QuoteWerks can create and print many types of documents such as quotes, orders, sales orders, purchase orders, and invoices. There are only three types of documents that are saved to the database which are QUOTE, ORDER, and INVOICE. Sales orders and purchase orders are just different output formats of the ORDER type document.
For more information about documents and the specific types, please see:
- Document Type and Status
- Quotes
- Orders
- Invoices
- Project Numbers
Document Type and Status
Document Type
In QuoteWerks, there are three document types: QUOTE, ORDER, and INVOICE. In the QuoteWerks database, the Document Type is stored in the DocType field. This field will contain a value of QUOTE, ORDER, or INVOICE. When you want to find a list of Quotes or run a management report that displays only Orders, it is this DocType field that is referenced.
NOTE: Users with Master Rights can hold down the CTRL key and double-click on the Document Type label (located on the upper right of the Document Items tab of the quote workbook) to manually change the document type. This could be useful in cases where a quote was converted to an order accidentally; you can easily set the document back to a quote. Please keep in mind however, that if you have links to this quote in your CRM software, those links are not updated when making this manual change.
Document Status
Documents also have a DocStatus field which stores the current status of the document. The default selections for a Quote type document are Closed, Dead, Draft, Lost, Open and Quoted, but are completely customizable and should be adjusted to match your sales process. For example, a Quote type document typically goes through various stages. Initially, it is “1-In Progress” while the sales rep is building the Quote. Next, the status may be set to “2-Awaiting Manager Approval”, next it may be set to “3-Manager Approved”, followed by “4-Presented to Customer”, and the last stage of either “Accepted” or “Lost”.
The default selections for an Order type document are Closed, Open and Won, but are completely customizable and should be adjusted to match your order handling process. An Order type document typically goes through various stages (different from Quote stages). Initially, it is “1-Open”, followed by “2-Parts Ordered”, “3-Parts Received”, “4-Technician Scheduled”, “5-Work Completed/Awaiting Approval”, and then the last stage of “6-Ready to Invoice”.
Invoices go through similar stages as Orders.
Typically, you will manually change the DocStatus value on the Sale Info tab as you recognize the document has progressed to the next stage. There are certain times that the document status will be automatically changed for you. For example, when a new document is created, a document status will be assigned. When a document is converted from, for example, a Quote to an Order, a DocStatus will be assigned. Lastly when a Quote is converted to a Lost Sale, a document status will be assigned. The Document Status that is assigned in each of these instances can be specified on the Installation tab of the Setup -> Options menu.
You can setup the list of stages for a Quote by having a Quote Open and then clicking on the ellipsis button of the DocStatus field on the Sale Info tab. On the F2 Lookup window that is displayed, you can add any stages that you would like. To setup the list of stages for an Order or Invoice, you would follow the same steps as for a Quote, but you would need to begin by opening an Order or Invoice respectively.
Similar to the DocType field, the Doc Status field is useful when locating Quotes and when reporting on Quotes. For example, you can find a list of all Quotes awaiting manager approval by selecting the DocType of Quote and the DocStatus of “2-Awaiting Manager Approval”.
Quotes
Quotes are the most commonly used type of document in QuoteWerks. When you create a new document by selecting the File -> New menu, by clicking on the [New] button on the icon toolbar, or by clicking on the split-menu arrow drop-down and selecting New Quote, a quote type of document is created. Quote documents have their own automatic numbering sequence.
When QuoteWerks is first installed, the first quote number will typically be AAAQ1001, where “AAA” is the location prefix, the “Q” denotes that this document is a quote, and the 1001 is the automatic numbering sequence. The automatic numbering sequence cannot be changed. The “Q” cannot be changed. The location prefix can be changed. See Setting Up QuoteWerks for more details on the location prefix.
NOTE: By default, all new documents will be quotes. This default can be changed to orders or invoices on the Documents tab of the Tools -> Options menu.
PDF Quotes
There are two main ways to work with PDF quotes:
- Clicking File > Print/E-Mail/Deliver or the Deliver icon on the main toolbar
- Clicking Save as PDF on the Print, Share, Publish, Deliver Document window that appears.
