Once you've assigned an order number to a quote, it's an order, and several order-specific facilities
are made available. (Note quotes can be deducted, but it's for simulation purposes and values won't
'stick' and purchase orders created from quotes will not retain a link to the quote.) There are several date boxes, staff selection boxes and checkboxes that can help a plant manager manage and track orders through their 'life cycle' and share that status information with everyone else:
Price Locks
as soon as an order number is assigned, all product and option prices on the quote become locked and
will show with small gray locks on the quote lines page
On Hold (checkbox) & Hold Note (text box)
used to indicate that order processing is delayed, and why
if your company is configured to require order approvals, the hold note will default to 'Approval'
other usual reasons for an order to be on hold are that the paperwork is ambiguous or deficient
can be set on quote header tab under Order Processing or the order status detail popup
Status Note (text box)
if the on-hold checkbox is not ticked, the note is used as a status note, often to indicate there
is an aspect of the order that will lengthen lead times, like a customized product or special service required
can be set on quote header tab under Order Processing or the order status detail popup
Required Date (date box) & Required Firm (checkbox)
used to record a customer's insistence on delivery or installation
on a specific date, or a sales representative's rash promise.
can be set on quote header tab under Order Processing or the order status detail popup
ticking the required firm box signifies that you will be on the phone apologizing (or worse) to the customer if the required date is not met
entering a value here will affect any installation or delivery calendar entry for this order
Measurements Are Final (checkbox)
used to 'release' an installed order to manufacturing/purchasing
meant especially for companies that do re-measures when installed quotes become orders
can be set on quote header tab under Order Processing or the order status detail popup
Product prices in Fenestratio should be thought of as "Public List Prices". Second, on Fenestratio quotes, the three factors that can be applied to product prices
must be applied the same to all products and options, so all of your product list prices should use a similar markup because they will all be discounted the same
by default. Further, if you consider the maximum discount you might give for installed or supplied jobs, you should ensure the net price has an adequate margin built in for all product lines.
There are several "knobs and dials" that can be fine-tuned on a quote to get the price you want:
Locking:
Product and installation and option prices can be overridden with the little blue lock icons. Once a price is locked, Fenestratio will not change it, so any adjustments to the price that become necessary to reflect a change to the product or option are now the responsibility of the user.
Multiplier:
On the quote is a Multiplier setting, usually set to 1, which is applied to the public list prices before calculating the product, installation and option prices for those items not locked. Think of this as a hidden discount (ie. where multiplier is less than 1) or upcharge (where multiplier is > 1). The initial inspiration for the Multiplier was to charge more or less for jobs in regions of varying economic power. Because multiplier was originally conceived as a regional setting, you can set a default multiplier on branch records at maintenance→branches. Because it makes sense to limit hidden discounts or upcharges, you can set a valid range for the multiplier on the branch record. Since each customer belongs to a branch, any new customer record will get a multiplier defaulted from its branch. The customer's multiplier gets copied as a default onto the quote record, which is the bottom level at which it can be tweaked. Last, since you may want to allow some users different latitude with respect to multipliers, you can also set a minimum and maximum multiplier on each security role into which users are placed.
Factors:
Also coming from the Branch onto the Customer and passed onto the quote record are discount/upcharge factors. On the branch and the customer you have one factor with a reason box for supplied jobs, and another factor-reason pair for installed jobs. On the quote there are two factor-reason pairs. These values by default show as bottom-line discounts (if factor is < 0) or upcharges (if factor is >0). If the factors are shown at the bottom of the quote, they are applied to all products and options on the quote - even the locked ones. You can roll the factors into the product prices by ticking the box on the quote header labelled "Apply factors at item level . In the case of item-applied factors-the locked prices do not get changed. Last, since you may want to allow some users different latitude with respect to factors, you can also set a maximum discount on each security role into which users are placed. Bear in mind a 100% discount is not uncommon, as it's often used for 'correction' or 'service' orders.
