Accounts

This chapter covers how to work with accounts in Siebel Business Applications. It includes the following topics:

About Accounts

An account is a business external to your company. An account represents a current or potential client, a business partner, or a competitor.

You work with accounts through the Accounts screen. Sales representatives use the Accounts screen and the associated views as the primary navigation tool for customer interactions. Call center agents use the Accounts screen to record information about companies and other organizations that interact with your company.

If your organization serves mostly businesses, then use the Accounts screen when answering general inbound phone calls. If your organization serves mostly individual consumers, or if you are answering inbound calls related to a marketing campaign, then use the Contacts screen when answering inbound calls.

Scenario for Managing Accounts in Siebel Sales

This topic gives one example of how account management in Siebel Sales might be used. You might use account management in Siebel Sales differently, depending on your business model.

At a vendor site, a sales representative meets a prospect. After a brief discussion, the sales representative determines that the prospect is interested in learning more about the products and services that the sales representative’s company sells. The sales representative sets up a sales call with the prospect.

During the sales call, the sales representative asks numerous questions to determine the account structure of the prospect’s business and to decide how best to meet the prospect’s needs.

The sales representative learns that the prospect’s business has four locations, and that each service is billed through the main office, and each location receives a billing statement.

After the meeting, the sales representative returns to the office and begins creating the account structure for the prospect’s business.

Scenario for Managing Accounts in Siebel Call Center

This topic gives one example of how account management in Siebel Call Center might be used. You might use account management in Siebel Call Center differently, depending on your business model.

The Accounts screen and views often provide the central navigation point to help call center agents research customers and respond to inbound calls. The type of call determines which view is used by the agent in the Siebel application. The following situations provide examples of how the Accounts screen is used:

The call center agent must see the existing account information, including the products owned by the account, to assist a caller with a service request or to follow up on a service request.
A caller contacts the call center in response to a sales campaign. Assuming the caller is unknown, the call center agent creates a new account. First, the agent records the account name, address, and other important information. Then, the agent adds a contact or enters other information about the new account. Finally, the agent associates the contact with the campaign that resulted in the call.
A call center agent wants to enter information about a prospective account. For example, the agent might call a prospective customer to find out if the customer located requested information on the company’s Web site, and whether the customer requires any additional information. The agent adds notes that can be used by a sales representative or schedules follow-up activities to help manage the account relationship.

Creating an Account

After you identify a business relationship, you add an account to your application. As the business relationship develops, you can update the account to track important details, such as individual contacts, opportunities, and service requests.

Before you add a new account, search the accounts list to make sure that the account does not already exist.

Note: When a company changes names or merges with another company, you must transfer account names and contacts to the new account name. Contact your implementation team for more information about how to rename an account. For help renaming an account, create a service request (SR) on My Oracle Support.

To create an account

Navigate to the Accounts screen, then the Accounts List view.

In the Accounts List, create a new record, and complete the necessary fields.

Some fields are described in the following table.

Field	Comments
Account Name	Type a name that identifies the account.
Site	Type the location of the account.
Parent	Select a parent account if the account is a subsidiary of a larger company.
Status	Select the account status. Default values include Active, Contract Pending, Gold, and Inactive.
Account Type	Select the type of account. Default values include Commercial, Competitor, Consultant, and Customer.
Account Team	Select the employees assigned to work with this account. If a call center user is not a member of the Account Team, then that user does not receive information about this account during the Mobile Web Client synchronization.
Address	Select or type the first line of account address. This value appears in some Contacts screen views and Account screen views for contacts that are associated with this account.
URL	Type the Universal Resource Locator (URL) for the account Web site.

Drill down on the Name field of the record, and navigate to the More Info view to complete more fields.

Some fields are described in the following table.

Field	Comments
Industries	Select the types of business engaged in by the account.
PO Approved	Select the check box to indicate the Purchase Order (PO) has been approved.
PO Auto-Approval Limit	Type the amount for which a Purchase Order can be automatically approved.
Shipping Information	Type text for additional shipping details.
Shipping Terms	Select a value for the terms of shipping. Default values include Due, FOB, TBD, and No Charge.
Price List	Select a price list associated with the account. Your application administrator uses criteria your company defines to establish price lists.
Organization	Displays the name of the organization with which the account is associated.
Current Volume	Type a monetary amount that represents the account’s current sales volume.
Potential Volume	Type a monetary amount that represents the account’s potential sales volume.
Synonyms	Select a synonym for the account. Use this field for alternate names for the account. For example, an account record for International Business Machines might have IBM as an entry in the Synonym field. This field assists in querying or in using Siebel Data Quality.
Partner	Select the check box to indicate the account is a business partner.
Competitor	Select the check box to indicate the account is a competitor.
Disable Cleansing	Select the check box to not permit data cleansing.
Territories	Select a sales territories associated with the account.
Lock Assignment	Select the check box to lock the sales team assignment from reassignment by Siebel Assignment Manager.
Assignment Area Code	Type an area code for the account. This code indicates that a sales representative from the same area code can be assigned to the account.
Assignment Country Code	Type a country code for the account. This code indicates that a sales representative from the same country code can be assigned to the account.
DUNS#	Displays the Data Universal Numbering System (D-U-N-S) numeric serial number for a company. The D-U-N-S number is unique for each company.
Parent/HQ DUNS	Displays the D-U-N-S number for the account's parent account.
Domestic Ultimate DUNS	Displays the D-U-N-S number for the domestic ultimate, which is the highest member in the hierarchy for the same business entity within the same country. A case can be its own domestic ultimate.
Global Ultimate DUNS	Displays the D-U-N-S number for the global ultimate, which is the highest member in the hierarchy for the same business entity worldwide.
Reference	Select the check box to indicate the account offers a reference for your company’s products or services.
Reference Stage	Select a value for the account stage according to your sales or other methodology. Default values include Project Planning and Strategy, Analysis and Design, Testing and Production Pilot, Rollout, and On Hold.
Referenceable as of	Select the date that the account first became a reference.

