ADP Customer Numbers

[imacdude]

Does anyone have a good or creative method of assigning customer numbers in ADP? From the service logons Customers can be given the next sequential number in the syste. From other logons (ie. F&I, and Accounting) they cannot. I am looking to put in place a uniform method, but have yet to find a good one? Phone numbers don't always work as those customers that move periodically can tell you. With the Area Code changes we've had compound the phone number problem. Any suggestions?

Thanks
John Belen

[RickW]

A Chevy store I worked at used the last 8 digits of the VIN for the customer number. Seemed to work for everybody including the front office.

[sallen1]

While using the VIN for customer number is easy there is one thing to concider...

If you take that car in trade and sell it to someone else, then two customers will share a customer number. But no problem, you say, because the first customer bought another car and has a new customer number. This even compounds the headache because the same customer for your dealership now has two customer numbers. Makes it difficult to track purchase histories, etc.

And if you sell alot of cars to wholesalers and process them properly through the system, then any single wholesaler will have lots of customer numbers. Same goes for dealer trades.

We did this from advice by ADP and I wish I didn't. After 10 years on the system, the database is a bit messy.

My advice is to use sequential numbers, start it at 100001 so not to confuse with your vendor #'s

scott

[dmacri]

John and others,

Now that CRM is becoming pivotal, the assigning of numbers is crucial in a dealership-wide manner.

As I write this, I am still in search of the perfect numbering system.

1. NEVER assign a customer number like deal number or Vehid, this is what promotes multiple numbers for the same customer.

2. Phone number used to be my favorite. As John mentions, this has become messy due to area codes and recent trends in lifestyles.

3. I suggest F&I ignoring the customer number prompt. Allow accounting to assign it when finalizing the deal.

4. Always search - and verify. Theres no excuse not to.

5. Until the next major release (7.0), you can get a custom program called 'Get next control number' for non-service add-ins.

6. Name consolidation exists to clean up your current mess. Very nice tool and allows you to run your customer base against postal records for latest change of address data.
**Advice** if you're going to clean up your names, make sure your go-forward policy of adding names doesn't keep adding to the problem.

7. Until I find a better way, sequential numbers seem to work best.

Dale

[Gerry Laughlin]

Dale,
You seem to have an inside edge on whats going on with ADP, so hope you don't mind if I ask a question. Your post seems to indicate a change in sequential numbering coming up in the next release. Do you know if this release might give F&I the ability to use sequential numbering? We use a number of reports that pull info from the sls-deals files so I am a bit gun-shy about waiting till FF to enter a customer number.
We have looked at the name-consolidation tool, which is sorely needed in our store, but the big-guy says he is sick and tired of paying for "tools" that should be a part of the base system. His feelings are that at $8000 a month the system tools should be enhanced once in awhile at ADP's expense if they care about their customers. I have pointed out some of the enhancements that have been included in updates but he is not impressed.
Well anyway I can empathize with anybody out there trying to clean up his or her name-file, it is not an easy task.

Gerry

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[dmacri]

Gerry,

I'll get the full details of what the next major release (AE stack 7.0) has on it. 6.0 just came out, so 7 should be about 6-9 months from now - assuming no programming oopsies from the beta clients.

Sls-Deals is a file that copies finalized deals (with customer number) from FI-WIP. This is so you can keep FI-WIP small & fast.
Dealers without Sales management must rely on FI-WIP or FDA (finance document archiving) for long term storage of deals.
Your concern over being gun-shy seems unfounded by me - unless I'm missing something.

Concerning the big guy.
You need to look at the return on investment.
How many of your reminders/letters/etc go into the dead letter hopper. At 35 cents a piece - it adds up.

With the need for full value of a customer, you'll have mis-readings if some of a customer's value is hidden under a different cust number.

With the updating from the national change of address (NCOA) database, you'll have the latest address of your customers.
** I don't know about you, but when I move, I'll tell magazine subscriptions, credit card companies, friends, family etc. The dealer is not one of the people on my list to notify.**

Yes you can consolidate names on your own without name consolidation (NCT), but it is incredibly slow. My experience shows that too many judgment calls need to be made during the process. The person assigned to this task usually doesn't have the dealer's best interest in mind (read Kelly girl).
NCT allows you to view all duplicates on one screen and window into details of each number so you can make a sound decision of which customer number to keep and which one(s) to merge into the master. 3 keystrokes does all the work, so the process is quick.

Dale

[Gerry Laughlin]

Dale,
I am just not sure when the record is created in the sls-deals file, before or after teh deal is finalized in accounting. If we have accounting assign the cust-no will that info make it's way back into the sls-deals file?

Gerry

[Jeannie]

Not meaning to be a 'butinski' in the middle of your dialogue, but a differentiation between ADP systems is in order. Having previously been on ERA and now using the completely networked, PC-based "Alliance" system,several differences may be noted.
"Alliance" allows for customer number assignment to be done at the deal finalization prior to close but before integration to accounting.(Yes, that number then 'makes its way back to the deal file and every other file (serv,parts, F&I, acct'g) in the dealership.Most importantly,as Dale says, search and verify is imperative. Who better to do this than someone close to the name and address file? If new number assignment IS NECESSARY, Alliance does it sequentially. Customer number consolidation is available in Alliance as a Utility program that is included (no charge). Easy to administer if customer data is collected EVERY time there is contact with a customer(ie: "May I verify that we have the right information in our files? address, zip, phone, yaddayaddayadda?)Initial consolidation may be horrific, and should be administered with cooperation from other sources close to the names (ie:service,parts),but done periodically thereafter is a piece of cake. Alliance's PC based system allows for migration of name and address files to other sources (Word, Excel,etc)for manipulation, mailing,etc.as well.
As far as expense to the "Big Guy', Alliance cost me less at the initial outlay AND on my monthly.
The Big Gal

[dmacri]

Sls-deals is created directly after the office finalizes a car-deal and the message 'Now updating sales management' pops up.

Prove it to yourself with just one deal.

[dmacri]

Gerry,
I have confirmation that next release AE 7.0 will have the option to auto-sequence the next customer number in F&I.
There are many more nice features in the release - but I'll leave it at that for now.

Dale