Your CloudSuite Distribution rep receives a request for valves supplied during an earlier repair. Before entering the quote, they need to find the approved alternative and decide which warehouse can supply it now. The email alone does not answer either question.
Bourne can gather that context and prepare a quote for review. Bourne includes a native CloudSuite Distribution integration. Connect the account, select the Quote Order records and actions the workflow may use, then follow the customer’s requirements through product selection and conversion to an order.
Prepare a Quote Order in Sales Order Entry
Infor’s Quote Order type, or QU, belongs to Sales Order Entry. QUs do not update customer, general-ledger or product records as stock orders do. Conversion to a stock order is a separate action.
For an initial deployment, have the agent prepare a QU for review. Keep conversion to a stock order as a separate approved action. Confirm the records and actions available for your CloudSuite Distribution release rather than relying on another Infor product’s transaction model.
Resolve the customer’s reference and the warehouse
Take this example request: “Quote 60 of our usual valves for the West plant, using the alternative from the last repair.”
The draft needs the buying account, West plant address, exact alternative and selling unit. The previous warehouse is useful context but does not prove current availability. Keep the proposed fulfillment choice separate from the customer’s destination.
The historical substitution approval needs to include its application limits. If the substitute was only acceptable for a temporary repair, the rep needs to know that before repeating it.
Confirm the proposed valve meets the customer’s requirement
Infor’s QU substitution and restriction rules permit defined substitutes and upgrades with applicable surcharges. They also govern restriction overrides during conversion. Have your administrator review those settings with the person responsible for product approval.
Separate three checks in your review: the candidate exists in the catalog, the customer accepts it, and the business permits the sale. One does not establish the others. Include an unresolved alternative in the pilot scorecard and check that the agent stops at the right decision.
Pressure and temperature need to be checked together for the actual construction. The Swagelok 60 Series catalog publishes pressure-temperature ratings with material and configuration details. A catalog’s highest pressure and highest temperature do not by themselves establish an acceptable operating point for every variant.
For the proposed alternative, put the customer’s operating conditions beside the applicable catalog table and exact ordering code. Keep the body, seat and end-connection details visible to the reviewer. If the old repair record names only a valve family, ask which construction was approved before offering the stock from another warehouse.
Preserve the quote through revisions and conversion
Record the customer RFQ reference and the ERP quote identifier. A revised email should update the pending work associated with that quote, not create an unrelated draft. Keep a visible summary of changed quantities and terms.
Test the sequence through order conversion. Under Infor’s documented QU conversion behavior, a Special designation can remain on a converted line even after a warehouse change. Review this with operations rather than assuming a warehouse update resets every line condition.
In the outgoing quote response, identify the current revision and explain the changed terms. The buyer should be able to distinguish it from the earlier offer without comparing every line.
Test the quote with changed warehouses and rejected substitutes
Start with one sales team, a known product set and quote preparation with review. Supply representative requests, current product and price references, and completed quotes. Include changed warehouses and rejected alternatives.
Measure the time to an approved QU and the corrections by type. Then extend into live actions once the administrator has tested required fields, permissions and failure recovery. Expand one permitted action at a time so the team can trace a failure to the change that introduced it.
Bring customer context into your CloudSuite quoting process
Choose Bourne when your reps need to reconstruct the request before they can enter a QU. We can build the workflow that resolves the customer’s product references, gathers the relevant warehouse information and prepares the quote for review. During implementation, we connect the supported operations in your CloudSuite environment.
Your team can keep its ERP process and add an app for the exceptions that currently require a chain of emails. Plan your CloudSuite quoting deployment.
Frequently asked questions
Does creating a QU reserve stock or post accounting entries?
Infor describes QUs as quotes rather than true orders, with record updates occurring after conversion to a stock order. Confirm the behavior of any extensions in your installation before making a customer commitment.
Can an agent choose a substitute automatically?
Only within the authority you define. A product cross-reference supplies a candidate; customer requirements and restriction rules still apply. Escalate when the evidence does not establish an acceptable replacement.
Is an Infor integration enough to launch this workflow?
The native connection is available, but the workflow still needs the correct product family, release, transaction access and custom fields. Test the actual QU creation and conversion sequence in your environment.
What should we measure besides time saved?
Track omitted lines, wrong units, incorrect substitutions and review escalations. For quote losses, Infor supports line-level lost-business reasons; agree how the team will capture those rather than using automation speed as the only outcome.
Further reading
Swagelok: 60 Series ball valve catalog
Materials, pressure-temperature ratings and ordering information. PDF.
Arda Bulut
Arda Bulut is the co-founder and CTO of Bourne and HockeyStack. He leads engineering at Bourne, building the platform people use to create AI products, agents and automations.