Service Discounts:
On the quote header page is a checkbox labelled "Apply factors to services", which ticked by default. If it is unticked, then factors will not be applied to installation charges or options that are marked as being part of installation.
Fenestratio orders are simply quotes with an order number assigned. Go to the quote header and click on the button - the next order number in sequence will be assigned.
For installed orders, you will need to enter an estimated installation time in days
If you need to start at a particular order number, or want to use a year-indicating prefix, you can enter an order number too.
verify standard customer settings for use by dealer
assign internal person as dealer's representative
set dealer quoting settings
create first Self-serve user
sign in as that user and try it
create other Self-serve user(s)
use Fenestratio [Test Drive] and [Test as Dealer] buttons for training
inform dealer users of passwords
the representative is the person in your company to whom the dealer users can submit questions,
and to whom requests for order submission will be addressed
all dealer-created quotes will be supply only, and have the Default Factor 1 Supply Only value
from the customer record as discount
when testing the first self-serve user, open a window in a different browser to test the dealer
account, ie. if you use Firefox, open a window in Chrome or Internet Explorer, then you can use
both sessions to look at the same quotes at once and fine-tune your settings quickly
Self-serve users can be restricted to seeing their own quotes - we recommend you have at least
one self-server user account not restricted so they can cover colleagues' absences
Costing:
in this context, cost is what the dealer pays you
the factors in the quote header shown internally get applied at the item level for
dealer-created quotes
dealer users can run a "Cost Quote" that shows what they will pay for the products
Pricing:
in this context, price is what the dealer charges their customer
Markup Percent is applied to product costs to determine what is shown as the list price
of products and options
Markup Handling is a management setting for dealers to control what dealer users can
see and do with respect to the Markup Percent
Hidden - dealer users do not see Markup Percent and may not know about it
Locked - dealer users can see the Markup Percent but cannot override it on quotes
Unlocked - dealer users can see and override Markup Percent on quotes
Discount will default onto dealer-created quotes - allows dealer to 'show' their
prospects/customers a bottom-line discount
Value-Added Options - dealers can charge for their goods and services by adding
miscellaneous options to quote lines. These options do not show for internal users.
if the formula from the related type is not suitable override the pricing formulae at the product level
to add "views" for the product, prepare and/or use "panel" images roughly scaled to 1 inch per pixel in the typical size
eg. for an entry door family
create "panel" images 36 x 82 for single doors
create "panel" images 16 x 82 for sidelights
we use Microsoft Paint on Windows to create monochrome product line drawings
you may be able to get images from your supplier
for all images created, create a horizontal mirror image so that either inside
or outside view can be represented, and link them using the "Flip View" selector
avoid using non-reversible drawing elements like the letter "F" for fixed
the product view detail page includes to help creating mirror images
the product view detail page also includes to link to an online PhotoShop clone for touch-ups
for compound, or multi-panel units:
for manufactured or layout-only families, select the panels and specify
the typical layout on the view detail
combine "panel" images to create images like double
doors, or door with sidelight(s), or casement-fixed-casement units
use Maintenance→Vendors to ensure the supplier is loaded, and the "Used for Products" checkbox is ticked
use Maintenance→Families to create the family, selecting the appropriate
vendor. Consider the "Deductions" value on the family detail:
"Deduct Modular" will be used for most fully manufactured product lines
"Deduct Structural" can be used for lines using transoms to mull compound units
"Do Not Deduct" will show only an image on order cut sheets
"Do Not Show" will not show on order cut sheets at all
for resale window families, you may want to choose "Layout Only", so the layout can be passed on to purchase orders
if the product is one for which you buy glass separately, select "Order Glass Only"
for each set of products that will share quoting rules and/or pricing methods, create
a type using Maintenance→Types
for each different type of single panel, follow steps for Add a Product above. eg. for a window family:
create a single casement product
create a single fixed product
create a single awning product
for each aspect of the products in the family that has multiple mutually-exclusive choices,
like jamb extension or brickmold type, add a feature using Maintenance→Features
use Maintenance→Options to describe and price all product add-ons, placing
them within features as necessary
for manufactured product lines:
use Maintenance→Vendor Items to add items that could serve as components of products in the family
from Maintenance→Families:
use the panels button to create a panel definition for each different single panel product
