Per Dave O'Neill, Juan Pena and John Foley: OK to kill this. Moving to archive. -SP, 12/11/18
1 Introduction
We want to create a streamlined system for tracking PO Confirmations, and recording vendor responses to them.
Goals
- Provide enhanced PO email containing appropriate responses. Each response will be linked back to the laddawn.com site and, when clicked, will record date/time stamps for the corresponding action. In addition, emails that receive no responses within a specified time period will be resent and/or added to a report that can be used to follow up with the vendor. This will cover those emails that may go undelivered (spam filters, etc.) as well as emails that have been delivered, but were not read or not successfully replied to.
Background and strategic fit
Tracking these vendor PO confirmations for Marketplace and NS bought jobs is time consuming and error prone. At this point, a full time employee spends most of his time tracking vendor responses to the emails we currently send, and managing those who do not respond. We want to free this employee's time up by automating as much of these tasks as we can.
Solution and scope
The solution involves the creation of a series of web services that can be called as links embedded into emails. Each web service call will collect the pertinent data (date, time, identifier for its parent email container, etc.) and will make a call to the database (Avante) to perform an update of a specific logical field and/or date stamp associated with the Purchasing workflow.
Using this mechanism, the existing PO confirmation emails can be adapted to contain a footer presenting the recipient with a series of response choices. For example:
This PO is accepted. All information on the PO is accurate and acceptable.
This PO is not accepted. The delivery date is too soon.
When each email is sent, a SQL Server log file will be updated to include a reference to the sent email.
Clicking each of these boxes would make a call to the appropriate web service and record the date stamp and other pertinent info directly in Avante. In addition, a SQL Server log file will be updated to reflect the recipient's response.
Periodically, the SQL Server log file will be monitored to find sent emails which have not received any replies. These emails can be:
- Resent to the vendor with different wording
- Added to an action report that can be sent to VRP personnel for follow-up
2 Definitions
<< Define terms specific to project, new terminology, trademarks, etc. >>
3 Assumptions
<< List all assumptions made at the outset. If the design is based on a specific set of conditions or givens, list them here. If there is a desired environment or specific set of requirements that need to be met for the solution to be valid, list them here. >>
4 User Interaction and Design
Not Doing
- At this writing, we are not planning to modify the selection of vendors. Vendor selection and PO Confirmation email sending will happen the way it has been happening. This solution involves the modification of the email that gets sent, and of the workflow that occurs thereafter.
5 Use Cases
5a Example Use Case
6 Testing
6a Example Test Case
7 Change management and rollout planning