Method CRM Help Center

Customers

Solution No. 383

OVERVIEW
How to create a new customer or lead
How to edit an existing customer or lead

SCREEN OVERVIEW
Existing customers grid
Search/new customer screen
Customer information section
Address
Additional info
Payment & Job
Contacts
Transactions
Activities & Work orders

Overview

As we mentioned in the CRM documentation on the Customers section, keeping track of customer information and interrelationships is vital to running a successful business, and this is particularly true of field services. Customer information can vary from job to job, depending on the focus of your business, so it's important you are able to meet each individual customer's needs with a personal touch. Maintaining a comprehensive record of all jobs associated with this customer as well as activities and transactions can help build out a trail of breadcrumbs unique to that customer alone that will help you and your employees maintain a healthy business relationship with everyone with whom you do business. This section will detail how to add a new customer through Method Field Services and how to edit an existing one, as well as provide a screen overview of all the pertinent fields and other elements on the screen.

How to create a new customer or lead

Method Field Services actually requires almost no information whatsoever to create a record for a new customer or lead, but the more information you provide, the more useful that record will be.

From Method Field Services, go to Customers. Do not select an existing customer from the list. The fields on the right should be blank (if a customer is selected, you can click Clear/New to clear the fields).
In the Address subtab, type a Customer Name into the noted field. This is the only required field that must be filled in for Method to create a record of this customer.
If you would like to denote this customer as a lead, click on "is lead status only". Please note that this can only be checked once: if you go back and edit this record later and uncheck this box, the record will be saved as a customer from that point forward and cannot be reverted.
Click on Save to save this record; if you click Refresh list under the Existing customers grid it will now appear. If you are intending to create multiple new customers, you can use Save & New to save the record and clear the fields to prepare the screen for new entries.

Obviously, you should include far more information than just a customer name if you want this record to have any utility whatsoever, so take a look at our Screen overview section below to learn more about what other information you can include!

How to edit an existing customer or lead

From Method Field Services, go to Customers.
From the Existing customers grid, choose the customer or lead you'd like to edit. Click on Select next to your chosen record. This will populate whatever fields have been filled out for this customer or lead.
From here you can alter any of the existing information on any of the five subtabs to the right. As long as the Customer Name field is filled in, Method will be able to save the changes to the record. Keep in mind that if you change the Customer name, the customer or lead will no longer be found under the original name.
Click on Save to save the record; if you click Refresh list under the Existing customers grid any changes you've made to the fields visible in the grid will be reflected there.

Screen overview

This screen is divided into two sections: the Existing customers grid on the left, and the information section on the right, which is comprised of several sections divided into subtabs. Let's take a look at each section in detail.

Existing customers grid

This grid functions the same way as most grids in Method in terms of sorting and searching (see our documentation on grid functionality for more information). However, there are some unique features we'll discuss here.

The Filter by view drop down list has the following options:

All active customers: This view will show all customers with "Customer is active" checked off (see below for more information).
All customers: This view will show all customers in your Method CRM.
All inactive customers: This view will show all customers with "Customer is active" NOT checked off (see below for more information).
Balance greater than 0: This view will show all customers carrying an outstanding balance.
Leads only: This view will show only leads.
Non-leads: This view will show vendors and employees.
Clicking select next to a customer in the grid will populate the fields to the right with all information associated with that record in Method. You can sort and search the grid by Customer and by Balance owing.
Clicking on Advanced search opens the Search / New customer screen (see below for details). Clicking on Refresh refreshes the grid above and provides an updated total balance for all customers currently being viewed.

Search/new customer screen

This screen is brought up when you click Advanced search under the Existing customers grid. From here you can use any and all fields associated with the Address section (see below for more details) to search for a customer or vendor. Click search to search for the customer matching the criteria you provide, or clear to clear the fields and try again. The grid below will display all customers currently in your Method CRM, and you can sort and search the grid as normal. The information displayed for each entry includes Entity Type (e.g. Customer, Lead, etc.), Full name, Company name, Customer contact, Phone number, and Email address. Each of these fields can be searched to locate specific Customers.