on each panel detail, select the corresponding product image as default view
use the button to the left of each panel name
to specify how each component is used in the panel
use the glass button to set default glass descriptions for glass purchases
use the default options button to set default options to show on quote line items for products in the family
for each compound combination of operating and fixed panels of a given type in a given shape that can share a price calculation, follow steps for Add a Product above
all prices are locked on orders so they are not a concern
use Administration→Price Lock to lock the prices on all quotes for which you want
to honour the quoted prices
the "Lock Prices on Quotes Since" setting will be calculated from your "Prices Effective Days"
setting on Administration→Company
use Maintenance→Types to review and change formulae for prices at the type level
use Maintenance→Products, filter the list as desired, then click to perform mass updates on the selected products
use Maintenance→Options, filter the list as desired, then click to perform mass updates on the selected options
Watch out For: price-affecting updates to quotes you've locked will require the price
of the product or option in question to be unlocked for Fenestratio to reprice it
on the company page you can indicate that customer and/or ship to addresses must be validated for order submissions
we decided not to apply validations at quote time in line with our design goal of keeping quoting as fast and simple as possible.
addresses are either unvalidated, validated, or overridden
validated addresses show
overridden address show an Omacron Ō
overridden addresses may be necessary for construction sites Google doesn't know about yet
if you're shipping to the customer's address - you don't need a separate ship-to entry
you can validate the customer's address from the quote header page by clicking on the modify button under the customer label
when you click the ship-to-address-search button, Fenestratio pops up a window to look in previously loaded addresses
when you hit [Validate] on either the address detail or customer detail popup, Fenestratio will ask google to validate the address and show you a map
if you know an address is correct but it's not recognized by Google yet, you can override validation and Fenestratio will record the fact you overrode it
When you generate a purchase order from sales order information, the sales order data and the purchase order are linked for reference
purposes, but they're not linked to cascade updates. That is, once you generate a purchase order from sales order data, changing the
sales order data will not automatically change the purchase order data. We couldn't do that - what if you've faxed a PO to your
supplier - without being hooked into your system how could ~they~ know you've changed things. Thus you need a procedure like this.
Two methods:
1. All Manual
best if changing an existing Purchase Order that has not been submitted or that the supplier knows you're going to be revising
go into Purchases, Lines,[Edit], for the image, choose [Load Mirror Image] or [Replace from Item] as required
edit the values and notes as required
re-submit the purchase order
2. Regenerate
best if you need to order a replacement
go into Purchases, Lines,[Edit], choose [Unlink Sale Line]
go to home page to ensure the quote gets cleared from your session memory
create a new purchase order for the same vendor
go to lines for the new purchase
choose [Add Product/Option/Item]
choose [Product] on the Add to Purchase popup
the sale line you just unlinked should be available to pull onto the new purchase order
beware you may need to flip the image for the vendor if they expect inside view and you quote outside or vice versa
from the deduction results page, you can click on the name of the glass vendor to create a purchase for that default vendor
to order the glass from a different vendor:
ensure the vendor in question is marked in Maintenance→Vendors as "Supplies Glass"
go to Home→Purchases, create a purchase order for the vendor
from Purchase→Lines, click [Add Glass], Fenestratio will list the glass units on open orders remaining
to be ordered, you can then'pull' glass units onto this purchase order
since many Fenestratio user companies buy products from suppliers with ordering extranets, we provide
manual purchasing as a 'lighter' way to keep your on-purchase-order values up to date, as well as providing
a simplified method to record receipts as they arrive
manual purchasing can be activated for a given vendor item from the vendor item transaction page
the vendor item transaction page can be accessed from the Inventory page or the vendor item detail page
once on the vendor item transaction page, a button to activate manual purchasing will appear if it is
not already active
once manual purchasing is activated for a vendor item, the vendor item transaction page will present a
button to add a new manual purchase
existing manual purchases will be shown in a collapsing section beside the item's on purchase order value
receipts can be recorded by clicking on the manual purchase for which material is being received
From the Quote Header page, click the deductions button
in the button bar at the top center of the page,
or the Deductions tab if your preferences show you're using quote section tabs,
and the deduction wizard will walk you through specifying the information necessary to deduct
the order.
