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This session should illustrate the wealth of information maintained within client records in ServMan and the methods used to locate and manage client information. Understanding the purpose and use of the client forms is critical to the use of the application. All individuals who have occasion to work with client or prospect records (CSR, Dispatcher, Sales, Management, etc.) should complete this session.
ServMan is a client centric solution. This means that if you’re looking for information about a client or need to perform a function related to a client - open the client record! The software is designed to allow users to perform most location specific tasks directly from the client record. Adding and editing records can be accomplished from a variety of locations in the application and merits little attention in training. More important is a firm grasp of the form and function of the client location records.
To support a client centric approach the software makes use of tabs and forms. When you open a client’s record it opens to form, containing information for a specific area of concern on a tab. There can be many tabs, each with its own area of focus. For example, some of the standard forms you may find at your installation may include: Address, Systems, Notes, Documents, Jobs, and more. We say “may” because the tabs are configurable allowing your administrator to turn them on or off, rename, as well as create new tabs to support your company's more specific requirements. On each tab you will also find certain areas of the screen that can be adapted with new fields and controls to better support your business.
In most accounting solutions you will have a client record and then other shipping locations. Often, the only information available for a shipping location is an address. All other information is only stored at the Billing Account level. For service focused organizations, every location requires the ability to track all of the same information, specific to this address, as you would normally have only at the Billing Account. ServMan is designed in exactly this way, every client location allows you to track ALL information and activities that have occurred at that specific location. All orders, notes, contacts, invoices, installed equipment and service histories are tracked for each location. When we want to see what’s occurred at a location, open the locations record. It’s all there. When we want to see all invoices for all of a client’s locations, we can view this based on the Billing Account's invoice history.
The software is also designed to support businesses that have many branches or locations. To better support this, each location record can be assigned to a specific Branch. This allows you to have an account that could potentially be serviced by many of your company's Branch offices. Security options allow you to restrict access to your users based on Branch. This means users in one Branch can optionally be restricted to only seeing location accounts specifically assigned to their Branch.
ServMan makes use of ServMan SmartViews to search, locate and edit client location records. See the SmartViews session to learn more about how to use these powerful tools not only to locate records but to actually manage your business as well. The client SmartView is accessible from the title menu bar or from the application's numerous navigators.
Remember, a client would typically have one record for each client location. When searching you have access to ALL of the location records. One of these will be marked as the Billing Location for each customer. If a client only has one location, they should typically only have one location record. Each SmartView has the ability to filter based on virtually any field in the clients record. Because SmartViews are used for all modules of the application we have created a separate and detailed section on their most effective use. If you are unsure of the proper use and purpose of SmartViews you should review Session one.
The following is an image of a typical Client location address tab. We will now look at each field and tab discussing its specific purpose related to the client record.
Each client location is defined by a unique account number; more correctly, a unique account ID which can be numbers or letters. ServMan may be configured to automatically generate a sequential number for each new client, or you may enter the ID of your choice. Our experience has shown that it is best to let ServMan automatically generate a sequential number for each new client. Manually creating an account number often seems appealing to assist in searching and identifying your accounts. You will quickly learn that using ServMan’s powerful search tools it is rare to search based on this value. Having a numeric based ID is the only scalable solution. Even if you think that your company will never grow beyond a certain size, what if you sell to someone larger? What if you sell your data? Having a scalable numbering solution will prove to pay benefits now and in the future.
Account ID’s MUST be unique! The software will not allow you to save a new record if the value already exists. There are three configuration settings; manually number, auto number and third an option allowing you to either manually key or auto number ID’s. If your system is set to auto number, the account field will be have the greyed word AUTO in the field. It will not allow you key a value. If your system is set to do either, the word AUTO will be presented but you can optionally replace it with your manually keyed unique value. In either of these two settings, hitting the save button will cause the system to generate and assign a new unique client ID if you haven’t keyed one. If the field is blank, you are set to manually key all client ID’s.
