Managing Partners

Creating a Partner

The Procurement manager, the Sales manager and the owner of your organization can create a partner.

1. Go to Business Partners > Partners and press New.
2. Fill in the General section:
   • Name: the partner’s legal name or trading name, such as “Sarl El Baraka Import-Export”.
   • Code: the app fills in the next partner code, PAR-000042 after PAR-000041. All partners share one series, clients and suppliers alike. You can keep the code, or type your own, such as BARAKA. If you clear it, the app gives the next code when you save. You can change the code later on the partner’s page.
   • Tax identifier: the partner’s tax number, its NIF in Algeria. A printed document shows it as NIF until the partner’s Legal identifiers tab holds an active number.
3. Under Partner roles, Client is already ticked. Tick Supplier if you buy from this partner.
4. Untick Client if you do not sell to this partner. A partner needs at least one of the two roles.
5. Fill in the section of each role that you ticked. The next sections describe Supplier details and Client details.
6. If you want, fill in Contact information and the Notes. No document prints the website.
7. Press Save.

You can also start a partner from the form that needs one, and keep that form open. A purchase order, a supplier’s bill and an import dossier have a New supplier link under their Supplier field. It opens a new partner in a new tab. Supplier is ticked on it, and Client is not. Under the Client field of a quotation, an order or an invoice, New client opens a new partner as a client. Picking a record from another list says how to bring it into the form that you came from.

A partner’s page has a tab for its addresses, its contacts, its legal identifiers and its categories. Only the owner of your organization can add a line on these four tabs, unless the owner gives you that right. If you can add a line on a tab, that tab is there while you create the partner. So you do not have to save the partner first. The first line that you add with Add in one of them saves the partner, and then opens the line (Adding lines before you save).

A supplier has two more tabs, which appear when Supplier is ticked. On a new partner, each of them appears only if you can add a row to it:

• Supplier products: the products that you buy from this supplier, one to a row. A row holds the Supplier reference and the supplier’s own name for the product. It also holds the purchase unit, the minimum order quantity, the standard price and the lead time. The Procurement manager and the owner of your organization can add a row. Where a line’s price comes from says what an order takes from it.
• Performance: one row for each calendar quarter, with the on-time deliveries, the fulfillment rate, the defect rate, the quality rating and the response time. Supplier performance says how the app counts each figure. Only the owner of your organization can add a row.

What the app fills in. Each time a goods receipt from this supplier reaches Completed, the app updates the active Supplier products row of each product that the receipt accepted. Last purchase price takes the order line’s unit price, before any discount. Last purchase date takes the receipt’s Receipt date. If the receipt’s date is earlier than the row’s Last purchase date, the app leaves the row as it is.

When a goods receipt completes a purchase order, the app counts that order on the Performance tab. It counts the order in the calendar quarter that holds the receipt’s Receipt date. Then it works out that quarter’s rates, Total orders and Total order value again. The app does not count the Quality rating or the Average response time (hours). Only the owner of your organization can type them.

If you untick Active on a Supplier products row, the app also unticks Preferred. Then a supplier that you can still order from can be the preferred one for that product. If you tick Active again, Preferred stays unticked.

Supplier Details

When Supplier is ticked, the Supplier details section asks for these fields.

Supplier Type

The supplier type says where the partner sits in your supply chain. The partner list shows it, and you can narrow the list on it. Nothing else in the app reads it.

Supplier Status

The status says whether you can do new business with the supplier. A new supplier starts as Active. The app never changes the status by itself, so each other status is one that somebody chose.

When the supplier status is not Active, the app refuses three steps, also on documents that already exist:

• It does not mark an order to the supplier as Sent.
• It does not approve the supplier’s bill.
• It does not record a payment to the supplier.

You can still send goods back to the supplier and record a debit note. When somebody approves a requisition, the app does not order from a supplier that is not Active.

The Supplier field of a purchase order, a supplier’s bill and an import dossier offers only the suppliers whose status is Active. So you never pick a supplier that the app then refuses at Sent. Other fields offer every supplier that you have not deactivated, whatever its status. These are a return to a supplier, a debit note, an asset’s warranty supplier and a spare part’s preferred supplier.

Other Supplier Fields

• Supplier payment terms: when you have to pay this supplier (payment terms), such as Net 30. A new purchase order opens on these terms. A bill counts its due date from its order’s terms. If the order has none, the bill uses these terms. If the supplier has none either, the bill is due in 30 days.
• Supplier credit limit: how much you are willing to owe this supplier, in your organization’s currency. The app only stores this figure. Nothing reads it, and it refuses no purchase order.

Client Details

When Client is ticked, the Client details section asks for these fields.

Client Type

The client type says what kind of business you do with the partner. The partner list shows it, and you can narrow the list on it. Nothing else in the app reads it.

Client Status

A new client starts as Active. The app never changes the status by itself. A prospect does not become an active client by itself. Before you convert its quotation into an order, set its client status to Active.

When the client status is not Active, the app refuses these steps, also on documents that already exist:

• It does not mark a quotation to the client as Sent, unless the client is a prospect.
• It does not turn a quotation into an order with Convert to sales order.
• It does not mark an order of the client as Confirmed.
• It does not mark an invoice to the client as Sent.

You can still record a payment that the client makes to you.

