A Quotation is a document sent to a potential customer offering to sell goods or services at a certain price, under specified conditions. It is used to let a potential customer know the cost of goods or services before they decide to purchase them. When a seller sends a quotation, it commits them to a certain price. This is why quotations are mostly used when costs are relatively stable and the services/goods to be provided can be accurately estimated (labor, cost of raw materials, etc.

This topic covers how to setup a Quotations and Estimating Transaction Type.

All of these fields and tabs are explained in detail in the Transaction Type topic, here.

Before you start, remember to set your Estimating General Settings in Main Menu > Setup > Settings and Defaults > Estimating.

What you'll find on this page

• • Start here

• Transaction Types

  • General

  • Estimating

  • Payment Schedule

  • Options & Defaults

• Status

• Copy Rules

• Templates

• Reporting

• Approval

Start here

1. Navigate to Setup > Transaction Types > Edit.

2. Click Add. A new record will appear at the bottom of the screen. You will note that some fields are auto-populated already.

Transaction Types

General

The defaults for Transaction Types only require a small amount of change. The only fields to change are:

1. Description - Enter 'Quotations'.

2. Code - Enter 'QT'. This is the 'nickname' of the Transaction Type.

3. Contacts - Select Customers - All. This is so that users can create a new Quotation for all customers.

4. Staff - Select Rep. This is so that you can know who to assign commission to.

Estimating

• Visible Tabs - Select Input, Costs, Desc, Spec, Pricing, Update. This shows what tabs are visible on an Estimate.

  • If you don't want staff to see Pricing and Costings, then leave these check boxes unchecked.

• Estimate Types - Select what Estimate Types this Quotation will have access to from the lookup.

Payment Schedule

• Use Payment Schedule - Check the box to activate a payment schedule for the Quotation.

• Default Payment Schedule - Select the default payment schedule that will be active for this Quotation Transaction Type, eg 30 percent, COD.

Options & Defaults

• Enable Versions - This specifies whether a Transaction Type has multiple versions or not. Check this box, so that a Quote can be updated or amended, and reflect these as versions in order to track which version the client approves.

• Images - Check this box. This allows you to include product images in the Quotation, which is a great way to visually confirm what the customer is being quoted on.

Status

Select Quotations from the drop-down list. Default Status settings apply. More on Status here.

Status can be set at a Header level, and at an Item level.

You can consider adding additional Statuses in order to comprehensively track why Quotations are not approved, or if a Quotation has been checked by a supervisor first, such as:

• Checked

• Lost - Price

• Lost - Deadline

• Lost - Cancelled

• Lost - Quality

• Lost - Version

Copy Rules

These are dependent on the other Transaction Types that need to be linked to Quotations. For a more in-depth explanation of Copy Rules, click here.

1. Quotations to Costing (COST) - This allows you to create a Costing transaction from the Quote.

2. Quotations to Quotations (QT) - This would be used when a Customer wants a quote for a previously quoted job. This makes creating a new Quote faster than doing it from scratch.

3. Quotations to Sales Orders (SO) - This allows you to create a Sales Order transaction from the Quote. This is so that, once a quotation has been approved, the busincess cycles continue without manual data capture, but all the information from the approved Quotation - including Notes - are copied over.

Templates

Various templates can be setup for Quotations. More on Templates here.

• Cost Sheet

• Quote Letter - This can be set to include Forex if you trade in foreign exchange, and an image.

• RFQ

This is an example of a Cost Sheet based on a Quotation.

Reporting

This shows instant transaction history for Customers and Suppliers.

• Customer Summary

This is an instant summary of customer transactions over time. More on Customer Summaries here.

You can add Quotations here to show the quotes that have been created on the Customer Summary.

Approval

This is useful when you need to put a check in place for certain types of orders before they move downstream, or if an order is higher than a predetermined value and needs a supervisor to authorise the order. For more on Approvals click here.

1. Select Quotations from the dropdown list.

2. Click Add.

3. Staff - Select the person from the dropdown list who is required to approve a Quotation before it can move to the next stage of the business cycle.

4. Change Status up only - Check. This means that a Status change down to a previous Status cannot be done by this user.

5. Min. Status - Pending. This is the lowest status the Approval can go for this user.

6. Max. Status - Complete. This is the highest status the Approval can go for this user.

7. Approved Status - Select Active. This ensures that, once the Quotation has been approved, the Status will be set to Active. Before that, the status is Pending, and cannot move downstream until approved.

8. Checked Status - Select Issued. This ensures that, once the Quotation has been checked, the Status moves forward to Issued, and can move downstream.

9. Approval Amount - Set this value. This ensures - should large value jobs need to be checked by a supervisor or manager before being approved - that the Quotation will only be approved by someone who has that Approval Amount access.