Importing Suppliers / Unregistered Suppliers

Users with relevant permissions can bulk Import Suppliers (including suppliers not already on the software) directly into the Suppliers tab of a Requirement. 

When importing suppliers, the software will identify whether a supplier organisation exists on the software if the e-mail address specified matches up to an account already on there. If there isn't a match, the supplier organisation will be treated as an Unregistered Supplier. 

How to: Import Suppliers

• Navigate to the Suppliers tab of your Requirement and click on the Import Suppliers button 
• Here a pop-up modal will appear to import suppliers
• Select any Categories that you want to qualify the suppliers for
• Click on "Download spreadsheet template" to download the template for importing suppliers. You will be asked to fill this in for each Supplier you wish to import with:
  • Organisation Name
  • E-mail address (this is used to match against any existing contacts to sync up the organisation OR when a user creates a new account with this email address) 
  • Reference (optional)
• Once you've filled in the spreadsheet template, save it and click "Upload Spreadsheet" to upload. The software will check that the information provided has been inputted correctly
  • If the uploaded spreadsheet is not correct (data is not filled in or the email address is in the incorrect format), you will see a comment highlighting the errors for you to amend on the spreadsheet and re-upload
• If the spreadsheet is correct, you can then click on the "Import" button to import your suppliers
• The suppliers imported will then show in the Suppliers tab of the Requirement
  • If an email address provided matches a contact already on the software, then the record will pull through that organisation connected with that contacts email address
  • If an email address provided does NOT match a contact already on the software, then this supplier will be considered ‘Unregistered’ - an icon against this organisation will be displayed. Please see below for further information on Unregistered suppliers
• If Categories have been selected for the supplier that already exists on the software, you will be able to click Go Live to make them live against those categories
• The 'Audit' tab will record any suppliers imported (including Unregistered suppliers)

Unregistered Suppliers

'Unregistered Suppliers' are suppliers that do not have accounts on the Software. However they can be recorded against Requirements for audit purposes / and to allow you to invite them to participate in a Questionnaire. This is particularly useful when conducting Tender activities using an External Framework (etc) where you can invite a list of pre-qualified suppliers that may never have registered on your own portal.

• See here on how to Invite Unregistered Suppliers to an Invite Only Tender Questionnaire
• See here  on how to Invite Unregistered Suppliers to an Invite Only Research Questionnaire

If a user successfully creates an account on the software after the import, in which their email address matches the email address held against the unregistered supplier, the software will then update their record on the ‘Suppliers’ tab of the requirement

• It will change the organisation record to the Organisation belong to the user with the matching email address and will record this in the 'Audit' tab of the relevant Requirement(s)
• It will only match and update the record once the user with the matching email address has created a password to access the site.