Directly below, a series of buttons are available to open additional options. The New Customer and New Customer (lead) buttons will open an additional screen that allows you to create a new customer or lead record by filling in address information, payment and job information, and additional info. Saving this screen will create the record, which will then appear in all Customer and Lead-related searches throughout Method. The same is true of the New Vendor and New Vendor (lead) buttons.

Customer information section

This section is where you can create a new customer or edit an existing customer, by filling in fields in each of the six subtabs. Let's take a look at these tabs in greater detail.

Address

This section is for your customer's relevant contact information.

Customer name: This field is the only required field on the screen, and can be used a variety of ways. Generally speaking the Customer name field is used as the primary identifier in the Customer Table (for more information on this, see our Other important terms document), which means for functions like mail merge, Method will refer to whatever this name is in the Customer table. In situations where you are dealing with a large client (for example Target), you can use the Customer name field in conjunction with the Company name field to differentiate between branches of the same company (for example, the Company name might be "Target" and the Customer name might be "Target Dallas").
Company name: This field can refer to a company where it differs from the Customer name.
Mr./Ms./…: This is the contact's preferred title.
First name: This is the contact's first name.
MI: Stands for "Middle Initial"; the contact's middle initial.
Last name: This is the contact's last name.
Contact: In almost all cases, the contact is the First name + Last name. In fact, when you tab away from the Last name field, it will automatically update the contact to reflect this.
Phone: This is the primary phone number for your contact.?
Fax: This is your contact's primary fax number.
Alt contact: This refers to the alt contact associated with this customer in QuickBooks. Please note that if no alt contact exists in QuickBooks, one will not be generated here during a sync.
Alt phone: In many cases, Alt phone refers to the main contacts' alternate phone number (for example, a cell phone).
Email: This is your customers' primary email address.
Bill to/Ship to: These fields refer to your customers' mailing address for billing and shipping. If these addresses are the same, you can use the Copy address button to automatically fill out the Ship to fields with the same information you inputted into the Bill to fields.

The buttons below allow you to Delete the customer (which can't be undone), Save the information in the fields and continue working, Save & New which clears the fields after saving, or Clear & New which clears the fields without saving.

Additional info

This section allows you to fill in information about this particular customer that doesn't fit in other categories.

Type: This drop down list allows you to assign a filtering option to this customer to make it easier to group with customers of similar type.
Terms: This drop down list lets you determine when invoices for this customer is due, and how much of a surcharge will be required on late payments (see our documentation on Terms for more details)
Rep: This drop down list identifies the user you have assigned to this customer.
Is lead status only: Checking this option identifies this customer as a lead.
Customer is active: Checking this option identifies this customer as active, meaning it will appear throughout Method and in the Active filter of relevant grids.
Sales tax code: This drop down list allows you to differentiate between whether the service provided by this customer is taxable or non-taxable. In QuickBooks Canada, this section includes applicable national tax codes (GST, HST, etc.)
Sales tax item: This drop down list allows you to differentiate between whether this customer is taxable or whether the customer is located out-of-state and therefore not subject to state taxes. Please note that QuickBooks Canada does not make use of this option.
Resale number: A resale number allows your business to avoid paying sales taxes on items purchased for resale to customers. If you are selling items to this customer that you have purchased elsewhere, you can include the resale number here for easy reference.
Job of customer: This drop down list allows you to assign a "sub-customer". A good way to think about it is as if you were doing jobs for a franchise of a larger company (for example, a Wendy's location). The drop down list lets you assign your customer to a parent organization.
Campaign: If this customer came to your business as a result of an advertising campaign, you can choose to associate this customer with that particular campaign using the drop down list here. Bear in mind there are no stock options of this type, so if you have not created a campaign in Method, there will be no available option here.
Price level: Price levels let you set custom pricing for different customers or jobs. This field is populated by your QuickBooks account, where you can create different price levels you can associate with customers.

Payment & Job

This section is dedicated to a customer's payment information, which will be saved as part of the customer record. It is important to note that Method is not currently PCI compliant, so it is not recommended that you store credit card numbers in your Method account.

