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Customer Accounts - Account Details

Customer Accounts - Account Details​

  • Customer Type: Selecting a customer type (click the arrow to the right of the field or press F3 and choose from the list displayed) ensures that:

    Inactive Customers appear in reports and statements, but cannot receive transactions. Prospective Customers do not appear on reports, and can only receive quotations. Active Customers appear in reports, and receive transactions.

  • Customer Name: Type all customer name details as they appear on invoices and statements. This field can accept up to 35 characters. Having the information at hand when you start saves time searching for invoices later.

  • Account Code: Create a customer code for each account (up to 16 characters) for quick reference possibilities later. This code should uniquely identify customers with similar names. For example, for two customers, Fastlane Ltd. And Fastlane Express Ltd., if you know the customer code for Fastlane is FAS001 and for Fastlane Express is FAS002, you can just type this in Account Code, and all of the details will appear. This allows you to access the account without typing the full name, and speeds up the recording process for sales invoices.

  • Country Currency: Typing the first part of a country name will bring up a currency, or alternatively, choose a currency from the drop-down list (or press F3). New currencies can be added by typing them in.

  • Customer Group: Customer Groups can be created by typing a name, selecting from existing groups by clicking the arrow to the right for a selection, or pressing F3 to bring up the same selection. If the group that you require does not exist, you can add in a group from here. See Setting up Customer Groups for details.

  • Category: Customer Accounts can also be grouped by category, for easy reference. For example, Computers Direct could be allocated a category called "COM".

  • Keywords: If you are using CRM then you can add keywords and associate a customer with a keyword or keywords.

  • Remarks: Use this field to record remarks or special instruction notes for the chosen customer. For example, 'Deliver before 10.00 AM'. Alternatively, use this field to record special purchase order references for the account, and so on.

  • Account Manager: The Account Manager is the person responsible for this account. Often it is the credit controller or a sales account manager. This can be useful for reporting purposes, and for filtering the screen view to show accounts associated with a selected account manager.

  • Branches:

    If you are using branches then you can assign a customer to a particular branch, or assign to all branches as required.

  • Tax Status: Select the Tax status of the customer to facilitate correct invoicing later. For example, Tax exempt customers will not be charged Tax, even though the product purchased could be subject to Tax. This saves valuable time solving such matters later.

  • Customer ABN (Australia and New Zealand) / Customer VAT Number (Europe): Enter the customer's Tax number. It is a legal requirement that you obtain a customer's Tax number for certain circumstances.

  • Bank Name: Entering the customer's bank name allows you to print bank giro forms correctly in invoices and statements. This can help to speed up the payment process.

  • Bank Branch: Again this can be useful to have for bank giros, or alternatively, should a credit reference be needed, this will facilitate an approach to the bank to elicit the quickest response.

  • Usual Sales Analysis: If you have a sales person who normally deals with this customer, you can assign this person to that customer. This will assign all sales to this sales person by default and can be used for calculating commission on such sales. The sales analysis names can be typed or a choice selected from existing analysis names by clicking the arrow to the right of the field or pressing F3 to select. See Adding a Sales Analysis for details.

  • Credit Control: An added security feature, credit control allows you to stop invoices, orders or deliveries until a customer has satisfied your credit terms, or to disallow any sales in the future with some customers. These appear with warning symbols to the left of the customer name. You can select a Credit Policy for the customer or set the credit control setting manually for each customer see Credit Policies

Note: When you open a customer, or supplier account to view the details, the balances on each account are recalculated automatically so that the age balances reflect the up to date situation. However, on customers or suppliers with many transactions, the process of opening the account could be slow. Therefore, if you do not want the balances automatically recalculated, you can turn this option Off, by selecting Tools\Options\Switches Tab, and unticking the appropriate option.