Know which customer orders a supplier delay will hit

The problem with supplier delays

A supplier tells you their shipment will be ten days late. The email lands in one inbox, the purchase order still shows the old date, and nobody connects it to the three customer orders that need those parts. You find out when a customer calls asking where their order is.

How ProcessRipple tracks it

• Every purchase order line has an expected delivery date. The purchase order’s expected arrival is the latest of its lines, so moving one line moves the order.
• Sales orders are linked to the purchase orders they depend on. A sales order’s estimated ship date is the latest arrival among its linked purchase orders, plus your own processing time for that order.
• A change ripples forward automatically. Edit a delivery date on a purchase order and every linked sales order gets a new estimated ship date at once — no spreadsheet to update.
• You hear about it right away. When a sales order’s ship date moves, ProcessRipple emails you, so you can talk to your customer before they ask.
• At-risk orders stand out. A sales order whose estimated ship date has passed the date you committed to your customer is flagged as at risk.

A record of every date change

Every change to an expected arrival or ship date is kept, with the old and new dates, when it happened, and whether a person edited it or it was recalculated from a supplier change. When someone asks “why did this date move?”, the answer is one click away instead of buried in email.

Reports on supplier reliability

The supply risk and ETA changes report lists the orders whose dates moved and the ones now at risk. The vendor delivery performance report shows which suppliers deliver on time and which keep slipping — useful when you choose who to order from next. Both export to Excel and PDF.

See also: purchase order tracking.