ALERE SALES MODULE

This one module handles the entire sales process from quoting all the way through receiving customer payments. The Sales Module does approach processing an order a bit differently than you may be used to. Instead of starting by choosing what type of order you want to process from a menu (quote, sales order, invoice, return order, credit memo, blanket order, and recurring order) you simply open the order screen and set the order type. This saves a lot of clicking back and forth among menu choices.

Another innovation is having the choice once an order is entered to either release the order or save it as a pending order. What is the difference? When an order is released the items on the order are allocated in inventory and the order value is included in the total of the orders your company has received. The order is also considered "live" and your company is free to include it in any material planning activities and to ship it.

Being able to save an order as "pending" however gives you a whole host of other options. Incomplete or partially entered orders can be saved instead of being cancelled. This avoids having to re-enter them later. As a pending order they can still be fully edited including lines added, changed or deleted. Some companies use pending orders to stage orders in advance to be released as groups. Pending orders can be accepted one-at-a-time or mass released. Pending orders add a great deal of flexibility to the order process.

Speaking of flexibility, each line on a sales order can be either a sale, a drop shop, a return or a credit. This permits one order to handle multiple sales functions instead of having to create several separate orders. Net negative orders can be converted directly to credit memos and those credit memos can be converted directly to a payable so a refund check can be easily issued.

Use the DAQ (Data Acquisition) product to enter items on a sales order using real-time bar coding and to ship the orders.

Even the shipping process gives you many options. A whole or partial order can be invoiced without being shipped so you can receive payment before releasing the order. You can ship the order without it being invoiced. This permits multiple separate shipments to be made and then one invoice to be created for everything that was shipped. The normal ship and invoice at the same time can be done.

A convenient Inquiry screen permits you to to see a listing of all sales related documents (orders, invoices, credit memos, return orders, etc.) for a company. Each line on the screen displays the type of document, for example invoices, and the net outstanding value of all the invoices. You can then drill down on that line to see a list of the individual invoices and their balances. The actual invoice can be displayed by drilling down on the invoice listed.

Customers have their own screen which is a subset of the Manager Module's Company screen. Any new customers entered or any information changed automatically updates the Company information. Customer part numbers and your equivalent part numbers can be stored so that customers who prefer to order items using their own part numbers can do so.

To save you time processing orders, ALERE supports mass accepting of pending orders and mass shipping of all or selected orders. Even the task or preparing monthly customer statements can be simplified by mass emailing them saving time and the expenses of envelopes, labels and postage.

 For most companies setting pricing for customers can be a difficult task. Not so in ALERE. As many pricing rules as you need can be easily defined. Each rule allows you control of everything from all customers, to groups of customers, and right down to a specific customer. The same control extends to items and locations on the rule. If the rule is only good for certain dates, those dates can be entered. Tiers can be established that control pricing for applying discounts to different quantities or extended prices.

Since many companies end up with complex pricing rules there can be very many to set up to cover every situation. That leads to the problem of making sure the rules operates as you intended. ALERE allow you to test rules before putting them into service. The testing will show each rule that applies in order of the lowest price to the highest. This is also a great way to quickly give a customer a price and for advising them of price breaks at different quantity levels.

The Sales Module does a great deal more and has features you both expect and ones you didn't. Take time to ask us for a personal webinar to better explore all ALERE offers.