Question
How do I search the Aftersales Diary to find specific information?
Answer
Once in the the Aftersales Diary, a screen designed to allow users to search for specific vehicles or simply view all contacts appearing in the After Sales Diary. The search section from the top of this screen is displayed below.
If the 'Contact Lead Diary' parameter is enabled an extra button will show labelled "Start Contacts" - allowing the user to begin working through today's contacts.
The search fields can be used to narrow down the records returned when the search is completed. If required, a single CRM record can be displayed by completing the fields for Registration, Surname or Company; the Vehicle Make field can be completed to return vehicles of a particular make.
The three ‘Radio Buttons’ shown below act as filters allowing the user to display the After Sales
Diary contacts in three main sections.
- Today’s Contacts will display the contacts whereby the ‘Event Date’ (e.g. the service due
date) minus ‘Lead Time’ (e.g. the number of days prior to the ’Event Date’ as set within the
CRM parameters) equals TODAY. - Overdue Contacts will display the contacts whereby the ‘Event Date’ is equal to/greater than
TODAY and the ‘Contact Date’ is less than TODAY. - Overdue Work will display the contacts whereby the ‘Event Date’ is less than TODAY and the ‘Contact Date’ is less than TODAY.
The final two methods of narrowing the display are controlled by the two drop down menus on
this page. The Contact Reason, if left at the default setting of ‘All’ will display all contacts due,
regardless of the reason. To select an option from the list, click on the drop down box and select
the contact reason required. The contact reasons available are driven by the entries within Lead
Times CRM.
The ability to display the results of the After Sales Diary contacts by Contact Reason allows for
different areas of the business to take responsibility for different types of follow up contact – for
example, sales of Extended Warranties may fall under the remit of the Vehicle Sales department,
whilst pursuing bookings from customers who own vehicles that are due for service may be a
task for the service department. By being able to search by Contact Reason, users can obtain
the information they need for their specific role immediately, as opposed to having to search
through a large list.
Finally, the display of due contacts can be narrowed to an individual department within the
business by using the ‘Department’ drop down menu.
In this way, a workshop can attempt to contact only CRM records attached to their department
whilst a parts department can concentrate on parts customers and so on.
Once the search criteria have been completed as required, select the “Search” option –
alternatively, to remove all of the search criteria select the “Clear” option. The system displays
the results of the After Sales Diary as below:
The system displays a line relating to each customer with an entry in the Aftersales Diary,
along with the total number of records displayed and the number of pages of records returned
(these details only appear if the ‘Include Totals on Aftersales Diary’ parameter within CRM
parameters has been selected).
Each line displays the name of the customer, the company name stored against the CRM record
(where applicable), the registration number and detail of the vehicle against which the contact
is required, the contact reason and the contact due date.