Stores contact information on your clients—name, address, phone, etc.—proposal history, current and past travel, information requests and other important information.
The Client or Contact database represents, first of all, your mailing list. You will create a record for every person or organization that does business with you. Client is also where your marketing efforts are recorded and is where you will begin the booking process. Over time, the records in Client become a treasure chest of information reflecting the destinations of interest, the brochure request history, and the travel history of each of your contacts.
Because this is probably the most “straightforward” part of the entire system, not much explanation is required to introduce all of its functions, so we’re going to use this particular database to explain some of the “basics” of TourTools™.
First, to the right of the button labeled “Master Menu” at the top of the screen, notice the text that says “Record #1 of 2”. This tells you that you are in the first of two records accessible to you right now. Above and to the left, you see a similar representation but see that you are in an isolated “Found Set” of just two records out of a total of 50.
Each record is assigned a unique, sequential serial number as it is created. The one shown here is Client Record #2688.
To the right of this area is a bank of “navigational buttons”. Each of these buttons activates a “script”.
Click on the “New” button whenever you want to create a new Client record. Before doing so, always “Find” to make sure it isn’t already in the database.
Click on the Proposal button to begin the proposal building process. You will be stepped through creation of a TM record as well as a Package (see chapters following for complete details).
You can search for one or a group of record(s) by clicking on the “Find” button.
Note: The Client database is the only one that offers a choice of layouts to conduct the search. Having clicked the button, you will be asked if you want to stay on the current screen or if you want to use the “Find” layout. Note that this layout allows you to search using fields that are actually resident in other databases. By example, if you want to assemble the Client records for all passengers confirmed on a specific tour, you would search on the Tour Name and Res Status “Active”. Similarly, you could locate the records of anyone having traveled on a tour that has already been archived by using some of the fields in the “Pax History Fields” section. Lastly, when you “find” on the Last Name field on this layout, TourTools™ will search for that name on both the first and second name tabs in Client.
Note: Anytime you want to do a “find” outside the parameters of a script, you can position yourself on virtually any screen and go into “Find” mode, password permitting (click on the mode button in the lower left corner of the screen, or click on “View” in the FileMaker menu and then click on “Find Mode”).
If you want to view the records in a particular order, click on the “sort” button. This will open a window listing the field(s) on which you can sort. Select the one(s) you want to use (such as Last Name), click on “Move” to move it to the right, then click on “sort” and the records will sort in the manner you selected.
Click on the (new) Booking button to begin making a booking/reservation.
In some instances, the button marked with a trash will be labeled “Delete” and in other instances it is marked “Cancel”. Clicking on the delete button will PERMANENTLY delete a record or set of records, and there is no “undo” so be careful when you use this function. (Some passwords do not allow the ability to delete.) When the button is labeled “Cancel”, as is the case in Bookings and TM, the record will be cancelled but will remain in the system marked as such.
Clicking on this button will take you to the TM database where you can check availability on a tour or tours before returning to start the booking process.
Buttons marked with a gray arrow and the name of a database perform a lookup of related records. By example, this button will assemble the Booking records for the client in question.
“Find All” will expand your “Found Set” to include all records in your database.
Clicking on “list view” will show the found set of records in a table format. Clicking on the “tablet” to the left of each name will take you directly to that record. Clicking on the bar graph icon above a given column will temporarily sort the records on that field.
Click on the Reports button to see a list of available reports, labels and letter layouts.
Client Entry
To create a new client record, click on the “New” button. A blank record will appear and you will click on the Home Address or Business Address tab as appropriate. If the record is for an organization like a travel agency, fill in all the fields (if the agency is new to you) and then click on either the “New Agency” or the “Load Agency Defaults” button. When you click the former, you are identifying the agency as a “Master Record” (in short, a “re-seller” of your product—a group leader, travel agent, etc.). When you click on the latter, you will be stepped through a process by which you will identify the master record whose address, phone, commission level, etc., you want copied into the record you are creating.
When you finish, click on the “Continue” or “Continue and Info Request” (process explained later in this chapter) button.
If the Client is an individual associated with an agency or group leader, you will want to link them to that Master Record (more detail on what constitutes a “Master Record” follows in the Group Info section of this chapter).
To do so, go to the Group Info tab and click on the second button “Link this Client…”. A dialog box will open, prompting you to identify the Master Record to which the record should be linked.
The next screen will display a list of the clients who meet the name criteria. Click on the name of choice and click “continue”. Once you finish you will be returned to the main client entry screen.
Main Screen
If you completed the fields on the Home Address tab when you created the record, that is the address designated as where mail should be sent. If you typed in the fields on the Business Address, then mail will be directed there. The fields that appear in the “Mailing Address” section will display details of the address chosen. To reference or change the choice, go to the Mailing Address tab and click the proper button.
The “FYT” at the bottom left stands for First Year Traveled, the “LYT” for Last Year Traveled. These fields will be filled in automatically as Bookings are made.
Select and Replace Field Content: Use this field to temporarily hold together a set of records that otherwise have nothing in common.