ServMan has the ability to assign your customers to specific branches. This feature is most useful if your company operates in multiple locations. ServMan's branch feature is a powerful tool that goes beyond simple client segmentation. With ServMan's integrated security you can restrict user access to all branches, multiple branches or a single branch depending upon your organizational requirements. In addition the branches can be used to facilitate the management of revenue and costs when used in conjunction with ServMan's general ledger masking features. Branches are created and managed under MasterFiles > Misc. More will be explained on Branches and Branch setup in Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
The default view of the client displays the client service address or "do work at address". The Location/Billing Selector allows you to switch between the customer's service address and billing, (mailing) address. If the customer's service and billing address are the same there is no need to enter a billing address, ServMan will automatically populate the required fields. If the customer has many locations with a common billing address and this account is NOT the billing location then you will not have a Billing Address option in the drop-down listing. You would edit the mailing address for the Billing Account on the location that is designated as such. The Billing Account Number is just to the right of the location field. And the Billing Address is listed below. If the addresses are not changed it will simply say SAME in this area. Notice that the account number on our screen above is the same for both the Location and the Billing. This is how it will be by default.
Next are the address fields. Remember, the Location or Billing account that we choose in the above field determines which we are viewing or editing. You can tab through these fields when entering information. When doing so, the software will take you to the Zip code field before going to the City/State fields. This is by design as the software will auto-populate the City and State based on the Zip code you enter. The software will “learn” this information as you use the system.
Remember, if you need to override the Billing, (mailing) address for this location, simply select Billing in the selector above. You can then edit the address displayed in the Billing Address fields to the right of the location address. By default, the Location address is always displayed when the screen is originally displayed.
The County field can be set up under MasterFiles > Misc and is covered under Session 14 of your training guide. Information contained in your address fields is only relevant for reporting and, if your using our Avalara Tax Service interface, more importantly for determining the tax rate for this location. If you are using mapping software, the location address will be pulled onto any orders that are created and would be used for mapping or directions.
Your company should discuss how you want names entered to the system and then universally enforce the rule. Names can be changed at any time. This field is used as either a Corporate name or individual name based on the setting of the “Is Residential” flag. If keying last names first you should always include a comma after the last name. Example Smith, Rick
Zones are provided to support a scheduling of optional features that your company may or may not use. They are:
• Scheduling – When scheduling work using Auto-Scheduling you have the ability to assign employees to work in specific areas or as we call them zones. Scheduling will only show technicians that are assigned to the zone that this location is located in when returning it’s results. If using this feature, you must assign zones to your locations.
• Zone Manager – ServMan provides the ability to allocate specific employees to work in specific areas by day and time slot. If using this feature, you must assign zones to your locations.
Zones are assigned based on relationships to zip codes. If you have them configured, the Zone will automatically be populated when you key a zip code for your client location. If more than one zone is assigned to a zip code the user will be prompted to manually select from the qualified zones.
Zones are setup under MasterFiles and their setup is covered under Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
If your company does not service clients internationally this field can be ignored. Countries, like other pre-sets, are set up under the MasterFiles options and covered under Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
Client types can be created and assigned to locations. It is common to see values like Residential, Commercial, Government, etc. However, you can use this field in any way to best support your business's use case. Remember, you can build reports around virtually any field in an enterprise database. Think about this when building out your defaults. If you’d like to see all Residential client locations in North Carolina, you’re going to need a value of Residential stored to the location. Similarly, if you’d like to see all clients in multi-family units, you’re going to need this set somewhere on the location account. If you are unsure of how to best utilize these fields for your business, speak with your project manager. Client types are set up under MasterFiles and covered under Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
Any employee listed in the Sales Rep field here will automatically be added to all quotes, orders or invoices created for this location. Sales reps are pulled from the Employee table as setup under MasterFiles.
The added field is automatically stamped with the date the record is entered into the system. The system additionally stamps the user id for the person that created the new record. This information is not displayed by default but can simply be added to the screen if desired. The field name the user adding the record is Client > Added_By. The date may be changed to allow for the back entry of data to the system.
The client status is limited to one of three possible settings of Active, Inactive and Prospect. If a client is flagged as a Prospect and a quote is converted to an order, the system will automatically set the client status to Active for you. Client Status is most relevant to your client searches and reporting. Inactive clients by default will no longer be displayed in your search results unless you specifically choose to see them. Likewise, prospects can be searched and managed independently from your Active accounts.