Running inventory requires significant organizational discipline, but the concepts behind doing it do not change
much from factory to factory. The main wrinkle with windows and doors is variable dimensionality, such that the
bill of materials must be adapted to the size of the product - hence the DynaBOM.
You must inform Fenestratio support if you want to activate inventory as there are some processes that run
overnight to perform certain necessary procedures.
Inventory
Preparation
you must understand fully everything on Maintenance→Vendor Items
you must understand fully unit of measure conversions and their role in
inventory and how they're used on the vendor item detail
Maintenance→Panels→DynaBom: "Usage Formula" describes how inventory is relieved
for those components that are part of a panel in a product, assuming the
Conditional Formula evaluates to true for a given quote line item
Maintenance→Families→Family BOM: "Usage Formula" describes how inventory is relieved
for those components that don't fit neatly into a panel concept, like outer door frames or
weatherstripping, assuming the Conditional Formula evaluates to true for a given quote
line item
Maintenance→Options: "Usage Formula" describes how inventory is relieved
for those components that result from feature choices on a product
it is possible to set up your inventory without fully understanding every formula
on the pages above because Fenestratio support is available to help you, but you
must at least understand every piece of data's purpose in the process
choose which vendor items represent components that need to be, and can successfully be and are worth being
tracked by inventory (ie. prioritize and avoid paper-chasing and ocean boiling)
designate storage locations for components and register them on each item to be tracked- no item can show on hand
quantity without specifying where the quantity is stored
Reports→Inventory Count can be useful for initial count to get started, and later for cycle counts
Vendor Item detail and Manufacturing→Inventory→Transactions allow adjustments to the current on-hand at a
location by clicking on the on-hand quantity
you must mark products 'ready' as soon as they're made so your inventory will
be relieved - best place to do this is Manufacturing→Barcode Ready
you must receive goods from purchase orders accurately and punctually
you can activate manual purchasing if you use
your vendor's extranet or some other method of ordering stock, but the key point
remains to receive stock accurately and punctually
if you don't enter all your purchase orders in sufficient detail, you won't be
able to know about availability or shortages
the requirements report gets more and more useful as your data gets better
if you want finished goods control, use Manufacturing→Barcode Store and/or
Shipping→Barcode Move/Load/Deliver
these capabilities are also built into the Fenestratio mobile apps
The quote posting page was set up to pull the events in an order's life cycle
that may result in an accounting journal entry being made. The account codes
and descriptions displayed come from values maintainable at Administration→Accounts. The placement of accounts in the journal entries is determined by
selections on the product family, customer branch and company records.
Also from the quote posting page, you can place a journal entry onto a posting
batch, which you may export at a later date for importing to your accounting
software.
Of special note with respect to invoices, Fenestratio provides two kinds of
invoices with different posting implications. A 'Sale Invoice' includes all
products and fees from the sales order and uses the same number as the sales
order. A 'Partial Invoice' uses a separate number series and can include
all or only some of the products or fees from the sales order.
Posting batches can be maintained at Administration→Posting Batches. A
posting batch is a grouping of journal entries generated from events in the
life of a sales order. Posting batches can be exported to files of various
formats for importing to accounting software.