Example
You want to produce mailing labels for all of your Clients named Susie who live in Vermont and all Davids who live in Maine. First, you “find” on Susie in the First Name field and VT in the “St/Prov” field. Imagine that your find produced a dozen records. Type something in the “Select” field; it might be your initials, today’s date, virtually anything. Then, go to “Records” from the FileMaker menu and select “Replace Field Content”. You will be asked to confirm that you want to replace the content of the field “Select” in the 12 records with your initials. Then, repeat the process, however, this time doing a find on David as the first name and ME as the state. When you finish, you can do a find on your initials (or whatever you input) in the “Select” field and print your mailing labels.
Smoking Preference and Cruise Dining Preference: Value list selections.
Pref Departure Point: Reference the point from which your client generally prefers to join a tour; could be a city code for air or a motorcoach pick-up point.
The Master Record field will display “yes” if you, in fact, designated this as a Master Record. “No” will appear if this is not the case. In the “Preferred” field adjacent, you can mark them as a “preferred” Client (also a Yes/No question).
As you create records, they will be marked as “Active”. This allows that a Booking can be made from the Client record. You de-activate a record and thereby prevent the possibility of a Booking being made by clicking on the button and changing the status. Some reasons you may want to “deactivate” a client include:
1. A client may have caused repeated problems on tours and you don’t want them on a future tour. By deactivating their client record and noting why in the record, you can prevent recurring problems.
2. A client may have a balance outstanding that you are having difficulty collecting on and, until the account is closed, you don’t want to allow additional booking activity.
Note: De-activating a Client record does not prevent its being included in a set of labels you might prepare for a mailing. Usually it is advisable to use “Active” as one criteria when finding records for this purpose. If you de-activate a record for any of the above reasons, you may also want to put them on a “don’t mail” status.
All three of these last-mentioned fields are connected to what are called “radio buttons”. To update what displays in the field, simply click on the button or change the field content from 1 (=Yes) to 0 (=No).
Home Address Screen
There is room to store both a primary and alternate address in a Client record. If you have customers who winter in Florida, by example, you can enter the “from” and “to” dates and their Florida address in their record. Whenever a mailing label or a document with an address block is generated during the time they are at the alternate address, that’s where it will be directed.
The “Update” button will automatically update every “First Date” and “Last Date” from the current year to the next year. Caution: Since, in actuality, very few alternate addresses will change “from” and “to” exactly the same dates every year, this feature may not work for you. Perhaps before using this feature, you will want to assemble a “found set” of records holding data in these fields to see how many should be updated in this fashion and how many need to be manually altered.
Business/School Address Screen
Use this screen to record a business or school address for reference or to direct mail to.
ARC and IATA Number/Consortium Name: Simple reference fields that you can fill in as appropriate or necessary.
Commission Rate: Clicking on the “Defaults/Clear” button will load the percentages set as defaults in your system (Value Lists Support File). You can otherwise manually complete the field(s). When you eventually make a booking from the Client record, commission will automatically be calculated based on the settings in the Package record being sold, where you will have identified the Package to be commissioned at the “top” or “second’ level.
Deposit Default: Reference the amount of money that you typically require the travel agent or group leader to deposit on a tour.
Use this button if an agent has left their agency to join another, already resident in your system. Open their record and click on the “Join Agency” button to display a “Find” and then a “Select” screen. Pick from the list of “hits”, and once you confirm the selection, that agency’s address, phone, etc., details will load to your current record. Before the process is complete, you will want to manually update things like e-mail addresses, private phone numbers or extensions, and similar.
If an agent leaves to join an agency not yet resident in your system, update all of the name, address, contact detail, etc., in their record and click on the “Make New Agency” button.
Use this if there has been some change in the detail loaded for a given agency—change of address, phone, commission level—that you want applied to all records at the same time. Begin in any one of the records, click on the “Edit Agency” button, make whatever change is desired, and confirm that you want that change applied to all related records.
Use this to change the Client designated as the manager in a given agency. Begin in the record of the agent that you want to appoint manager and click the “Make Manager” button. The pop-up window will give an indication of who is now designated manager, at which point you can confirm the change or halt the process.
Mailing Address Screen
This is an overview of the address detail that’s been loaded (home and business), showing which has been designated as the one to where mail is to be sent.
Mailing Group Screen
This page allows you assign your Client to one or more mailing groups for purposes of targeted mailings.
Mailing Group: The appearance is different than most, but the choices that appear in these fields are part of value lists that can be modified in the usual way in the Support File called Value Lists (see Chapter 1).
Salesperson: Reference the salesperson to which this client is credited by selecting from the staff list that presents. Bookings made from the Client record will be tagged with this name and you can get a breakdown of activity attributable to the salesperson by running the Salesperson Totals report in Bookings. If a salesperson’s name is loaded in the Client record when it is linked to a specific Tour Master record, the salesperson will be credited with all of the reservations activity on that tour when you run the P/L Report by Salesperson from TM.
Source and Segment Fields: The “Source” field is indicative of how the client found out about your company. It can be as generic or specific as you want it to be. The “Segment” is used to more “finely” define the source. Once you select a Source from the value list that appears, a list of Segments associated with that Source will drop into view.
