CM-G  Enter Personal Contacts

Purpose of Program

Use this program to enter and manage personal contacts, such as friends, relatives, and local merchants.  Its history notes and follow-up functions are identical to those of accounts and vendors.

Field Explanations

Most of the fields are self-explanatory, except for the following.

Contact Cd

A user-defined code used to identify the contact.  The coding method we recommend is as follows.  If the contact is a person, use the first three letters of the person's last name, followed by the first three letters of the person’s first name.  If the person¡¦s name were "Joe Frank", his code would be FRAJOE.

If the contact is a business, use the first three letters of the first word in the company name, followed by the first three letters of the second word in the company name.  If the company's name is comprised of just one word, use the first six letters of that word.  You can use any method that works best for you.  This is a 10 character alphanumeric field.

Alpha Sort

Various reports sort either by contact code or by this alpha sort field.  Enter the first few letters by which you want reports sorted alphabetically.  The first six letters of the Name field default into this field, where they may be overridden.

Class Cd

A user-defined code used to classify your personal contacts into groups for report filtering purposes.  These class codes are set up in advance through SM-I-G  Enter Class Codes.

General Program Operation

First you will be required to enter your password.  Enter a contact code or select one from a pop-up window using the F2 key (or click on the Lookup button).  If you enter the code of an existing contact, the contact information will display on the screen.

The Rep field will automatically display your Rep code.

Enter the rest of the fields as needed.  You can save your entry at any point by pressing the F2 key (or clicking on the Lookup button).

Entering History Notes

You can enter history notes of phone conversations and meetings through history notes.  To access history notes for a personal contact, press F5 (or click on the History Notes button) while the contact record is on the screen.  You will be asked for your Rep password.

The last note entered is displayed, and the cursor is on a new line ready to enter the next note.  The date defaults to today's date, but can be overridden.  The Rep field defaults to your Rep code (which it knows from the password you entered) and does not require an entry.

The Cd defaults to your personal default history code set up through SM-I-I  Enter Reps and Passwords, if there is one.  The code classifies what type of history your are recording (phone call, sales call, etc.).  The Ev field is assigned by the system and ties together multiple history lines with the same vent?number so they are treated as a block paragraph.

If the history code has been coded to present a phone window through SM-I-C  Enter History Codes, then a pop-up window will appear, which lets you enter start time, stop time, and actual minutes fields.  These are used to record phone calls for statistical purposes.  If you enter a start time and stop time, the program will automatically calculate the actual minutes.  You can always go back to this window anytime and enter the times after-the-fact.

Enter history notes in the Remarks field.  You can use as many lines as you wish to record a particular event.  Each line is automatically saved when you press <Enter>.  If you exit the screen before pressing <Enter>, you will lose the last line entered.

To edit existing lines, use your <PageUp> and <PageDn> keys and up and down arrow keys to move the cursor to the line you wish to edit.  Make your changes, press <Enter>, and the changes will be saved.

Entering Follow-up

Personal contact follow-up lets you program in a follow-up code and date that alerts you to perform some of follow-up activity, such as to call someone, send a birthday card, etc.

To access follow-up, press F6 (or click on the Follow Up button) while a contact is on the screen to access the contact follow-up entry window.  Enter a follow up code or select one from a pop-up window by pressing the F2 key (or clicking on the Lookup button).  Follow up codes allow you to set up different classifications of follow-up so that they are not all mixed together.  For example, you might have phone follow-ups separated from personal visit follow-ups.

Enter the follow-up date and any remarks as to what you are to do for the follow-up event.  Press F10 (or click on the Save button) to save the follow-up record.

To get a listing of follow-ups to be performed, run CM-H-B  Print Personal Contact Follow-up. You can return to the Enter Contacts screen by pressing the <Esc> key or you can enter additional follow-ups.