If a user attempts to add an order to an inactive account they will be warned that the client is currently Inactive and must be made Active to proceed.
Two tax codes can be set on this screen of the client record that drive the software calculation of Sales Tax on quotes, orders and invoices. If using the optional Avalara sales tax module, these fields are still displayed but will be ignored by the software. Avalara is a third party sales tax application for organizations with large geographical responsibility.
Any codes keyed here will by default be added to all quotes\orders and invoices added for this client.
Tax codes are setup under the MasterFiles section and covered under Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
Terms codes are used to drive the date due for all invoices for this client. Terms codes are also optionally used to trigger automated credit card or E-Check transactions that your company may process. Any terms code entered here will automatically be added to all quotes\orders or invoices added for this client.
Terms codes are setup under MasterFiles and covered in Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
Pricebooks control a client’s pricing level with your client. Whatever is entered here will automatically be added to all quotes\orders or invoices added for this client. They are setup under MasterFiles and covered in Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
If a client location has service restrictions as to the time of day or day of week you can perform services at their location you can set a service window restriction here. In scheduling the auto-schedule feature will return only time slots that comply to the clients time restriction. If manually scheduling tickets, the scheduler will be warned if attempting to schedule work that is out of compliance with the service window on an order.
Whatever is entered here will automatically be added to all quotes\orders or invoices added for this client. They are setup under MasterFiles and covered in Session 14, ServMan System Setup & Configuration.
Whenever you sell anything to a client you create an Accounts Receivable transaction in the General Ledger. This field will be set automatically for you. The account used is based on the default value set in your company settings listed under Utilities – Program Settings & Defaults. The information entered here will default to all quotes/orders and invoices created for this location.
The is residential check box should be selected for all residential accounts. This setting controls two specific things. First, if checked as residential the Name field is treated as a person’s name, not a company's name. Second, if checked when adding clients, the name keyed in the Name field on the address tab will automatically be pulled into the contacts names when saving the order. If you list the name as last name first include a comma like this: Smith, Rick. If you do this, the software will take the first name found and use it as the last name in the contacts. If you don’t use a comma, the software will assume last name as last when adding the contact record.
The menu button is accessible from all tabs of the client location screen. These feature allows you short cut access to the following features and functions:
| AR Inquiry View |
All open invoices or work with a client’s AR detail including payment processing. |
| Quote/Order History View |
All open or closed quotes and orders for this location. |
| Invoice History View |
All invoices for this location. |
| Add Location | This feature allows will create a new location record that is linked to the same billing account of the location it is launched from. |
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Add Quote, Sales Order, Work Orders, Recurring orders, Invoices |
Short cuts to add any of these documents to this location account. |
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Credit Card information To view, add or edit client credit card information. |
Once credit cards are saved only the last four digits of the card number may be viewed on screen. Information is encrypted in the ServMan database. |
| eCheck Setup | Used to configure a client’s checking account information for e-check transactions. Information is encrypted in the ServMan database. |
| Map Current | If compatible mapping software is installed this option will show this location as a point on your map. |
| Map route to Current | If compatible mapping software is installed this option will map a route to this location from your office. |
| Add PM Agreement Only | will be displayed if the optional contract management module is installed. Select to create a new PM agreement for this client. |
| Reports | Select to view reports listed in the Clients section of the report menu. |
The contacts tab is where you store contact information for persons specific to this location. If you have a multi-site account and wish to see the contacts for the Billing Account, simply switch to that account and view the contacts on the billing accounts location record. When you create a residential account a contact entry will automatically be created using the information listed in the Name field on the Address tab. If you have listed the name with a comma, like “Jones, Rick”, the software will properly place the first word from the name field to the last name, second word to the first name fields. If you do not use a comma, “Rick Jones”, the software assumes the second word to be the persons last name.
You can have any number of contacts on a record with up to five phone numbers per record.
