Managing Contact Relationships

Identify the Contact Roles You Need to Maintain

In Pams, a shared contact represents a person or organization you need to use consistently across customer sales, Principal Relationship Management, and purchasing work. Before you create or change a relationship, decide which commercial role that contact performs. This prevents the same person or organization from being entered several times under slightly different names.

Pams distinguishes these three roles:

Use one shared contact whenever the same party appears across connected work. For example, the person who receives an Offer may also be the person you contact during delivery coordination or payment follow-up. Select the same shared contact instead of creating a separate copy for each Sales Job, Invoice, or Payment.

A single organization may legitimately have more than one relationship. A company can be a Client for one sales Sales Job and a Sub-supplier for a different purchasing activity. A represented manufacturer may be a Principal and may also take part in supply-related work. In these cases, maintain each required relationship deliberately.

The relationship role is important because it identifies how the contact is used in commercial work. It does not replace the company account itself. Maintain company details through Managing Company Accounts, then use Contacts to keep the people and relationship roles connected to that company work.

Review Shared Contacts Before Creating Relationships

1. Open Contacts in Pams. This is the shared area for contact information used by customer, Principal, and Sub-supplier relationships.

2. Use the available search to look for the person or organization before creating anything new. Search using the information you have available, such as Contact Name, Full Name, Email, Phone, or Mobile. Check close name matches carefully, especially when companies use abbreviations or when a contact’s name may be written in more than one format.

3. Open the matching contact and review the details already maintained. Check the displayed relationship information for Client, Principal, and Sub-supplier. Also review identifying information such as Position, Department, Email, and Mobile where those details are available. This helps you confirm that you are looking at the right person rather than another contact with a similar name.

4. Compare the contact with the commercial work where you need to use it. Confirm whether the contact is already connected to the relevant Client, Principal, or Sub-supplier relationship. If the correct relationship already exists, use that shared contact rather than adding another version of the same party.

5. If you find more than one possible match, identify which contact is already used by the related Sales Jobs, purchasing work, or financial documents. Retaining the contact already connected to ongoing commercial work keeps communication history and relationship information together.

Reviewing first is especially important when a team shares customer and Principal information. A duplicate contact can cause different people to select different entries for the same party, making follow-up and commercial coordination harder.

Add Customer, Principal, and Supplier Relationships

1. In Contacts, open the shared contact you want to use. If the contact does not yet exist, create the contact entry and enter the available identification details, such as Contact Name or Full Name, Email, Phone, Mobile, Position, and Department. Use the name and contact details that your team recognizes in day-to-day commercial communication.

2. Select the relationship role required for the contact. Use the role shown in Pams:

   • Select Client or Is Client for a customer relationship.
   • Select Principal or Is Principal for a represented Principal relationship.
   • Select Sub-supplier or Is Sub-supplier for a supplier relationship.

3. Add every role that genuinely applies. Do not create separate contact entries just because the same organization has more than one commercial role. For example, if one organization is involved as both a Principal and a Sub-supplier, maintain those two relationships on the same shared contact where Pams allows both roles.

4. Check the relationship selections before saving. Make sure you have not marked a contact as a Principal when the person actually represents a Client, or as a Sub-supplier when the relationship belongs to a customer account.

5. Click Save to keep the relationship available for future commercial work. Use Save and Close when you have finished maintaining the contact and want to return to the Contacts list.

A clear relationship setup means colleagues can select the same customer, Principal, or Sub-supplier contact throughout connected work. This is particularly useful when an Sales Job moves from an Inquiry and Offer into a Orders, delivery, invoicing, or payment follow-up.

Connect Shared Contacts to Commercial Work

1. Open the commercial work where you need to identify the people or organizations involved. Depending on the work you are handling, this may be a Sales Job, an Offer, a Orders, an RFQ, a Purchase Job, a PO, an Invoice, or a Payment.

2. Find the relationship field shown on that form. Look for the relevant Pams label, such as Client, Principal, or Sub-supplier. Select the party that matches the commercial role in the work you are completing.

3. For customer sales work, choose the shared Client contact or relationship that represents the customer side of the deal. Confirm that it is the intended customer before you continue with commercial details such as pricing, delivery dates, invoicing, or payment information.

4. Where the work involves a represented manufacturer, select the appropriate shared Principal relationship. This is important for work that later contributes to Principal sales results, Principal Invoices, Principal Payments, or Commission Invoices.

5. For procurement work, select the correct shared Sub-supplier relationship. Use the same relationship consistently when working through RFQs, Offers, POs, receiving, and AP Invoice activities related to that supplier.

6. Before you click Save, read the selected names again. Check that each name comes from the shared contact you reviewed in Contacts, rather than a similarly named duplicate. If the commercial form includes more than one party, confirm each role separately; the Client, Principal, and Sub-supplier must each point to the intended relationship.

Selecting shared contacts at the commercial-work level helps sales, purchasing, and finance teams work from the same relationship information throughout the process.

Keep Contact Relationships Current Across Connected Work

1. Return to Contacts when a customer, Principal, or Sub-supplier relationship changes. Update the shared contact rather than creating a new entry merely because a person changes department, position, email address, phone number, or role in the commercial relationship.

