This Tech Tip discusses pro-forma order entry and activation.

The pro-forma business case

A customer calls for a quote of an order and wants you to send it for review.  At this point, you don’t know if the order will be acted upon or not, so you can choose to enter it as pro forma.

You enter one or more pro-forma orders into the database and send to the customer.

When the customer calls back to purchase, most likely the Advantage representative will begin to enter a new order. At this time, any pro-forma order(s) for this customer will display in a dialog for the representative to Activate, Void or Iignore.

Selecting Activate copies the pro-forma order information into the new order automatically. You don’t have to reenter the order details!

Entering pro-forma orders

For a pro-forma (order type O), you enter order details the usual way (MSTDAT/FST), however, the product, subscription or online service isn’t fulfilled. Rather, the orders post with the other daily activity but do not fulfill. You then run a pro-forma printing process the CIR248 Pro-forma Reminders process, for example, to print and send to the customer.

Managing pro-forma orders

When responding to a customer’s call by starting a new order, any pro-forma orders for that customer in the database pop-up in a dialog to be activated, voided or ignored. 

The Activate button copies the pro-forma order details into the new order automatically.

The Void button removes the highlighted pro-form order from displaying in the future. You ignore the displayed orders by clicking the Cancel button. This means you decided not to use any pro-forma order and may activate one or more at a later date.

The Inquire… button allows you to drill down into the pro-forma order to confirm the details before activating or voiding.

You may schedule and run the pro-forma purge process (MST820) to void pro-forma orders that you determine to be out-dated.

For more information refer to your Master Order manual or contact your Advantage account manager.