Fenestratio shares information with QuickBooks as below:
if you've never connected your Fenestratio to your QuickBooks, you will
see a link to connect on the Company, Account, User, Vendor, Customer Detail,
Service Detail, Purchase Detail, Quote Posting and Invoices page
when you click Connect you will be taken to the QuickBooks online login where
you will enter your user id and password
we do not see your user id or password and we have no need to know it
QuickBooks sends us an opaque token to signify you've granted Fenestratio
the authority to update your QuickBooks on your behalf for a limited time
if you log into QuickBooks successfully, you will be returned to the Fenestratio
page from whence you came and Fenestratio will now be connected to QuickBooks
all interaction between Fenestratio and QuickBooks will be under the user account
you logged into QuickBooks with
if your Fenestratio is connected to QuickBooks and you want to change the connection
to another QuickBooks user, you can do so on the Finance tab of the Company page
if you want to disconnect Fenestratio from QuickBooks without re-connecting,
you can do so on the Finance tab of the Company page
QuickBooks connections last 1 hour but can be refreshed for some time longer
If a connection expires the user will be shown a link to refresh
First Steps:
review account settings on the Branch and Company detail pages to select as many accounts as you can
connect all your tax groups to QuickBooks tax codes
connect all your tax codes to a QuickBooks tax rate
connect all your tax codes to a purchase account if you want to post purchase invoices to QuickBooks
connect all your accounts to QuickBooks accounts
customer and vendor and user records can be linked or added to QuickBooks as needed
customer and vendor records can be imported from QuickBooks on their list pages
NOTE: all transactions Fenestratio sends to QuickBooks can be previewed, ie. the json payload to be
sent to QuickBooks online can be displayed whether there is a connection to QuickBooks currently active or not.
Sales:
will be passed to QuickBooks as an
Invoice after the customer has been linked to a QuickBooks
customer
the invoice will have one SalesItemLine per account and tax code combination, with the account determined either by the
branch, the company or the product family
the invoice will have one TaxLine per tax code used under the quote's product and service tax groups
a 'Sale Invoice' for the entire sales order will have a QB document number FenSalennn
where nnn is the sales order number
a 'Partial Invoice' for some or all of the sales order will have a QB document number
of FenInvxxx where xxx is the invoice number
Deposit:
will be passed to QuickBooks as a
Sales Receipt after the customer has been linked to a QuickBooks
customer
Commission:
will be passed to QuickBooks as a
Bill, after the sales representative has been linked to a QuickBooks
vendor
Installation:
will be passed to QuickBooks as a
Bill, after the installer has been linked to a QuickBooks
vendor
Service Invoices:
will be passed to QuickBooks as an
Invoice after the customer has been linked to a QuickBooks
customer
a service invoice will have a QB document number of FenSvcyyy where yyy is the service ID
Fenestratio is determined to be an effective, cooperative cog in your enterprise,
as it is today, and as it will evolve over time. Our willingness to build
interfaces is part of that, and our API is another. The API is described
in a separate document.
On records that are most likely to correspond to records in your other software,
we provide a special column we call "Other System Code". This is our 'pointer' to
that record on the other system, and will be included in all payloads we send
to your other software. You may need to enter other system codes on some of your
Fenestratio records to enable certain integration capabilities. At time of writing there are "Other System Codes" on Customers, Contacts, Families, Vendors,
Users (as a vendor - for commissions and installation sub-contractors). Some
values not thusly labelled are expected to have the codes from other sources,
like vendor item code and account code.
Exports can play a useful role in integration, as well as off-system-analysis. Fenestratio's export-to-Excel facilities are almost all offered at Administration→Export Data. Some exports are offered 'in-place', like purchase order line
details or service records.