2. Review the contact’s current relationship selections. Check whether Client, Principal, or Sub-supplier still accurately describes how the person or organization participates in your work. If a new role is required, add that role before using the contact in new commercial work.

3. Check the connected work that is still active. Review relevant Sales Jobs, Offers, Orders, RFQs, POs, Invoices, or Payments to understand where the relationship is being used. Focus first on work that is ongoing, awaiting action, or due soon.

4. Use the same shared contact again for recurring relationships. For example, when the same customer contact appears in several Sales Jobs, select that existing Client relationship each time. When a Principal contact is involved in multiple deals, use the existing Principal relationship for those deals.

5. Save any relationship updates with Save. If you update information while reviewing a specific contact and are finished, select Save and Close.

Take extra care when an organization changes role. A former Sub-supplier may become a Client, or an organization may participate as both a Principal and a Sub-supplier. Review each active commercial relationship rather than assuming that one role change applies correctly to every Sales Job or purchasing activity.

Keeping shared relationships current gives your team one dependable source for customer, Principal, and supplier contact information while connected commercial work continues.

Resolve Missing, Duplicate, and Incorrect Contact Relationships

1. If you cannot select a customer, Principal, or supplier in commercial work, open Contacts and search for the shared contact first. If the contact exists but is not available for the relationship you need, check whether the appropriate role is selected: Client, Principal, or Sub-supplier.

2. If the shared contact is missing the required role, update the relationship selection and click Save. Return to the commercial work and select the contact again. Do not create another contact entry before checking whether the existing one can be used.

3. If more than one contact appears to represent the same party, identify the entry already used in connected commercial work. Compare Contact Name, Full Name, Email, Phone, Mobile, Position, and the current relationship roles. Use the established shared contact for new work whenever it is the correct party.

4. If the wrong party is selected on a Sales Job, Offer, PO, Invoice, or other commercial form, open that work and replace the incorrect Client, Principal, or Sub-supplier selection with the correct shared contact. Click Save after confirming the replacement.

5. When a role change affects active work, review every related commercial item. For example, if a party is no longer the correct Sub-supplier for an RFQ or PO, check the related purchasing work. If a Principal relationship changes, check deals, Principal Invoices, and Principal Payments that use that relationship.

6. If you are unsure which duplicate is correct, avoid adding a third contact entry. Use the contact already connected to the most relevant ongoing commercial work, then verify its relationship labels and identifying details before making changes.

Resolving issues at the shared contact level reduces disconnected customer, Principal, and supplier information across Pams.

Overview

Contact relationships in Pams keep the people and organizations involved in commercial work connected through a shared Contacts area. Instead of maintaining separate customer, Principal, and supplier details on every Sales Job, Offer, PO, Invoice, or Payment, your team can select the same established contact relationship where it is needed.

The core relationship labels are Client, Principal, and Sub-supplier:

• Use Client for customer-facing sales work, including inquiries, offers, Orders, Delivery Notes, AR Invoices, and incoming Payments.
• Use Principal for represented manufacturers and other Principal Relationship Management work connected to sales results, commissions, Principal Invoices, and Principal Payments.
• Use Sub-supplier for supplier and purchasing work, including RFQs, Purchase Jobs, POs, goods receipt, and AP Invoices.

A contact can have more than one of these roles when the same organization participates in more than one part of your operation. For example, a hybrid business may work with one company as a Principal in one deal and as a Sub-supplier in another. Maintain the roles that reflect the actual commercial relationship, then select the correct one in the relevant work.

The most reliable approach is to search Contacts before creating a new entry, review existing relationship assignments, and reuse the established contact wherever possible. This keeps customer communication, Principal coordination, and supplier follow-up aligned across sales, purchasing, delivery, invoicing, and payment workflows.

Prerequisites

Before you maintain contact relationships in Pams, have the following information available:

• The contact’s correct Contact Name or Full Name. If possible, also have the person’s Email, Phone, Mobile, Position, and Department so you can distinguish them from similar contacts in the shared Contacts list.

• A clear decision about the commercial role the contact needs. Identify whether the contact is a Client, Principal, Sub-supplier, or more than one of these. Base this on the person or organization’s actual involvement in customer sales, Principal work, or purchasing work.

• The related company information. If you need to confirm the company before setting up the contact relationship, review Managing Company Accounts. Keep company account maintenance separate from the contact’s Client, Principal, and Sub-supplier relationship selections.

• The commercial work where the relationship will be used. This may include a Sales Job, Offer, Orders, RFQ, Purchase Job, PO, Invoice, or Payment. Knowing where the contact will be selected helps you verify the correct role before saving it.

• Enough detail to recognize duplicates. Check whether an existing contact has the same name, email address, phone number, company relationship, or commercial role before creating another entry.

Use Contacts as the starting point whenever you need to add, confirm, or correct a shared relationship. After the correct customer, Principal, and supplier relationships are available, continue with Managing Product Records to maintain the products connected to your commercial work.