2. E-Mailing a PDF quote.
Lost Sales
In the event that that a quote is not accepted, i.e. “lost”, QuoteWerks allows you to convert the quote to a lost sale. This is done by selecting File -> Convert to Lost Sale. Selecting the File -> Convert to Lost Sale menu accomplishes two tasks. First, it sets the DocStatus field of the quote to a value that identifies the quote as “lost”. The ability to identifying the difference between an active quote and a lost quote is very important when running reports such as “Outstanding quotes reports” since you do not want lost quotes showing up as potential sales. Second, it updates the associated forecasted sale/sales opportunity in the contact manager (if applicable) as a lost sale. The DocStatus value that identifies the quote as lost can be setup on the Installation tab of the Setup -> Options menu.
Orders
Once a quote is accepted by a customer, you can choose to convert the quote document to an order document. Converting a quote to an order is mostly done so that you can track information about your documents. Once you have converted a quote to an order, you can now track information about orders. Management reports can be created that will show only orders, and not quotes during the month of November as an example.
To convert a quote to an order, open the quote, and then select the File -> Convert to Order menu:
NOTE: If you have already converted a quote to an order or invoice, a warning message will appear confirming that you still wish to convert this quote to an order. It will provide the date, time, and the QuoteWerks user who converted the document. This is to reduce any errors that may be caused by another user converting the same document without your knowledge.
Users can also create new Order documents by clicking on the File-> New menu option or by clicking on the split-menu arrow and selecting the "New Order" option. If a user creates an order this way, the Convert to Order window will not appear since the document is being created as an order.
After you make this selection, QuoteWerks will issue the next available order number like AAAO1001 for example. The order number sequence is separate from the quote number sequence. See Quotes for further explanation of the AAAO1001 format.
When converting a quote to an order, the DocDate field on the Sale Info tab will be updated with the date of the conversion. If the quote was accepted through QuoteValet, the date of the acceptance will be used.
Allocate inventory for this Order
When converting the quote to an order, you will have the option to “Allocate Inventory for this Order”. If you check this checkbox, QuoteWerks will reduce the inventory count of the item as listed in the native product source by the appropriate quantity for each item in the order. This option can be defaulted on the Installation tab of the Setup -> Options menu. For information on how to set the inventory count, see the Availability field description in Setting Up Native Products and Services.
Apply default literature for new Order
You also have the option to "Apply default literature for new Order", which will add the default Order literature to the existing selections currently associated with the Quote. These defaults are set on the Documents tab of the Setup-> Options menu.
Remove Non-Selected Optional Items
If you have optional items on your quote that were not selected by the customer you can check the box to have them removed from your document.
Also, the “Convert this Quote to an Order” window will display the new status of the quote and the status of the New Order. Lastly, if you have any revisions of the quote, they will be displayed and you will have the option of deleting those revisions by putting a check mark next to the Doc No.
Sales Orders
A Sales Order is a document that is used internally by your company to print cost and profit information about an order. Unlike quotes, orders, and invoices, a sales order does not have its own numbering sequence, and it is not a separate document from the order. A unique feature found in the sales order type of print layout is that when it is printed, it will “disassemble/expand” grouped bundles and grouped configurations. So if you have a grouped bundle on the quote with a group quantity of 3, and you have 4 line items in the bundle each with a quantity of 1, when the sales order is printed, there will be 4 line items on the quote each with a quantity of 3. QuoteWerks formats the data this way when printing a Sales Order print layout to prepare the data for presentation to your vendor. It will also not include comment type of line items from the order since it assumes that the comment lines were meant for your customer, not your vendor that you are purchasing the products from. To print a sales order, just open the order that you want to print a sales order for, and select File -> Print/E-mail/Deliver. On the File -> Print/E-mail/Deliver window, check the box next to the “Display all Layout types” checkbox. Then choose a Sales Order layout from the list and print it.
Purchase Orders
A Purchase Order is a document that is used internally by your company to purchase the items that your customer ordered. Unlike quotes, orders, and invoices, a purchase order does not have its own numbering sequence, and it is not a separate document from the order. To print a purchase order, just open the order that you want to print a purchase order(s) for, and select File -> Print/E-mail/Deliver. On the File -> Print/E-mail/Deliver window. Then choose a purchase order layout from the list and print it.
When you select a purchase order type of print layout, the “Create PO for each Vendor” checkbox will appear above the list of layouts:
If you check this box, QuoteWerks will look at each line item in your document, and create a separate purchase order for each unique vendor name as it appears in the vendor column of the quote. QuoteWerks will look in the vendor list (Setup -> Vendors menu) for that vendor name to obtain the vendors address, phone number, etc. and place it on the purchase order.