Account no.: This is your customer's account number, as applicable.
Credit limit: Sometimes you will be made aware of a customer's credit limit. This is the field in which to record that information.
Preferred payment method: This drop down list allows you to choose from a list of payment options, from credit cards to cash to e-check.
Credit card no.: This is the field for your customer's credit card number.
Exp. month/year: These fields are for your customer's credit card expiry date.
Name on card: Input the name on the credit card exactly as it appears here.
CC Address/Zip/Postal: This is the address information associated with the payment type.
Job status: This drop down menu is for the current customer or customer:job you have selected. This will typically be auto-filled when you choose a customer from a drop down list. Typically this is used to denote the status of a customer:job chosen.
Start date: This is the date the job is slated to begin (or did begin).
Proj. end date: This is the end date you project for this job.
End date: This is the actual end date, which may or may not differ from the projected end date.
Job desc.: This field allows you to put in a brief description of this job.
Job type: This allows you to differentiate between Commercial and Residential jobs. if you require other job types, they can be created in QuickBooks.

Contacts

This subtab generates a grid showing all contacts associated with a selected customer. It also offers several options, described below.

When a customer is selected, the grid will show all contacts associated with that customer in the grid, including the Type of contact, the contact Details (including name and email address), and the Phone/Alternate Phone/Mobile Phone numbers for the contact. On the far left, clicking on Edit contact will bring up the Add/edit contact screen, and clicking on New activity on the far right will bring up the New activity screen. The New activity and Add contact buttons below the grid will do the same thing.

Transactions

This grid shows all the transactions associated with a selected customer, including Received payments, Sales orders, and Invoices.

When a customer is selected, the grid will show all transactions associated with that customer in the grid, including the Type of transaction, the transaction Number, the Date of the transaction, the Account associated with the transaction, the Amount and Balance of the transaction, and whether or not the transaction has been Posted. Clicking Go to next to a selected transaction will open the Add/edit screen associated with the transaction type. The buttons below the grid open the requisite screens as well (e.g. the New invoice screen button will open the New invoice screen).

Activities & Work orders

This grid displays all activities and work orders associated with a selected customer, past, present, and future, depending upon the Filter by view you are using.

Unlike the other grids we've covered above, this grid has a Filter by view drop down menu with the following options:

All activities: This view will display all activities (past, present and future) associated with this customer.
All history: This view will display all activities scheduled on or before today.
All work orders: This view will display all work orders (past, present and future) associated with this customer.
CRM history: This view will display activities that are not identified as Work Orders (in the Activity type field) on or before today.
History: This view will display all work orders completed on or before today. This refers strictly to work orders, not any other type of activity.
Job Setups: This view will show all active work orders (series and one-time).
Scheduled: This view will show all active work orders (one-time or occurrence).

When a customer is selected, the grid will show the information specified in the Filter by view drop down associated with that customer in the grid, including the Due date of the activity or work order, the Details of the activity or work order, the type of Recurrence, the Contact information, any applicable Opportunity number, and the Job Name and any Comments associated with the record.

Clicking on Edit or Edit series next to a selected record will have a different effect depending on the Recurrence type associated with it. For a One-time job, both buttons will take you to the Add/edit work order screen and auto-fill the pertinent information into the fields. For a Series, both buttons will take you to the Add/edit work order screen and auto-fill the pertinent information into the fields. For an Occurrence, the Edit button will take you to the Add/edit work order screen and auto-fill the pertinent information into the fields, and the Edit Series button will take you to the Add/edit work order screen, but the information auto-filled will be for the Series the Occurrence is associated with, not for the occurrence itself.

The buttons below differ from the other subtabs in this tab link as well. Let's look at them here.

Est. Vs. Act. Hrs. Report: This button generates a viewable PDF report comparing the estimated number of hours to complete the job to the actual number of hours the jobs took for the selected customer.
Job Cost Profit Report: This button generates a viewable PDF report comparing how much the job cost your company (e.g. materials) to how much revenue was generated from the job.
New Work Order: This button will open the Add/edit work order screen, with the information for the selected customer already filled in.
New Activity: This button will open the New activity screen, with the information for the selected customer already filled in.
Refresh: This button will refresh the grid above.

Created on	Jan-27-2014
Last modified on	Sep-17-2015