How to take and track a special order

A special order is a job your shop runs for one named customer, covered in What are special orders?. You create and work them at Selling › Special orders. Each job has its own page, where its costs and payments add up to what is owed and what it made.

Your workspace may use its own word for special orders; Settings › Terminology shows both.

Before you start

You need:

• The Store and Special orders modules on. The Special orders row shows under Selling only while both are. See How to switch parts of Tideswell on and off.
• Your Shopify store connected, to search your catalog and customers and to take stock off the shelf. See How to connect your Shopify store.
• View special orders, Create special orders and Edit special orders to see, create and work jobs. All three start at member.
• Record payments on special orders and write off balances to record money, link till sales and write off a balance. It starts at lead. See How to set who can do what.

How do you create a special order?

Press New special order on Selling › Special orders, fill in the popup, and press Create special order. Tideswell opens the new job's page, at the first stage (Quoted, unless your workspace renamed it).

1. In Search the catalog, or type what they want, type the product. Pick it from From your catalog, which shows each product's brand, versions and units on hand.
2. Choose the options, such as colour and size. Each option shows how many are on the shelf.
3. Set Qty. The Agreed price fills in as the retail price from Shopify times the quantity.
4. Add a note, like when they need it or how to reach them.
5. Press Customer and choose who it is for. The pill then reads For and their name.
6. Set the Owner (you, until you change it) and a Promise by date.
7. Press Create special order.

Press Change on the product card to pick a different product.

What if the item is not in your catalog?

Choose Not in the catalog? Type it in yourself under the search. Fill in Brand, Product, Colour or finish, Size and Rep's style number, and the title builds itself from them.

Colour and the style number are optional. With no retail price, type what you agreed in Agreed price. Search the catalog instead takes you back.

If the product is in your catalog but the size is not, pick the product and press Other size…. Tideswell keeps the brand, product and colour and lets you type the size Shopify does not have.

How do you choose the customer?

The Customer pill offers three routes:

• Shopify customers: search by Name, phone or email and pick them.
• A staff order: pick someone on your team.
• Add a new customer: fill in First name, Last name, Phone and Email, then press Add customer.

Give a new customer a phone number or an email, so someone can reach them when it arrives. Tick OK to email them offers only if they said yes.

Add customer adds them to your Shopify store as well. If Shopify already has that phone or email, Tideswell uses the existing customer and says so.

If you see "Shopify hasn't allowed Tideswell to add customers yet", ask an admin to open Settings › Integrations and press Re-authorize permissions on the Shopify row, then try again. See How to connect your Shopify store.

What if you agree a different price?

Press Use a different price under the agreed price and type the job total you agreed. A line shows how far that is below or above retail, as an amount and a percentage.

Fill in Why the different price, such as "matched the price we quoted at the open house". It is saved on the job, so anyone who reads it later knows why. Use retail puts the retail price back.

What does the list show?

One row per job, with open jobs first and the soonest due at the top. The columns are Job, Customer, Stage, Due, Cost, Paid and Owed.

Cost reads Cost unknown when stock was taken for the job without a cost in Shopify. Owed reads Not priced until the job has an agreed price. Use the filter bar to narrow the list by Stage, and click a row to open the job.

What does a job's page show?

The top of the page holds the title, the Stage picker, the customer, Agreed price, Due and Owner. A job made at the register also reads "Created from register sale" and the order number.

Under that sit what was ordered (product, options, quantity, retail and the reason for the price) and the note. Then come the four figures:

• Cost: the bills, costs and shelf stock on the job.
• Paid: payments and till sales, less any reversed.
• Owed: the agreed price, less what was paid and anything written off.
• Profit: the agreed price, less anything written off, less the cost. It shows a dash until the job is priced and every cost on it is known.

If a job has a price and no costs yet, a line warns that the profit is the full agreed price, not a real profit. If a customer paid more than the price, a line says by how much.

How do you record what the job cost?

Three panels on the job page add to Cost: Bills, Costs and From the shelf.

Attach a supplier bill

Record the supplier's bill on Buying › Bills first, as in How to check, record and pay supplier bills. Then press Attach in the Bills panel and pick it from Attach a bill.

The list offers bills that are not tied to a delivery received against a purchase order. A bill can sit on one job only. The bin icon beside an attached bill detaches it.

Add a cost by hand

In the Costs panel, type a description, such as embroidery or freight, and an amount, then press Add. The bin icon removes a cost.

Take stock off the shelf

When the item is already on your shelf, press Take from stock in the From the shelf panel. Search products or SKUs, pick the exact item, choose the Location and Quantity, and press Take.

Tideswell lowers the stock in Shopify and adds the units to the job's cost at Shopify's Cost per item. A unit with no cost in Shopify shows "cost unknown", and the job's Cost reads Cost unknown while that stock is on the job. To fix it, set the cost in Shopify, press Put back, and take the stock again.

Put back returns the units to the same location in Shopify and takes them off the job's cost.

Taking and putting back stock also needs Change stock, receiving and store settings, which starts at lead. The Location list holds the locations you ticked under Locations you own in Feed settings on Buying › Data feeds › Open to buy. See How to send your open-to-buy file to a buying planner.

If Shopify does not confirm a take, the row says so and offers Retry, which never takes the stock twice. After a day, check the product's stock in Shopify instead.

How do you record the money?

Use the Money in panel. Link till sale and Record payment show only to people with Record payments on special orders and write off balances.

Link a sale from the till

Press Link till sale, type the Order number from the receipt, such as 4127, and press Link. Only the lines typed in by hand at the till count toward the job, net of discounts.

The sale shows under Till sales, with the lines it counted. A sale links to one job, and Unlink takes it off. If part of the sale was refunded, record what was actually paid as a payment instead.

Record a payment

Press Record payment. Fill in the Amount, Paid on date, Method (Cash, Card, Check, Venmo, Payroll deduction or Other) and an optional Reference, such as a cheque number. Press Save.

To correct a payment, press the undo icon beside it. Tideswell adds a matching reversal rather than deleting the payment, so the history stays.

Write off what is left

When a customer will not pay the rest, press Write off the remaining balance. Check Total written off, give a Reason, and press Write off.

The total can be up to what has not been paid. A second write-off replaces the first, and the popup says so.

How do you move a job through its stages?

Pick the new stage from the Stage picker at the top of the job page. The default stages run Quoted, Ordered, Arrived, Delivered and Closed, with Cancelled for a job that falls through.

By default a job moves forward one step at a time, can go from Ordered straight to Delivered, and can close from Arrived or Delivered. Cancelled is open from any stage before Closed, and a job can go back to Quoted from any stage.

An admin renames stages and sets which moves are allowed in Settings › Stages › Special orders. See How to set up the stages a record moves through.

Settle a job before you close it. Moving it to Closed while money is owed shows "This job still owes" and the amount: record the money, or write the balance off with a reason.

Can you change the price, date or owner later?

Yes. Click into Agreed price, Due or Owner at the top of the job page and change it. A blank agreed price means the job is not priced.

Once money has been recorded on a job, only people with Record payments on special orders and write off balances can change its price.

How do you look up a special order on your phone?

In the iPhone app, open the ⇕ menu and choose Special orders. Search by Customer or item and tap a job to open its Special order screen. See Using Tideswell on your phone.

The Money card shows Agreed price, Paid, Written off (when there is one) and Owed. Change the stage from the stage pill. Create and price jobs on the web.

The list shows open jobs only. When nothing is open it reads "No open special orders".