The Client field of an order and an invoice offers only the clients whose status is Active. A quotation’s field offers your prospects too. A delivery note, a credit note and a return offer every client that you have not deactivated, whatever its status. None of them offers a partner that is only a supplier.

Other Client Fields

• Client payment terms: when this client has to pay you (payment terms). A new quotation, order or invoice opens on these terms, and the invoice’s due date follows them.
• Usual payment method: how this client usually pays you, such as Cash or Cheque. A new order opens on it, and so does the invoice made from that order. If it is Cash, the invoice adds the stamp duty.
• Client credit limit: how much this client can owe you, in your organization’s currency. The app itself does not refuse an order over the limit. An approval workflow can test it (Configuring approval workflows). If a rule of the workflow uses Client credit limit exceeded, an order that takes the client over its limit goes to an approver. Only the owner of your organization can set up a workflow.

What the client owes is what is left to pay on its invoices that are Sent, Partially paid or Past due. The app counts each invoice in your organization’s currency, so an invoice in euros counts at the day’s rate. If no rate is on file for that day, the rule counts the client as over its limit.

Changing a Status

You do not change a partner’s status in the edit form. You change it on the partner’s own page, with the pill in the strip at the top. The page has one pill for each role that the partner has. When the partner is both a supplier and a client, each pill carries the name of its role. Click a pill to see every status that it can move to, pick one, and confirm. The Procurement manager, the Sales manager and the owner of your organization can change a status.

A partner shows no row of stages, unlike a quotation or a purchase order. Every status is one move from every other, in both directions, and none of them is an end. A blacklisted supplier goes back to Active in one click. A supplier that has worked with you for years can go back to Pending approval when something needs checking again. This is on purpose, because a partner’s status says what the relationship is today.

The Active switch is a different thing. You find it under More actions (the three dots), as Deactivate and Activate. The status says what the relationship is. The switch says whether the app offers the partner anywhere at all.

Finding a partner

The Partners list narrows on its filter button (Working with lists). You can narrow it by:

• Supplier or Client
• the type and the status of each role
• the payment terms, the currency or Active
• a band of credit limit

A partner’s own tabs narrow in the same way:

• the addresses by type, country, default and active
• the contacts by primary and active
• the legal identifiers by active and order
• the categories by category
• the supplier products by product, unit, currency, preferred and active. You can also narrow them by a band of price, of quantity or of lead time, or by a window of last purchase. A buyer often asks for the preferred rows with a lead time under a week.
• the performance rows by period, currency or any of the rates

Dual-Role Partners

A partner with both Supplier and Client ticked has two separate sets of details. This is common. For example, a company makes your packaging, so you buy from it. It also buys your finished goods to resell them.

Each role has its own type, status, payment terms and credit limit, and its own pill at the top of the page. A change to the supplier status does not change the client status, and the other way round. If you untick a role, its section leaves the form and the partner’s page, and the save clears its fields. So a supplier that stops being one keeps none of its supplier terms or its credit limit. No report can then read a figure that the relationship no longer has. If you tick the role again before you save, its fields still hold what you typed. If you tick it again after you save, its status starts as Active again.

Deactivation

When you stop dealing with a partner, deactivate it, and do not delete it. Open the partner and choose Deactivate under More actions. The Procurement manager, the Sales manager and the owner of your organization can do this. When you deactivate a partner:

• The app no longer offers it on a new document.
• The app refuses it at the steps that commit a document, such as Sent on a purchase order or Confirmed on a sales order.
• It stays on its past documents, with its addresses, its contacts and its history.
• You can bring it back with Activate.

Delete removes a partner for good. Only the owner of your organization can delete a partner, unless the owner gives you that right. The app refuses the delete while a document or another record names the partner, such as a Supplier products row or a Performance row. So delete only a partner that you created by mistake. The app deletes the partner’s addresses, contacts, legal identifiers and category links with it. A few fields that named the partner become empty, such as an asset’s warranty supplier or a spare part’s preferred supplier.

System Partners

The app creates some partners itself. The one that you will meet is the walk-in customer, with the code WALKIN. The Point of Sale creates it when a register first needs it. When a session closes, the app invoices that session’s sales to customers with no name to the walk-in customer. The app gives it a name in your organization’s language, such as Walk-in Customer in English.

The app keeps system partners for you:

• Their identity is locked. You cannot change the code, the name, the Client tick or the Active switch, and you cannot delete the partner. The invoices and tickets of past sessions depend on it. You can still change its other fields, such as its notes and its payment terms.
• The pickers leave them out. The app does not offer the walk-in customer when you pick a client on a sales document or a payment. Only the register’s sales reach it. A document that already names it still shows its name.

Tips

• Set up payment terms first. Before you add your partners, the owner of your organization adds your usual payment terms, such as Net 30 and Net 60. Then they are ready to pick.
• Let the codes number themselves. Each new partner opens on the next code, so all the codes have one shape and nobody guesses. Type your own code only where a code already means something outside Beelocity, such as the account number that your accountant keeps for that partner.
• Fill in the tax identifier. A printed document shows it as NIF until the partner’s Legal identifiers tab holds an active number.
• Use categories only to record your groups. You see a partner’s categories on its Categories tab, and no list, filter or report reads them yet (Categories).
• Review the statuses from time to time. Set a supplier that you no longer buy from to Inactive, or deactivate a partner that you no longer deal with. Then nobody puts it on a new order by mistake.