Use bids to give customers a price quotation, without tying up your product inventory. Unlike other sales orders, bids do not commit the inventory, so the products remain available for sale. Once the customer is ready to order, you can quickly convert the bid into an order.
The system includes many features for working with bids. For instance, the Job Bid Subtotal Maintenance screen lets you group, subtotal, and reprice bids. When you need to manage multiple bids for the same project, use the Job Bid Maintenance feature. You can also create reminders for following up on individual bids.
You create a bid the same way you create any other sales order. You can change an order's mode so that it becomes a bid. For more information, see Creating and Copying Bids.
If more than one customer needs a bid on similar products, there is no need to enter the same information twice. You can open an existing sales order or bid, and copy it. Then edit the new bid as needed. For more information, see Creating and Copying Bids.
You can quickly convert a bid into an order. Do this instead of retyping all the order information when the customer is ready to order. You can then edit the order as needed. For more information, see Converting Bids into Sales Orders.
Use the Job Bid Subtotal Maintenance screen to group and sort the products on a sales order bid, and also display subtotals for each group. From this screen, you can also get vendor bids or procure items. Or select a subtotal group and override the pricing of the products in that group.
Use the Job Bid Maintenance screen to track multiple bids for a job. This is handy if several of your customers are bidding on the same project. Once you create a named job bid, you can associate sales and purchase orders with it. Then you can easily review all outstanding orders related to the job bid. Once a bid is awarded, you can use the Master Job Bids features to manage a large, ongoing project.
In addition to the Job Bid Maintenance features, the system also lets you track individual bids. When you create a bid, you can also create a Bid Follow Up reminder.
Using the Bid Follow Up queue, you can display bids, and drill down to view their details. Then contact your customers to see if they are ready to place the orders. For more information, see Following Up on Bid Reminders.
Run the Unconverted Bids Report to list bids that have not been converted into orders. Use this report to identify old or "stale" bids that you may want to delete. One report option lets you include or exclude the Master Job Bids. For more information, see Master Job Bids Overview.
If your customer has identified their own client in the Customer's Client field on the Additional Header screen, the pricing that prints on the bid will display the customer's client pricing rather than the customer's (contractor) pricing.
Click here for a printable version of the Bid Management documentation.
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