A major feature of the Sales Rep’s Assistant (SRA) forklift sales software is the function of “intuitive option compatibility checking in the configurator.” From the very beginning, the SRA software was designed to provide two important features: 1) the salesperson could develop a proposal for a complicated and unfamiliar piece of equipment can feel confident that selections made can be built at the factory for the price quoted, and 2) the salesperson would not be able to overlook options that are required to allow other desired components to be added, or to function properly.
An example of the first instance could be a circumstance that a deluxe full-suspension seat is added to the specifications, but the salesperson is not aware that this seat requires the optional raised overhead guard, which costs hundreds of dollars more, to provide the ANSI mandated head clearance. The dilemma now comes in deciding who has to pay for the mistake. The Dealer? The Factory? The Salesperson? The Customer? The SRA configurator was designed to eliminate these types of costly errors.
A second situation might occur in the instance where a hydraulically operated attachment is added, but the required attachment hose group and control valve is overlooked. Yes, the truck can be built, but when it arrives at the dealership, expensive custom modifications must be made. Another example would be in the circumstance when a mast with a very high maximum fork height is chosen, but wide tires required for stability are missed. The forklift arrives, built to specifications, but at a much reduced capacity rating. Again, SRA was created from the beginning to mitigate these type of configuration errors.
When configuring a forklift quote in SRA you will notice that the categories seem to be displayed in a random order. In designing the SRA program, it was decided that the logic built into the price books would always “drill down”. This means any selection made would affect only the options below it, or on following screens. If selecting an option were allowed to modify choices on previous screens, this change might not be noticed, resulting in an error to specifications.
Another reason for displaying categories in the order shown is because we always try to design the layout so that compatibility will display the available set of options, rather than prevent the selection of a popular item. An example of this might be that SRA would require you to select a seat before the overhead guard because the choice of a full-suspension seat requires a raised overhead guard. If these categories were reversed, a salesperson opting for the default standard height overhead guard may be confused that the full-suspension seat was not displayed as available, though it is on the printed pages.
Sometimes, with agreement from the manufacturer, incompatible options may be ordered together. To allow this situation to be quoted, the precluded category can be set to “Not Included” and the configurator portion of the proposal can be finished. Select the “Dealer Adds” function and type in the non-compatible option, click the “Include with Factory Equipment” check box, then add the prices. The non-compatible option will then be added to the customer proposal and the factory order.
If you have any questions about the SRA forklift quote configurator, feel free to contact us.