Language
While most of the terms used in Fenestratio are universal in the window and door industry, there may be some that we are using in a
manner that may not be intuitive for the user:
Family - a set of products from a particular manufacturer or vendor that share a common set of options and may be mulled
together in a frame, such as windows, steel doors, and sliding doors. The family is the level at which you can describe features
and options
and defaults applicable to the product types in the family, and whether the products included are manufactured or resold by you.
Families can be worked with from the Maintenance menu.
Type - a set of products belonging to a family that share an operating mechanism, such as awning, casement, single hung, etc.
The type is the level at which you specify pricing and installation
charge formulae for standard products like rectangular windows. Types can be worked with from the Maintenance menu or the Product
Types button on the Families page.
Product - a simple or compound window or door or sunroom wall. At the product level you specify the attributes that
determine pricing, like number of panels and operators and frame shape, whether width and height are
both required at quoting time, and can override the pricing and installation formulae and default options specified at the type
level if necessary. Also at the product level you can specify standard sizes if applicable. Products can be worked with from the
Maintenance menu or the Products button on the Families page or the Products button
on the Types page.
View - a layout of a product. At the view level you specify how the frame of the product is configured using x-y coordinates
and either provide or generate an image of the layout. Views can be worked with from the Maintenance menu or the Views button
on the Types page or the Views button on the Products page.
An example view:
{type:CasementLeft,x:0,y:0,w:28,h:60}
{type:FixedStandard,x:28,y:0,w:28,h:60}
{type:CasementRight,x:56,y:0,w:28,h:60}
Panel - a simple window frame that is used in a view. At the panel level you specify whether the unit is an operator,
what its minimum and maximum allowed sizes are if applicable, what components make up the panel, and which energy star ratings apply.
Panels can be worked with from the panels link on the home page and the Maintenance menu, as well as the Panels button
on the Families page. Some panels:
Option - an add-on to a product, such as tinted glass or grills. At the option level you specify pricing information
as well as formulae for width and height and usage rules. Options can be worked with from the Maintenance menu or the Options button
on the Families page.
Feature - an aspect of a product for which only one of a set of options can be chosen, such as brickmold or casing.
At the feature level you specify which options are included, whether the feature is for installation or supply only, is
mandatory, whether the first option should be defaulted, and where in relation to other features the feature should be presented.
Features can be worked with from the Maintenance menu or the Features button on the Families page.
when you see a control highlighted in light yellow,
it is mandatory
most pages will include a feedback image at the top
right of the page, which will allow you to send email to fenestratio
support including context information
pages where specific help text is available will include a help image
at the top right of the page
List Navigation
At the bottom left of most lists is position text, such as "1 - 8/367",
which tells you that you are viewing rows 1 to 8 of 367 rows which meet
the selection criteria. To navigate through the records in the current
selection, use the first page button ,
the previous page button ,
the next page button ,
and the last page button ,
all of which are located at the bottom right of the list.
When navigating lists, in order to most quickly find the record(s) you
wish to work on, it is best to use the selection criteria at bottom center
under the buttons to filter and/or sort the list records. Each list page
will have its own applicable search criteria. After you have made your sort and filter selections, click the refresh
button to reload the
list. Note that the list does not automatically return to the top of the
new selection, rather, it will stay at whatever page you were previously viewing.
most pages will include , which will return you
to the previously visited page.
most pages will include , which will save your
input. Note that if any errors are found, you will be brought back to this page,
and a message like
Some error value was found in your input.
..will appear and no updates will have been saved.
note that not all users will see the same links on menu pages. The role into
which the user's profile is placed will determine which pages the user will
see. Further, not all buttons will be visible to all users, depending upon the role.
at the top of most pages is a location bar with a gray background, which
shows your current location in the application's structure. You can use the
underlined words in the location bar to navigate to pages previously visited.
at the bottom of most pages is a list of the links from you home menu. These
are provided for you to navigate from page to page more quickly.
please note that some field descriptions, messages, and button captions may
differ from what is shown above if your system administrator has modified
the system message values