Opportunity Management: Sales Quotes

In MYOB Advanced, you can use sales quotes to present an offer based on an opportunity to a prospect or customer; the sales quote includes a list of products and services offered at specific prices and with specific discounts, taxes, and other terms.

Creation of Sales Quotes

A sales quote is a document you create in MYOB Advanced on the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form. You can create sales quotes in the system if the Sales Quotes feature is enabled on the Enable/Disable Features (CS100000) form.

You can create any number of sales quotes for an opportunity as you negotiate the deal with the prospect or customer. A sales quote can be printed or emailed to the specified customer for review. A sales quote can be selected as primary for an opportunity. When the customer accepts an offer, at least one sales quote must be selected as the primary one.

You can start creating a sales quote in any of the following ways:

• By clicking Create Quote on the form toolbar of the Opportunities (CR304000) form while viewing the opportunity the quote will be based on. This opens the Create Quote dialog box, where you can specify basic settings. When you click Create and Review, the system closes the dialog box and opens the Sales Quotes form with applicable settings filled in, so that you can view and edit the created sales quote.
• By clicking Create Quote on the table toolbar of the Quotes tab on the Opportunities form while viewing the opportunity the quote will be based on. This opens the Create Quote dialog box, where you can specify the basic settings of the quote.
• By clicking New Record on the form toolbar of the Sales Quotes (CR3045PL) form.
• By clicking Add New Record on the form toolbar of the Sales Quotes form. In this case, you need to enter the settings of the sales quote manually.
• By selecting an existing quote and then clicking Copy Quote, which is available on the table toolbar of the Quotes tab on the Opportunities form and on the More menu or on the form toolbar of the Sales Quotes form. This command causes the system to open the Copy Quote dialog box, where you can specify the needed settings for a new quote. When you click OK, the system copies the settings of the selected quote to a new one.

The system copies the settings' values specified on the Contact, Financial, Shipping, and Taxes tabs of the Opportunities (CR304000) form and inserts them to a new sales quote that is generated on the Sales Quotes form.

If any automatic group and document discounts has been specified for lines on the Details tab on the Sales Quotes form, the system will apply these discounts even if the value in the Inventory ID column for a line is empty.

Primary Sales Quotes

When a sales quote is created for an opportunity, the system sets this sales quote as primary by selecting the Primary check box in the Summary area on the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form and in the row that has the settings of the sales quote on the Quotes tab of the Opportunities (CR304000) form.

If multiple sales quotes are created for an opportunity, one of the sales quotes must be set as the primary, which you can do either during the creation of a quote or by clicking Set as Primary on the More menu of the Sales Quotes form.

An opportunity uses the primary sales quote as the source of various settings on the Opportunities form, such as the list of products and services, the currency and the currency rate, the location, billing address, billing information, contact information, tax details, and discount details. If you change the sales quote set as the primary sales quote for the opportunity, these settings are changed for the opportunity to those of the new primary sales quote.

If a sales quote is the primary one for the opportunity and its status has changed from Draft to any other status, the Business Account box is unavailable for editing both for the primary sales quote on the Sales Quotes form and for the opportunity on the Opportunities form. If the status of a non-primary sales quote has changed from Draft to any other status, the Business Account box is unavailable for editing only for this sales quote.

Sales Quote Activities

On the Activities tab of the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form, you can create activities associated with the selected sales quote. On the Activities tab of the Opportunities (CR304000) form, activities related to the selected opportunity are listed, along with activities related to the primary quote associated with the opportunity.

Processing of a Sales Quote Through Statuses

In MYOB Advanced, as a sales quote is being processed by a salesperson, it progresses through various statuses. The current status of the sales quote is displayed in the Status box in the Summary area of the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form. Because the system updates the status of the sales quote during processing, the Status box is unavailable for editing.

A sales quote can have one of the following statuses:

• Draft: The sales quote is being prepared and can be edited. This is the default status of a new sales quote.
• Sent: The quote has been emailed to the customer—that is, an email activity with the quote attached to it has been created and sent to the customer contact.
  Note: The Sent status does not guarantee that the sales quote has been delivered to the recipient or has been read.
• Pending Approval: The sales quote requires an approval or multiple approvals, which are determined based on the approval map assigned to sales quotes.
• Approved: The sales quote is approved within the company.
• Rejected: The sales quote has been rejected by an approver within the company.
• Accepted: The sales quote has been accepted by the customer.
• Converted: The sales quote has been converted to a sales order or invoice, and no further work on the quote is planned.
• Declined: The customer has rejected the offer presented in the sales quote.

You can also see the statuses of a particular opportunity’s sales quotes on the Quotes tab (Status column) of the Opportunities (CR304000) form.

Approval of Sales Quotes

Approval of sales quotes can be set up in the system if the Approval Workflow feature is enabled on the Enable/Disable Features (CS100000) form.

Sales quotes require approval if an approval map for sales quotes has been specified in the Approval Map box of the General tab (Quote Approval Settings section) of the Customer Management Preferences (CR101000) form.

With this configuration performed, you can submit a sales quote with the Draft status for approval by clicking Request Approval on the form toolbar of the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form. When a sales quote has been submitted for approval, the Approve and Reject buttons are displayed on the form toolbar. The information on approvals of a sales quote is added to the Approvals tab of the form.

The following settings of a sales quote that has the Pending Approval status cannot be modified:

• The business account, location, and settings related to amounts in the Summary area
• The settings on the Details tab
• The settings on the Shipping tab
• The settings on the Taxes tab
• The settings on the Discounts tab

An assigned approver can approve or reject the sales quote by clicking Approve or Reject on the form toolbar of the Sales Quotes form. After a sales quote has been approved, it can be sent to the customer.

Emailing of a Sales Quote

You can send a sales quote to a contact of the customer or prospective customer for review by clicking Send on the More menu of the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form. The system creates an activity of the Email type, attaches the Sales Quote (CR604500) report (which is a printable version of the sales quote) to the email, sends the email, and changes the status of the quote to Sent. A row with the details of the email is added on the Activities tab of the Sales Quotes form.

The email is generated automatically in accordance with the mailing settings specified for customer relationship management (CRM) in MYOB Advanced, as described in Emails and Activities: Emails.

Location-Related Sales Quote Settings

When a sales quote is created on the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form, to populate the location-related settings (that is, the settings specified in the Ship-To Address and Ship-To Info sections of the Shipping tab) of the form, the system copies these settings from the same sections of the Shipping tab of the Opportunities (CR304000) form for the associated opportunity. On the Shipping tab of the form, the Override check boxes in the Ship-To Address and Ship-To Info sections are cleared.

The system displays a dialog box in which you need to confirm the replacement of the existing settings with the new settings if the following conditions are met:

• You have selected the Override check box in the Ship-To Address or Ship-To Info section (or both sections).
• You have specified a different business account in the Business Account box or another location of the business account in the Location box of the Summary area.

Opportunities with Quotes for Multiple Business Accounts

If an opportunity has multiple sales quotes, the business accounts specified for these sales quotes on the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form can differ from the business account specified for the opportunity on the Opportunities (CR304000) form.

In an opportunity that has sales quotes for different prospects or customers, on the Quotes tab of the Opportunities form, you can track the business account, location, and contact of each sales quote in the following columns: Business Account, Location, and Contact.

Relations Between a Sales Quote and Its Associated Records

As you work with a sales quote in MYOB Advanced, you can track the records associated with the quote on the Relations tab of the Sales Quotes (CR304500) form. For details, see Managing Relations.