Creating an Estimate
Creating a Bid from an Estimate

An estimate is a list of materials and custom prices for a specific customer. An estimate is saved by the system so you can recall it (a quote is like an estimate, but it is not saved by the system). You can recall an estimate and change it to a bid. A bid is an estimate that has been accepted by your customer. You and your customer have agreed on the initial quantities and prices.

Once you have turned an estimate into a bid, you can create orders from it, to ship and invoice. You cannot make changes to a bid. If security permits, however, you can turn the bid back to an estimate, and then make changes to the estimate.

This job aid explains how to create an estimate (from either the Header screen or the Posting screen) and how to change an estimate into a bid.

For more information about working with saved transactions, including estimates and bids, refer to the online help topics. Open the Point-of-Sale book and then the Saved Transactions book.

 

1

Create an estimate from the Header screen in POS

  1. From the Header screen, press Estimate to start creating an estimate.

  2. Review the customer information that displays. Enter or change information if needed.

  3. For more information about some of the boxes on the Header Screen, see the last section of this job aid.

  4. When all the information is correct, press F11 to return to the Posting Screen.

  5. Post items to the estimate as you normally would.

 

2

Create an estimate from the Posting screen in POS

  1. From the Posting screen, click Start Trx on the toolbar.

  2. On the Start Transaction menu, click Estimate/Quote.

  3. Enter or change customer and transaction information, if necessary.

  4. When all the information is correct, return to the Posting screen.

  5. Post items to the estimate as you normally would.

 

3

Create a bid from an estimate

  1. Recall the estimate transaction.

  2. From the Header screen, at Bid? type Y.

  3. Click Change. The estimate is now a bid.

4

Information about the fields

  • Est/Bid # – If creating a new estimate, do not enter anything in this field. The system assigns a number when you complete the transaction.

  • Bid? – This determines if the transaction is a bid or an estimate. Y indicates that this transaction is a bid. N indicates that the transaction is an estimate.

  • Ph# – If the transaction is for a cash customer (for example, *5), then enter the phone number and do not enter anything in the Short Id field.

  • Ship To, Special Instruct – Use these boxes to specify any delivery information or other information for this transaction.

  • Expiration – Enter the date that the estimate will expire.

  • Prt Prices – This determines if prices print on this transaction. Y indicates print item prices and transaction total. N indicates do not print item prices, only print transaction total.

  • Pricing – This box defaults to the standard pricing for this customer as set up in Customer Maintenance. Use the drop down list to select a different pricing method.

  • Retain? – If set to Y, the transaction is protected from purging. A retained transaction remains in the system until you type N in the Retain box again.

  • Open Quote – For estimates and bids, this field must be N.

  • Codes – This is the "use codes" field. You enter use codes on the Posting screen in the Code box. The codes allow you to group items on an estimate according to when, how, or where they will be used. You can then use the codes to automatically select a group of items when creating an order from the estimate. Your system may be set up to display a list of pre-defined use codes, or you can enter your own code.

  • Archive? – This determines if the transaction will also be saved for later retrieval in QuickRecall.