Accounts can mean vendor accounts, customer accounts, internal department accounts, or many others depending on your case use. The good news is that to add an account of any type, you will go to the same place in the system: MENU->ACCOUNTS->ACCOUNTS->Add button.
What are Accounts?
A note about terminology: Accounts do not mean your organizations users. Those are called users. Although, an account type could be internal, such as county departments within a county using Flowtrac. In this case, accounts are departments, and could have users in the system within those departments. This is the case with many of our government sector clients.
Another note about terminology: Accounts do not refer to your own bank accounts or financials. In a WMS or IMS like Flowtrac, these are fields of data that interact with product movement and management. However, accounts in the system can be used to support your accounting and financials in various ways. This is often a main reason people are looking for a better way to manage inventory when they find us.
How do they work?
For example, when creating a pick order, you can add to the pick order information the customer account it is being picked for or to whom the products are being sold. As another example, on a receive order (or PO), you can attach a vendor account to keep track of where the order will be shipped from in route to your location, and/or who you paid for the order.
Creating an account:
- MENU->ACCOUNTS->ACCOUNTS->”Add” button
- The new account window, titled in the top bar “Account-Add”, will appear.
- Enter the name of the account in the “Name” field at the top. This is required.
- Enter the type of account it is in the “Type” field. For example, is this a vendor or a customer? (Use the magnifying glass in the “Type” field will pull up all account types currently in the system to choose from. More types can be added if needed). The “Type” field required.
- Enter more details about the account in the other fields provided. This is not required.
- Click the “Create” button at the bottom of the “Account-Add” window.
- Click the “Save” button.
- Close window.
Useful Fields
Fields are all the fill-in-the-blank sections in your “Account – Add” window in which you enter the data that applies. Not all fields available are required. They can also be filled out later. But here is more details on fields clients most commonly use:
Billing Address–
Here you will enter the billing address of the account. This is the address that will be used on any reports or printouts of orders such as Sales Orders and Bill of Lading. Note that the “Name” and “Company” fields on the billing address is not the same as what you name the account in the field at the top of the “Account – Add” window. You can use the same name for this or different as appropriate for this account.
Miscellaneous–
In section, you will find the option to set categories on your account. This is different than the “Type” (e.g., Vendor, Customer, Department) of account that you have already entered at the top of the “Account – Add” window as a required field. Categories are ways you’d like to perhaps group together. It can help with searching and reporting on certain categories (groups) beyond their general type. For example, you could categorize vendors by their geography, or by what products they provide you.
Backorder–
Backorder refers to what happens at the end of an order that is not fully fulfilled yet is nevertheless marked as completed. If all products that were originally added to the receive order (i.e., PO), the system will automatically generate a new order for the remaining products. If you do not want this to happen, select “No”. This field is set to “Yes” by default.
Notes–
Many of our clients take advantage of the ability to add notes at the account level. Notes can be anything additional text or attachment you’d like to connect with the account for future reference. The same button is found in other places in the system such as for products and orders.
Account Activity-
The “Account Activity” button is the a quick way to see what orders have been created and fulfilled that are tied to this account. You can generate reports from this list. More details of the order can be found here by clicking on the blue hyperlinked order number found in the grid of account activity that appears when you click on the “Account Activity” button in the “Account – (name of account)” window.