ABSTRACT
Customers' perception of suppliers varies greatly from their actual performance. It does not matter whether suppliers are good or bad – what does matter is what the customer thinks about them. Customers can look for a match between their own style of company and the style of the supplier. The major factors affecting customer relations are a result of market strategy projected through sales and sales order processing. Customer service can be structured or focused on a particular group of customers or market sector using alternative availability policies. Stock control requires an identification code for each item, ideally provided by the customer. Order processing transfers the customer order into company information reliably, speedily and without errors. If the customers are entering the data, it should be simple for them to identify what they want and organise payment. Customers often require acknowledgement of order and confirmation of price as well as a despatch note and invoice.
