by field basis throughout;
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You don’t have to wait for all the Tabs to be completed before “Saving” your work. You can click on
this field at any time and as many times as you want.

The Account Settings Tab: Now move to the next Tab;

General Ledger Settings: Once again inherited from the “Defaults” table and which can be changed
here, these entries specify a default GL Account (Sales Account) to which postings will be made in
respect of invoiced sales to this Customer. This GL Account will presented automatically during
transaction entry (e.g. Invoice Entry) and can be directed to another Account Code at that stage if
required. The second Account is the GL Debtors Balance Sheet Control Account (of which there can
be several if you want to segregate Debtors by type).

The Drop Downs for Delivery Settings contain all the entries you have previously set up in the Codes
Tables. Note that you can also add new entries to any of these Tables from here and elsewhere
throughout the system without the necessity of having to leave this program;
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Sales Rep: Enter the Sales Rep that is assigned to this Customer from the Drop Down. The Sales
system has a sub-system which enables Sales Rep’s Commissions to be calculated based on invoiced
sales for associated customers and it is in this sub-system that the details of Sales Reps are set up
and maintained. For full details as to how this facility works, please refer to the Article “How does
the Sales Reps & Commission Management Feature Work?”.

Head Office Account: Tick this box to indicate that this Customer record is in respect of a Head
Office Account. It is possible to link this Head Office account with subsidiary or branch accounts.

Invoice Head Office: Use this flag to denote whether the Head Office Account associated with this
account should be invoiced instead of this Customer Account. This is used when centralised billing is
in place where sales to branches should be invoiced centrally to the Head office account. If this flag
is ticked, you should also specify the Head Office Account Code for Invoice purposes in the Drop
Down beside it. For further details refer to the Article “How does Head Office Accounting Work?”.

Customer Area, Region and Customer Group under Account Dimensions are attributes which can be
used for Sales Analysis Reporting. Inherited from Customer Defaults, they can be over-ridden here.

Referral: This Drop Down field from the Codes Tables allows you to record, for marketing purposes,
the source by which you acquired this Customer. However, if you have no use for this particular
code, then you can use it for an entirely different purpose if you wish.

As mentioned in the introduction many Companies will want to analyse their performance at a lower
level than that of just Company - such as Location, Department, Division, etc. Some of the
Company’s Customers will always “belong” to a particular part of this lower Company level. If this is
the case then this is the default “Department” for this Customer. A Department is a sub-division of
the company and its uses and setup are detailed in the article “How do I Implement Extended
Business Analysis?”. It is not a mandatory field as you may not wish to use Extended Business
Analysis. If there is an entry here, then it will be presented at Transaction Entry stage where it can
be re-directed to another GL Sales Account if required.

The Finance Settings Tab: Moving on to the next Tab;

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Under Bank Details enter the Bank details of the Customer. These fields will subsequently be used in
new functionality currently under development covering the areas of Customer Direct Debits and
Credit Cards. It is also used by some clients to extract a report and import information into
alternative DD generating systems.

Average Pay Days is a system maintained field which provides details of how long has passed
between Invoice and Receipt of funds based on an average over time. It is a useful metric to track in
order to classify late payers and to use within debt collection and credit control processes.

Credit Terms as defined in the Codes Tables, is the number of day’s credit this Customer is allowed
before the receipt of funds becomes overdue. It is also used in the Aged Balance receivables analysis
for each Customer’s Account to show the periods by which the Customer debt is outstanding period
by period, where a period is defined by the number of day’s credit..

And Credit Limit is the maximum amount of Credit being allowed to the Customer. During Order
entry or Invoice entry, warnings will be produced if this limit, or the Credit Terms limit, is being
exceeded.

Payment Method: This is the Payment Method normally used by this Customer to remit funds.

EDI Details: Mainly used by Customers who deal with large retailers, these fields are used to extract
their Sales Invoices in an electronic format to send to their own Customers. The system allows you to
generate Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) files for the purposes of billing Customers where this
form of file transfer is supported. Each customer must be identified by a unique EDI number which
can be recorded in this field. The file generated will contain a list of outstanding invoices due for
payment and the individual customers will be identified using this ID number. If you wish to use this
facility you will need to contact your system provider who will arrange for your particular format to
be specified if it is not already available.

Price Category and Price Lists: Price Categories allow you to classify Customers into different Groups
for individual pricing purposes. Price Lists allow you to set up and use special price lists for
promotions and such like. The topic of Price Category and Price Lists is covered in complete detail in
Chapter 4. and Chapter 5. of the Article “How do I Maintain Products and Services Type Items
(Sales)?”.

Discount is the amount of Discount you are extending to this Customer on his Invoices. It’s a straight
forward Discount percentage un-related to Payment Terms. Its format is such that 15% should be
coded as 0.15.

Franchise: This flag indicates whether this customer should be treated as a 'Franchisee' in the
context of a Franchise implementation of the system. For more information on this topic please read
the article "How do I, as a Franchisor, Interact with my Franchisee Companies?" available within the
administration layer.

Default Tax Code: During Transaction entry, the applicable Tax Codes are generally derived from
the Product or Service being sold. However, there are facilities for entering Invoices without Product
being involved (small household items for example). In Customer Batch Invoicing the Tax Code to be
used will be the one quoted here as a default – but which can be over-ridden during transaction
entry stage.

Use Tax Code: You can however, insist that the foregoing Tax Code and Rate is used even for
Product related Invoices – by ticking this box. It will still be a default rate which can be over-ridden
during transaction entry.
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VAT No. and VAT Exempt Ref. are used to record the relevant Tax Codes for this Customer.

The Contacts Tab: On the Contacts Tab you can set up a number of Contacts for this Customer
together will their phone no. and email address;

To add a new Contact simply click on “New Contact” and fill in the required information. Use the
“Set Primary Contact” to select one as the default Contact for subsequent Orders and Invoices.

The Notes Tab: On the Notes Tab you can add a series of Notes. To add a new Note click on “Add
New Note”, type in the Note, followed by “Save”.

The note is saved along with the name of the author and the date it was entered. You can find more
detailed information regarding this particular facility in the article “How Do I Attach Notes and
Images to a Document?
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The Custom Fields Tab: If there are other items of information that you would wish to hold against
each Customer, then you should avail of this facility to add these additional datums. The topic of
Custom fields and how to use and deploy them is detailed in the Article “How do I Create additional
User Defined Fields on Master Records?”.

As well as Notes and Custom fields, you can attach one or more Document Images and other Objects
(Terms & Conditions, References, Letters of Credit, Voice Mails, etc.) to the Customer’s Master
record. Click on the “Paper Clip” symbol displayed next to the “Attach Document” in the top right
hand corner of the window and follow the instructions detailed in the article “How Do I Attach
Notes and Images to a Document?”.

3. Actions: if you haven’t already, you should now “Save” your setup or maintenance changes
work. After that there are a number of “Actions” available to you which are documented elsewhere
in this series of “How To …” articles;