To create the PO’s you will need to click on the [Print], [Preview], or [E-Mail] buttons.
QuoteWerks will then launch the “Select Vendors to create PO’s for” window:
This window displays a list of Vendors on the Order and will allow you to select the Vendor(s) that you want to create PO’s for. Finally, click on the [Ok] button to create the purchase order for the first Vendor.
When printing each purchase order, QuoteWerks will append an alphabetically sequenced letter to the end of the order number to create each purchase order number. If you do not want QuoteWerks to automatically create that purchase order Number, you can remove the DocumentHeadersDocNo field from the purchase order print layout, and insert a dialog field instead. When you print the purchase order, the dialog field will ask you to enter the purchase order number that you want on the purchase order. For more details on creating Dialog Fields, please see Printing and Customizing Document Layouts.
When using the “Create PO for each Vendor” feature, please note that the totaling values have been designed to return a zero value. The line items and their price extensions will print correctly; there will just be no total for all the items on the Purchase Order. Also, when using this feature, the cover page macros may not function as you may expect.
If you do not check the “Create PO for each Vendor” checkbox, and there are line items for more than 1 vendor in the document, all of the vendors line items will be printed in the purchase order, and no vendor address information will be printed on the purchase order.
Invoices
A quote document or an order document can be converted to an invoice document. Converting a quote or order to an invoice is mostly done so that you can track information about your documents. Once you have converted a quote or order to an invoice, you can now track information about invoices. Management reports can now be created that will show only invoices and not quotes or orders during the month of November for example.
To convert a quote or order to an invoice, open the quote, and then select the File -> Convert to Invoice menu:
After you make this selection, QuoteWerks will issue the next available invoice number like AAAI1001 for example. The invoice number sequence is separate from the quote number and order number sequence. See the quotes section for further explanation of the AAAI1001 format.
When converting a quote or order to an invoice, the DocDate field on the Sale Info tab will be updated with the date of the conversion. If the quote or order was accepted through QuoteValet, the date of the acceptance will be used.
When converting the quote/order to an invoice, you will also have the option to “Allocate Inventory for this Invoice”. If you check this checkbox, QuoteWerks will reduce the inventory count of the item as listed in the native product database by the appropriate quantity for each item in the invoice. Please note that you must only reduce the inventory count 1 time. If you convert a quote to an order and choose to reduce the inventory at that time, when you convert the order to an invoice, do not reduce the inventory a second time. You also have the option to "Apply default literature for new Invoice", which will add the default Invoice literature to the existing selections currently associated with the Quote/Order. These defaults are set on the Documents tab of the Tools -> Options menu.
Also, the “Convert this Quote/Order to an Invoice” window will display the new status of the quote/order and the status of the New Invoice. Lastly, if you have any revisions of the quote/order, they will be displayed and you will have the option of deleting those revisions by putting a checkmark next to the Doc No.
Users can also create new Invoice documents by clicking on the File-> New menu option or by clicking on the split-menu arrow and selecting the "New Invoice" option. If a user creates an order this way, the Convert to Invoice window will not appear since the document is being created as an invoice.
Project Numbers
QuoteWerks automatically assigns unique project numbers to all new documents.
When a quote is converted to an order, and you choose the “Preserve the Quote” option, the project number from the quote is copied into the new order. This allows you to see which quotes are related to which orders. The same applies when converting a quote/order to an invoice. In addition, QuoteWerks will copy the project number into any revisions of quotes, orders, and invoices.
Project numbers are automatically created by QuoteWerks, but they can be manually overridden or edited by clicking the ellipses button to the right of the project number box and selecting “Enter Project No Manually”. You can also select an existing project number from the drop down list.
NOTE: Only project numbers in documents that the current user has rights to view will be listed in the drop down list.
NOTE: If the user has the Misc Access right of “CannotManuallyModifyProjectNo”, the ellipses button will be disabled.
When you open a document and select the File -> Duplicate menu option (to create a copy of the original document as a new document), by default the project number is NOT copied into that new document. On the File -> Duplicate window, there is a checkbox to “Copy Project # into the duplicate” to override this default behavior:
To view all the documents that have the same project number as the document that you currently have open, simply select the View -> Associated Documents menu.
