Contact Categories

The software allows you to categorize your contacts using two types of Contact Categories:

  1. Software-defined categories, which appear in angle brackets such as < Technician >, and

  2. User-defined categories which you set up yourself.

You use the Contact Category Editor to set up and maintain your list of Contact Categories.

You may assign each of your contacts to any number of categories on the second tab of the Contact File Card. For details see Updating Contact Information.

Software-defined Categories

There are 7 Software-defined Categories:

Employee - A contact set to <Employee> will appear in the payroll system.

Misc Supplier - A miscellaneous supplier is one that provides other products and services to the business other than parts that are resold on work orders. Examples of this would include the telephone company and outside towing services.

Parts Supplier - A parts supplier is one that provides parts to your business which are resold on invoices directly or for inventory.

Client Access - Allows you to assign a password and access rights to the contact so they may use your Software System.

Service Advisor - A contact who writes up work orders documents.

Supplier Connection - A supplier that you can order parts from through the online ordering system.

Technicians - Contacts that are credited for production labor operations on work orders.

NOTE: You may not change software-defined categories, as they are required by the software.

User-defined Categories

You can use user-defined categories to track sales by customer category, or to target promotional material to specific contact groups. Regardless of category, any contact may be a customer.

To access your Contact Category definitions:

  1. Select Tools | Enterprise | Contact Categories

The Contact Category Editor:

To Add a new Contact Category:

To Update a Contact Category:

To Remove a Contact Category:

IMPORTANT: You may not remove a Contact Category if any contacts have been assigned to that category. If you attempt to remove a Contact Category that is used, The software will display a dialog which displays the number of contacts assigned to that category.

TIP: Contact Categories are set up for an entire Enterprise. Individual business Location do NOT activate subsets of the enterprise contact categories list.