The lookup screen

You can search through your QuickFill database to find a customer, a subscription, a prospect, or an order using your choice of several identifying names or numbers. QuickFill always uses the first field on the lookup screen that is filled in, ignoring any fields below it. (There is one exception to this rule. You can search for a name within a zip code and country by filling in all three fields.) To clear the fields on the lookup screen prior to beginning a new search click the 'Reset' button.

Searching by zip/postal code

To search by zip code, fill in the zip code field and click on "Find." (You can also search using a partial zip code by entering just the first few digits.) Once you click on "Find," you'll see a list of customers sorted by zip code displayed on the bottom of the screen. The first customer with the zip code you specified is highlighted. What happens if you enter a zip code in which you have no customers? In this case, QuickFill goes to the first zip that is greater than the one you specified.

If a lot of your customers are in the same zip code, you may also want to enter the first few characters of the customer's company name. Now when you click on "Find," QuickFill finds the first customer from that company in that zip code.

When you include a zip code in your lookup request QuickFill displays records sorted by their "match code". The match code includes the country code, the zip code, the first few letters of the company name and lastly the first few letters of the customer's name. If you find that you need to lookup by zip code and name more often than by zip code and company, then you can change the match code to reverse the order of the company name and the customer name. You make this change to the match code on the 'Lookup' tab of the Preferences screen.

To look up a foreign customer by their postal code, you must first enter their country code and then go to the postal code field and enter the appropriate postal code. One exception to this rule is if your home country is the United States and you're looking for a Canadian customer. In this case, you can enter the customer's Canadian postal code; it is not necessary to enter a country code. The space in the code can be omitted. Canadian users of QuickFill may also look up customers from the United States by simply entering the customer's zip code; again, it is not necessary to enter a country code.

Searching by country code

To search for foreign customers by country code, fill in the country code field by directly typing in a code. You may also use F2 or click on the country code field with your right mouse button to select from a list of defined country codes and the countries they represent. Once you click on "Find," the list of customers will be sorted by country. The first customer with the country code you specified is highlighted.

If there are no customers with the specified country code, QuickFill goes to a customer with the country code following the one you entered; the list is in alphabetical order. That is, if you entered FIJ (Fiji) in the country code field, QuickFill would go to the first customer for FIN (Finland) if there were not any customers from the Fiji Islands in your database.

You may add, change, or delete foreign country codes by going to the 'Foreign countries' menu option under definitions (click here for information on defining foreign countries).

Searching by person's name and initial

To search for a customer by using an individual's last name, fill in the name field with the first few letters of the last name (the case doesn't matter) and click on "Find." QuickFill displays a list of customers in alphabetical order by last name. The first customer whose name matches the letters you entered is highlighted.

To search for a customer by using an individual's last name and first initial, fill in the name field with the customer's last name, enter the first letter of their first name in the 'Initial' field, and click on "Find." Again, QuickFill displays a list of customers in alphabetical order by last name. The first customer whose last name and first initial matches the letters you entered in the 'Person's name' and 'Initial' fields is highlighted.

When searching for a customer by last name and first initial do not enter a zip/postal code. Doing so will cause QuickFill to ignore the initial and perform the search based on the zip/postal code and last name only.

Searching by company name

To search for a customer by using a company name, fill in the company field with the first few letters of the company name (the case doesn't matter), then click on "Find." QuickFill displays a list of customers in alphabetical order by company. The first customer whose company name matches the letters you entered is highlighted.

Searching by E-Mail address

To search for a customer by using an email address, fill in the email field with the first few letters of the email address (the case doesn't matter), then click on "Find." QuickFill displays a list of customers (for whom you have entered email addresses) in alphabetical order by email address. The first customer whose email address matches the letters you entered is highlighted.

Searching by User ID

To search for a customer by using a user ID, fill in the user ID field with the first few letters of the ID (the case doesn't matter), then click on "Find." QuickFill displays a list of customers (for whom you have entered user IDs) in alphabetical order by user ID. The first customer whose ID matches the letters you entered is highlighted.

Searching by QuickFill number

QuickFill assigns each customer a number when you first enter them into the database. Similarly it assigns numbers to orders, combination orders and web transactions (for systems with the QuickFill Internet Extensions (QFIE) feature). You can search for any of these things by filling in the "Number" field on the lookup screen and clicking "Find". The resulting display will vary depending on the type of number you entered.

Searching by external customer ID or external order ID

Every customer record and every order record contains an optional field that can be used to store an ID number from an external system. This external system might be a previous subscription fulfillment system or it might be an Internet based ordering system other than the QuickFill Internet Extensions (QFIE). Sometimes you may find that you have an ID number from the external system and need to locate the corresponding record in QuickFill. To accomplish this task, enter the ID number in either of the external ID fields and click Find. QuickFill will present a list of QuickFill customers or orders with their external ID numbers, positioned at the closest match (please note that external ID numbers are not required to be unique so you may have more than one record in QuickFill for a given external ID number). From that screen you can select the record you want and click the Select button. QuickFill will display the complete customer record or order record, just as if you had started with a QuickFill customer number or order number.

Searching by credit card ticket number or transaction ID number

QuickFill assigns a ticket number to every credit card payment processed within QuickFill. Similarly, Element Payment Services assigns a transaction ID number to those same payment transactions. When answering questions about a credit card transaction it can be helpful to locate the QuickFill order to which the payment was applied. Use these two fields search the index of credit card transactions by either ticket number or transaction ID number.

Note: credit card transactions processed outside QuickFill are not indexed in the QuickFill database.

Customer list

Below the lookup fields, you'll see a section of your customer file.

For each customer in the list, you can see his or her customer number, name, company name, zip/postal code, and country code. If you didn't record a company name, QuickFill shows the city and state instead. When you search by e-mail address or user ID the state, zip and country columns are replaced by e-mail address or user ID columns. Also, only the customers in your database that have an e-mail address or user ID will be displayed.

The order in which the customers appear depends on what you entered in the lookup screen. If you entered a zip code, the list of customers appears in zip code order. If you entered a customer or company name, the list appears in alphabetical order.

Once you click on a customer in this list, you can use the up- and down-arrow keys to scroll through the list and locate the particular customer for whom you're looking. You can also use PageUp and PageDown to move through the file faster.

 

 

See Also

 

 

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Toolbar: image\tblook.jpg

Keys: CTRL+L