If you have multiple contacts for a record they will be listed in the area highlighted in Black above. Selecting a contact record from this window will cause their information to be displayed in the fields below. When a contact is selected all of the tabs listed, highlighted in red above, will be relevant to that specific contact record. You have the ability to set a contact as the Primary Contact, Billing Contact, or both for this location. The Primary Contact for a location will automatically be linked to all quotes, orders or invoices for this location. If the record is also a Billing location, the contact listed as Billing Contact will be used for all invoices. These fields are highlighted in yellow on the above image.
When adding a new contact simply press the NEW button to create clear the fields for entry. You can then optionally click the “Copy from Account” button, highlighted in green, to pull the address information from the Address Tab, if the information is the same.
Contact Type can be used as a referential field or to support your adapted use of ServMan. Contact types are setup in MasterFiles.
Selecting the Misc tab on the contact record revels the above options allowing you to capture up to two Email addresses, a client Web page, date of birth, gender, race and marital status. A Notes area is also available.
The eDoc tab is used only if you choose to email your clients copies of their Invoices, Statements or Mobile work orders instead of printing them. eDoc’s requires pre-configuration with your ServMan implementation team, if configured, you can designate the specific contact to receive any of the various document types by setting the information here. A contact must have an email addresses if you choose to use eDoc’s.
The Software allows you to create additional user-defined tabs for this screen.
Select the client Notes tab to add or edit notes for this location. Notes are specific to this record but can be linked to quotes, orders, invoices and jobs. When we look at a client record, we can see all notes. Because there can be many, the software allows you to choose to restrict the view to the last 10 by choosing “Show last 10 notes” from the drop-down list. To view all notes, simply change this setting.
Notes can be pre-built and assigned codes. Notes are setup with your MasterFiles.
ServMan uses a record called a “Job” to manage projects or contracts where you will have additional requirements for tracking cost, time and materials over a protracted period. Job records can be flagged as contracts, still supporting the job cost management features while exposing features like expiration dates and other contract specific functions. These records are often assigned to Groups allowing them to be viewed independently from one another. Service Agreements, Installations, etc..
All Job records for a location can be viewed or accessed directly from this screen. Note to view Closed or Cancelled records you must uncheck the Open Jobs check box. Also, you can filter the records based on the Job Group field using the “For Group” drop down list at the top of the screen.
If you have Maintenance Agreements, Extended Warranty programs, or Installation Projects for a client they will most likely be listed here.
The client systems tab is designed to show all equipment that you have either sold this client or otherwise worked on for the client. The software refers to these records as “Systems” because it allows you to track subcomponents for each record. From this screen you can right click to access the menu displayed below allowing you to view the service history for the selected record, as well as add a new work order, again for the selected record. If you create a work order using this method the System record will automatically be linked to maintain the service history.
System records can be added to this screen using several methods they are:
Selling equipment to the client – You have the ability to set a flag on certain items you sell called “Update to Client Systems database” as well as assign a System type. When you invoice these items or otherwise relieve them from inventory they will automatically be added to your client location record. If added using this method, the System record will include the invoice number, Date Purchased, Warranty information, item Number with description and equipment type. (A warranty code must be attached to the item to update the System Warranty information.)
Manually entering the System Record – You can manually add system records directly from this screen. When adding System records it's important to understand exactly how your organization is using the software, specifically for maintenance contracts and plans. System types can be critical to your organizations workflow. Refer to your company's local documentation for help if you need it.
Manually entering Systems using Mobile – Technicians have the ability to add Systems records in the field as they work on equipment, attaching them to their work orders. The system records will be updated to the back office when the synchronize their work orders.
The client inspections tab displays records added, usually to jobs, for tracking municipal inspections for this location. Inspections can be edited or added directly from this screen.
Right click to add a new record and display the inspection record. The process is intuitive and easy to use. Simply complete the form to support your local use of the application. All inspections related to this location will be displayed from this tab. If an inspection is linked to a job record, it will also be displayed on the Job’s Inspection tab as well.
The Client Misc Tab has a significant number of very important fields and should not be overlooked. Starting at the top of the screen we will explain each fields use:
This field is referential only and has no effect on the functionality of the software unless your workflows have been adapted to specifically use it. If desired you can apply a preferred or default technician ID here to support your organizations workflow.
