V9 - Customer portal setup and use

SOS Inventory enables Pro plan subscribers to set up a portal for your business that allows your customers to access information about their orders posted to SOS Inventory. Your customer portal is on Orderfacts.com, a service of SOS Inventory that is included at no additional charge to you. The portal works in conjunction with order stages and specific variable codes included in the body of system-generated emails for sales orders and sales receipts sent to your customers.

Customer portal setup and setting descriptions

Go to Tools & settings > Configuration > Sales > Customer portal to set up your customer portal.

Enabled. Checking the box enables the portal for your customers. You can disable access if you decide it is being misused or want to reconfigure the settings. The rest of the settings listed below only display if the Enabled box is checked.

Portal subdomain. The URL to which you'll direct your customers. As an example, in the URL https://acmetools.orderfacts.com, acmetools is the portal subdomain. Your subdomain is usually your company name and is particular to your customers only.

Company name for portal. The company name you want displayed to your customers. Leave this field blank to default to the company name entered in the Company name field under the Name and address settings (Tools & settings > Configuration > Company > Name and address).

Footer. The text you want to be displayed at the bottom of all portal pages. The footer typically includes disclaimers, contact information, etc.

Require password. If enabled, requires your customer to enter a password on your company's Orderfacts login page to access the customer portal. The password is a randomly generated eight-character password.

• If a password is required, your customer can access their Order History page, as well as any individual transaction and its status.
• If no password is required, the login page is bypassed. Your customer can access a copy of a sales receipt or sales order and the status of that transaction on an individual basis only. The customer cannot access the Order History page or the status of any other transaction.

Show assigned representative. If enabled, allows the customer to see the name of the SOS user assigned to the order.

Setting up the Orderfacts customer portal link and password

When a sales order or sales receipt is sent to a customer using the Email function on the transaction's Actions menu, the body of the email message must include how a customer can log in to the portal (if your company requires a password for portal access) or a link to a sales transaction (if you do not require a password).

In the Sales order message (Tools & settings > Configuration > Sales > Sales orders) and Sales receipt message (Tools & settings > Configuration > Sales > Sales receipts) settings: 

• Insert the variable [StatusLink]. Depending upon whether you require your customers to log in with a password, the link will either direct them to the Orderfacts login page or open a copy of the sales transaction directly.
• If you require your customers to log in with a password, also insert the variable [PortalPassword] in your message. SOS automatically assigns an initial password in the Portal password field of the customer's Edit page.

A sample Sales order message with both variable codes is displayed below:

Using order stages with the customer portal

You can give your customer the ability to view the status of their orders in the customer portal by setting up order stages that reflect your sales workflow.

The stages that have been defined by your company are listed in the Order stage field dropdown on sales orders and sales receipts. These transaction types also include a Status message field, in which you can manually enter a message. The order stage must be updated manually on the transaction.

When updated, the order stage will be displayed in the customer portal's Status column on the Order History page, as well as in the Status field on the portal's copy of the sales transaction. A status message will also be displayed in the Status message areas on the Order History page and sales transaction. (See the example screenshots of how these fields appear on the portal in the section, Using the customer portal.)

Logging in to the customer portal

If your company requires customers to sign in to the portal with a password, they will see a login page similar to the screenshot below.

If your customer selects the I forgot my password option on the portal login page, they will receive an email with the password that your company currently has on file in the customer definition.

Using the customer portal

The header of the customer portal includes your company logo (as specified under Tools & settings > Configuration > Company > Logo) and the name of your portal. If you entered a name for your portal in the Company name for portal field (Tools & settings > Configuration > Sales > Customer portal), it will be displayed in the header of portal pages. If you left that field blank, the name of your business as entered in the Company name field (Tools & settings > Configuration > Company > Name and address) will be displayed by default.

Links to Order History and Logout are also found in the right corner of the header. As previously mentioned, Require password on the Customer portal settings page must be enabled to give your customers access to their order history. If your company does not require customers to log in to the portal, those links will not be displayed.

The customer portal has two areas of interest: the Order History page and the transaction page of an individual sales order or sales receipt.

Customer portal Order History 

A customer who logs in to the portal is directed to their Order History page. There, your customer can view the list of their transactions and their statuses, as well as specify a date range of transactions to display, as shown in the screenshot below.

The Order History column heading descriptions are as follows: 

• Type. Either Receipt (sales receipt) or Order (sales order).
• Txn #. Transaction number assigned to the sales order or sales receipt.
• Order Date. The date of the transaction.
• Customer PO. The customer's purchase order assigned to the transaction.
• Sales Rep. Your company's sales representative assigned to this transaction.
• Status. Status as entered in the Order stage field on the sales order or sales receipt. 
• Status Message. The message in the Status message field, if manually entered on the sales order or sales receipt.

To view a copy of a sales transaction, select its transaction reference number link in the Txn # column.

Customer portal sales transaction page

The copy of the transaction includes a Shipments field that provides the shipment transaction date (pulled from the Date/time field), ship method, and tracking number. The Invoices field displays the invoice date, invoiced amount, and whether it is paid or unpaid.

If multiple shipments or invoices are connected to a sales order, a separate entry will be displayed for each shipment and/or invoice. For sales receipts, multiple shipments will appear as separate entries.

If you are in the SOS application, you can access the portal from a saved sales order or sales receipt. On the transaction's Edit page, select the Status URL link to go directly to the portal's transaction page or click the content_copy icon to copy the URL and paste it into another document or browser:

When you access the customer portal from the Status URL link or the content_copy icon, you will go either to the portal login page or directly to the transaction, depending on your settings.

Changing a portal password for a customer

If a customer needs or wants to change their password, you must do it for them.

To change a customer's portal password, open the customer record in the Customers list (Operations > Sales > Customers). By the Portal Password field of the customer definition, select the Generate new password button to assign a new system-generated password—or you can enter a new password manually in the Portal Password field.