Customers, parts, quotes and pricing
Sales in Amp-Hour is three screens: Customers, Parts and Quotes. The part record holds the price, the finish and the thickness tolerance, so a quote, a job and an invoice all start from the same numbers.
Customers
Sales > Customers lists every customer with code, name, city, state, phone, terms and active flag. The customer record carries billing address, a separate Ship-To Address, phone and email, Terms (days), Credit Limit, Tax Exempt, Industry and Sales Rep, plus the switches that drive the rest of the system:
- Cert of Compliance Required
- On by default. Shipping issues a cert per job for this customer.
- Default Packing Instructions
- Used on the traveler and packing slip when a part has none of its own.
- Customer Portal Access
- Lets invited contacts sign in to see their jobs, certs, invoices and quotes.
- Email When Jobs Ship, Email Invoices
- Send the shipment notice and the invoice to the customer's contacts.
Custom fields added under Settings > Fields appear on the customer form as Additional fields.
The customer page opens with a strip showing open balance, sales year to date, open jobs and parts on file, and buttons for Receive job, New quote, New part and, for finance roles, Statement. Below are Contacts (name, title, phone, email, primary flag), the Activity and follow-ups log, the parts on file with process and price, recent jobs with due date and status, and either invoices or quotes depending on your role.
An activity is a note, call, email, visit, follow-up or complaint with a subject, notes, a follow-up date and a done flag. When a portal user submits a quote request it lands here as a follow-up activity, and everyone with an Office, Manager or Administrator role gets a notification.
Parts
A part belongs to one customer and carries Part Number and Revision, Description, Material (from the materials master, which selects material-specific routing variants) and a material description such as 6061-T6, the Process / Finish, Customer Price, Price Unit and Minimum Lot Charge, thickness min, max and unit, surface area and weight per piece, drawing revision, masking and special instructions, pieces per rack, a Barrel Plated flag, the packaging fields, a Precious Metal Factor and a part image.
The part page shows the image and a job history for that part number with customer PO, quantity, received and due dates and status. Customers and parts import from CSV under Settings > Data.
Pricing
Prices are per unit, and the unit is one of each, lb, sqft, sqin, lot, rack, barrel or hour. Each line also has a minimum lot charge; the extended amount is the greater of quantity times price and the minimum. The lookup order is the same everywhere a price is needed:
| Value | Taken from | Falls back to |
|---|---|---|
| Unit price | Customer Price on the part | Default Price on the process |
| Price unit | Price Unit on the part | Price Unit on the process |
| Minimum lot charge | Part | Process |
| Thickness min, max, unit | Part | Process |
Picking a part on a quote line or on Receive job fills these in; you can still type over them for that quote or job. For finishes on a precious metal, the part's metal factor and the daily metal price add a surcharge line at invoicing. That is covered under Precious metals.
Quotes
Sales > Quotes lists quotes with customer, date, valid-until date, line count, total and status, with tabs for All, Draft, Sent, Accepted, Converted and Lost. New quote asks for the customer, an Attention name and a Valid until date, which defaults to 30 days out. Each line has:
- Part: an existing part number for that customer, or New P/N with a typed part number and description.
- Process, quantity, price, the per unit, minimum charge and lead time in days (default 5).
- Extended, computed as you type, with the quote total at the bottom.
Choosing an existing part fills the process, price, unit, minimum charge and description from the part. On a new-part line, choosing the process fills the process defaults. Notes and terms print on the quote. Status is set by hand to Draft, Sent, Accepted or Lost.
Print produces the Quotation (form PO-QTE-01) with quote number, dates, customer address and the line table with process and specification, price per unit, minimum lot charge, lead days and extended amount. A standing note says that precious-metal prices are based on the metal price on the quote date and that a surcharge applies when the market price exceeds the base.
Convert a quote to jobs
Convert to jobs opens a dialog where you enter the customer PO, tick the lines the customer ordered and set the quantity received for each. Every ticked line becomes a job at the quoted price, unit, minimum charge and lead time, with the line description carried into the job notes. A line quoted for a new part number creates the part on the customer's part master with the quoted process and price, so the next order for that part is already priced.
While some lines are still unconverted the quote shows Accepted; once every line has a job it becomes Converted, is read-only and can only be printed. Converted quotes cannot be deleted; any other quote can be deleted from its page.
Reports
Analysis > Reports has Sales by customer, Sales by process, Job profitability and On-time delivery, each with a date range and CSV export.
Customer-owned stock
Some customers send bulk parts to be held at the shop and then release a quantity at a time with a purchase order. Tick Customer stock held here on the part. The part page then shows a Customer stock card with the pieces on hand, a Receive stock button for each shipment from the customer (quantity, their packing list or PO number, a note) and an Adjust button for count corrections and pieces returned to them, with the history of every movement, who recorded it and which job drew it.
Sales > Customer stock lists every stocked part with customer, pieces on hand, open job quantity and the date of the last receipt, with a Receive button on each row.
On Receive job, choosing a stocked part shows the balance on hand and a Draw from customer stock box, ticked by default. Saving the job takes its quantity out of the balance and the job page shows Drawn from customer stock. If the quantity is more than is on hand the job is refused with the shortfall; you can receive the missing stock first, untick the box, or confirm and let the balance go negative until the next shipment arrives. Editing the job quantity moves the draw with it, splitting a lot divides it between the two jobs, and cancelling the job puts the pieces back.