If you set a value in this field, all new quotes, orders and invoices created for this account will default to this department unless otherwise modified directly on the documents. You should only use this field if specifically advised by your workflow coordinator.
Many organizations that work with larger accounts may be required to include their clients store numbers with invoices and orders. Set the value here and if required, be sure to have this field added to your appropriate print formats.
The software supports up to three tax codes on a location account. Tax Codes 1 and 2 are located on the Address tab.
Used EXCLUSIVELY to hold a client’s tax exempt number. Warning: Placing any value in this field will cause your clients to NOT be charged sales tax.
If your organization uses the software to calculate sales tax, all records must be assigned an applicable tax status. By default, clients are set to Taxable unless specifically set otherwise.
This field stores and displays the original Marketing Source for how the client was originally acquired as well as the referral, below, if applicable. Marketing source information is captured on all quotes, orders and invoices as well, allowing you to continue to track the effectiveness of your campaigns. To use, you must first set up your Marketing Source codes in your MasterFiles.
If applicable, enter the referral for this project. Referrals can be either Vendors, Employees or Customers. The appropriate lookup table will be determined by the Marketing Source selected above.
Set this field the client requires a purchase order for their orders. If set, the software will not allow orders to be invoiced without a value keyed to the PO number field on the order.
Whatever is keyed to this field will be populated to the PO number field for all orders or invoices created for this client.
You can set a credit limit for this client here. Note, credit limit is determined by the limit set on the billing location for multi-site accounts. If a client exceeds their credit limit a warning will be provided when taking new orders.
Placing a client on hold will provide a warning to users when taking orders for this client, or attempting to invoice orders for the client.
Checking this box will activate the calculation of finance charges and the percent of charge on overdue accounts. Finance charges require a specific process to be run to be added to your accounts. The rate is based on a default finance charge amount set in your company settings. This rate can be overridden for a specific account here. These fields are only applicable for Billing accounts.
You can optionally key or have the your mapping software auto fill specific directions to this Location to support your local workflow.
ServMan supports two billing methods, Invoice Billing or Statement Billing. If you do not send your clients invoices, only statements, you can select Statement Billing here. When printing invoices your billing clerks have the ability to skip the printing of invoices for accounts with this setting.
These fields are used if you are using the ServMan optional web interface to store their access information. These fields are being replaced by new login logistics and will be retired in the near future.
These fields are used to store the specific mapping coordinates for this client. Coordinates can be set using optional mapping software by clicking the Find Client Lat/Long control and Set Client Lat/Long buttons to the right of the fields. If mapping software is enabled, all new records will automatically have these values entered when users add new records. Using the Avalara tax software also sets these values when adding new records.
ServMan supports the ability to print Statements based on the value set in this field. If you print statements for clients at different times of the month you can key specific identifiers here. Then when running statements you can choose to only include statements with matching values.
The client group field was designed to provide clients an additional means of associating accounts for the purposes of reporting or other adapted purposes. Examples of the use of groups would be a large national account that wants a single billing account but desires you to provide work reports by region. Using this example you could create client specific region codes and assign their locations to these. Client groups are maintained in your MasterFiles.
When assigning groups you can choose from either Client specific, or global groups.
To-Do items are used to help users manage back office tasks Similar to how work orders are used to manage our field personnel, back office users can create To-Do items to remind themselves and others of task that they need to perform. Like notes, To-Do’s can be linked to many different types of documents and also like notes, all To-Do items linked to this location will be listed here. You can add new or edit and complete your To-Do items from this screen. By default only OPEN To-Do items are displayed here.
To-Do items are assigned to specific users and can contain a required date as well has have alarms set to remind users of the task. A user can view their assigned task using the schedule board by selecting the To-Do list option from the schedule view.
Your system may have other tabs that are not documented here. The ServMan application is extremely adaptable and your workflow coordinator may have installed or configured additional features and capabilities. Consult your local documentation for how these will be used to support your organization.
The videos in this section will show you how to enter and manage clients in ServMan.