Navigate to other views to complete more fields.

Some fields are described in the following table.

Field	Comments
Address Line 2	Type the second line of account address. This value appears in some Contacts screen views and Account screen views for contacts that are associated with this account.
Expertise	Select the area of expertise for the account. Default values include Technology, Quality Control, and Client Management.
Global Owner	Displays the user ID of the team member who is the global account owner. In cases of multi-national or global companies, this field designates one main account team member to oversee the account.
Inventory Location	Type the physical location of the inventory.
Location Type	Select the type of facility operated by the account at the specified site.
Parent Site	Displays the location of the company of which the account is a subsidiary.

Associating a Contact with an Account

As you work with a prospective account, you develop business relationships with the contacts associated with an account.

Contacts can belong to multiple accounts, and only one account can be the primary account. Deleting a contact record in the Accounts screen’s Contacts view only removes the contact’s association with the account. The original contact record is still available in the Contacts list.

To associate a contact with an account

Navigate to the Accounts screen, then the Accounts List view.
In the Accounts list, drill down on the Name field of the account.
Navigate to the Contacts view.
In the Contacts list, add an existing contact, select the contact from the Add Contacts dialog box, and click OK.

Associating an Activity with an Account

An activity is a task or event that is generally, but not always, performed for a contact, an account, or an opportunity. You attend meetings, calls, presentations, and perform other activities associated with an account. You can use the Activities list to enter and track account-related activities. If the activity has a time associated with it, then the activity appears in the Activities list and Calendar.

An account can have numerous activities associated with it. You can associate an activity with an account to track which activities you have completed and track those you want to accomplish in the future as you manage the account relationship.

To associate an activity with an account

Navigate to the Accounts screen, then the Accounts List view.
In the Accounts list, drill down on the Name field of the account associated with the activity.
Navigate to the Activities view.
In the Activities list, create an activity record to associate with the account.
For information about how to add an activity, see Creating Activities (End User).

Associating an Opportunity with an Account

Accounts are a source of business for your company. An opportunity is a potential revenue-generating event and the opportunity record stores information that you can use to manage accounts.

To associate an opportunity with an account

Navigate to the Accounts screen, then the Accounts List view.
In the Accounts list, drill down on the Name field of the account.
Navigate to the Opportunities view.
In the Opportunities list, create an opportunity record to associate with the account.
For information about how to add an opportunity, see Creating an Opportunity.

Assessing an Account

You can use assessments to compare accounts with each other, compare them with a model, or to determine the information that is present or not present for an account. To perform the assessment, you enter values for the assessment attributes. The Siebel application calculates a composite assessment value for the account. For information about how to perform an assessment, see Performing an Assessment (End User).

Synchronizing Account Information with External Applications

The Application Services Interface (ASI) feature allows you to synchronize the account data between a Siebel application and an external application in real time. This feature enables you to maintain consistent account information across your enterprise, and to eliminate manual entry of data in multiple applications.

If your Siebel administrator has set up real-time account integration between a Siebel application and another application, then you can use the Update External System command to send new and modified account information from the Siebel application to the other application in real time. For more information about ASI, see Siebel Application Services Interface Reference and Integration Using ASIs

If an account has associated contacts, then you must synchronize the contacts with the external application separately. For more information, see Synchronizing Contact Information with External Applications.

To synchronize account information with an external application

Navigate to the Accounts screen, then the Accounts List view.
In the Accounts list, select an account record.
To create a new account record, see Creating an Account.
In the Accounts list, click the cogwheel icon, and select Update External System.

Viewing Account Credit Profiles

If your organization uses a back-office application or another external credit management application to store customer credit information, then you can use the Credit Profile read-only view to get the most current account credit profile information.

The Accounts screen’s Credit Profile view allows you to improve employee productivity by providing visibility to complete customer information within your Siebel application, and streamlines the quote-to-cash process by allowing the sales professional to identify potential credit problems early.

This procedure assumes that your Siebel administrator has completed the work necessary to allow real-time account integration through Application Service Interfaces (ASI). For information about how to set up the Web services administration to communicate with the external application, ASI structures, configuring and customizing the ASI, see Application Services Interface Reference and Integration Using ASIs

To view account credit profile information

Navigate to the Accounts screen, then the Accounts List view.
Query the Account Name field for the account with the credit profile that you want to view.
In the Accounts list, drill down on the Name field of the account.
Navigate to the Credit Profile view.
The Credit Profile form appears and includes information about credit status, risk category, credit limit, and so on. Fields in this form are read-only, except for the Skip Credit Check and Credit Auto Approval Limit fields. For more information about how to use these fields, see Siebel Order Management Guide.
Click Refresh to update the information in the Credit Profile form.