buckleytech

I have been in the business for awhile, and over the years I have patched together quite abit of code to handle all my business functions, from marketing, to service, inventory and cash management, etc.

After seeing the limitations of what's currently out there, and how my competitors have struggled with their solutions, I think I've finally reached the point where a little work to make the software marketable to other tech's might be a good idea. Even if it isn't, maybe this thread will help me further develop the software to suit my needs.

Currently, this is what I do.

1. Manage customer accounts, right beside my own bank, credit, and other "real accounts"

2. Maintain several "imaginary money" accounts that help me out with cash flow issues, for example, an inventory account that lets me know if I buy product X by the 100's, and reorder when I have 10 left, how much should be set aside when I've only got 40 X's on the shelf.

3. Keep full inventory and barcode cross-reference.

4. Store sales lead information, current customer information, sales history, etc. (mainly for marketing purposes)

5. Assign assets (mainly computers) to customers, trouble tickets and work orders to assets, as well as components to assets (for example, if I'm drowning in RAMBUS modules, I can mail out special coupons to those customers still using systems that could be upgraded with those modules)

6. Handle quotes and invoices, barcoding them so that payment slips can be quickly cross-checked and entered into the database when the checks come in.

7. Service management (I also run a dialup ISP, and handle several recurring service contracts, so the ability to bill for a single product monthly/quarterly/yearly is important.)

8. Basic document management (signup forms, canned contracts, filling in service reports from other data in the database, etc.) Tied to individual products and services.

9. Web integration of all of the above, allowing customers to submit tickets, order directly online, schedule service calls, etc.

Right now I think the weak points are mainly that my service contracts are all based on quoted amounts. I haven't really got a solidified formula for the charges, its more of a "gut feel" based on existing equipment, operating environment, sales input (how mission critical it is / what they are willing to pay for the level of service they need)


And now finally, THE QUESTION!

What would be important to you if you were in the repair / maintenance / sales of tech products business? Am I missing anything that would make my life easier? I'm working with just about the most flexible infrastructure I can think of, so I'd really be interested in knowing what I might be missing. Does anyone use a system like this?

I think the perfect market would be all those businesses using a CRM + Quickbooks + POS + Trouble Ticket system out there.

[Mystic]

CommitCRM + Quickbooks... however CommitCRM lacks until 3.7 comes out in a few months.

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