These value lists are actually created and maintained in the Support File called “Marketing” accessed from the Main Menu. As you create a Source record, the system will automatically assign it a number and will mark it as “Active” (at such time as the Source becomes outdated and you no longer want it to show in the drop down list, you can “de-activate” it). In the “Vehicle Code (Brochure)” field, reference the mailing piece, advertising source, or event that represents your marketing effort. If the event or mailing piece has “multiples”, move over to the “Seg Codes” field to load the factors. In this example, NTA is identified as the “Source” and the Spring meet from March of 2004 is the “Segment”. If you attend subsequent NTA events, those events become additional Segments to the single NTA Source record that you will maintain.
Contact Method: Value list choice to reference the preferred method for contacting this Client—phone, e-mail, fax, etc.
Group Info Screen
Three things happen on the Group Info screen. You can designate a client as a travel agent or group leader, associate a client with a travel agent or group leader, or create a “Group Profile” for the group leader.
Why give a Client “Master Record” status? If they are an agent “re-seller” of your product or are acting as the primary contact for a group or organization promoting a trip with you, you want to be able to link travelers to them and generate an Agent or Group Leader confirmation or invoice from Bookings (these documents will be explained in more detail in the Bookings chapter).
In addition, commissions will only calculate automatically in bookings that originate from a Master Client record.
You may have instances where you will get only the traveler’s name from an agent or group leader, in which case you would not create an individual Client record for them. Rather, their bookings will be made via their agent’s or group leader’s Master record.
You may have other situations where it is permissible to add each traveler to your database; however, the cost of their tour needs to be reflected on a statement generated not to them but to their agent or group leader. In such a case, you will click on the second button to “Link this Client to a Master Group…”.
Example
John Smith travels with XYZ Travel, the Dublin Senior Center, and sometimes books directly with your company. When you create John’s Client record and indicate that you want to link to an Agent or Group Leader you will be prompted to pick from a list of records that have been tagged “Masters” to create an association. You’ll do that twice, after which John’s record will reflect—under the heading “Agents and GLs for this Client”—XYZ Travel and the Dublin Senior Center. The records for each of these organizations will show John Smith in a list under the heading “Clients of this Agent”.
The last button, when selected, allows you to create, reference or print a “Group Profile”. This document reflects things like the preferred departure point of the Client, the number of comps they typically want included in the cost of their trips, the type of hotels and restaurants they usually ask for, etc.
Notes Screen
Use the “Notes” field for free-form entry of general information about the client or specifics about conversations with them. When your entry is complete, click on the pencil, and today’s date, your name, and your comments will load to “history” (which can be edited only by a holder of the highest password).
Activities/To Do Screen
From this screen, you can create and reference a variety of activities associated with this client. You are also able to reference documents—receipts, invoices, etc.—that have been printed/sent to the Client (on the Documentstab).
New Info Request: Each time a client requests a brochure or some other information, click on the New Info Request button.
Pick the brochure requested and destination information (if applicable) from the value lists that present themselves. In the same way that you assigned a “Source” and related “Segment” to indicate how the Client came to be a client, you can capture how the information request came to be (the same value lists are in use in both places). Note that the Action Status of the record is set to “Pending”.
Once you run the report called “Information Request List/Labels” to complete your brochure fulfillment (explained in detail in the “Reports” section of this chapter), the request will be marked “closed”, and a “To Do” record will be created as a reminder to follow up on the request seven days later. You can manually create a “To Do” reminder from within the “Info Request” by clicking on the “New To Do Item” button at the bottom of the layout.
Click on “New Activity” to create a record referencing a call, fax, email, letter or meeting. Depending on the activity chosen, you will be taken to the appropriate screen to enter in text or information. If “e-mail” is selected, you will complete your message and click on either the “Send” or “Send/Attach” button. “Send” will activate a seamless transmission of your message; “Send/Attach” will open the usual dialog box you see when attaching something to an email message. Messages sent from TourTools™ are saved for future reference in the Client record.
New To Do Item: You can create a “To Do” item by clicking on the button so named. You can also create them while in the process of logging a new “Information Request” or an “Activity”. For more specific instructions, refer to the “To Do” chapter.
You may review any of these entries by clicking on the appropriate tablet in the list on the Activities/To Do layout.
Bookings/Quotes Screen
On the left hand side of the “Bookings/Quotes” tab, you will see a list of bookings currently linked to this client. Click on “More Detail” to see additional information about the bookings, or click the tablet preceding to actually open the reservation in question. Click on the “Archive” button to see information on bookings that have been archived (records that have been deleted from the Bookings data base, details of which have been saved for historic purposes). On the right, you will either see a list of all proposals sent to or (if the “ship module” is part of your system) a display of cabins blocked by this Client. Clicking on the tablet that references either will take you to the detailed record.
Emergency Info Screen
Click on this tab to store emergency contact information and any medical conditions for both the first and second named client.
Passport/Visa Screen
Passport and visa information can be stored here for both the first and second travelers.
Hobbies/CC Screen
On this page you can log additional information about your clients’ hobbies, occupations, interests, anniversaries, etc. This is also where you can pre-authorize a credit card that will ultimately be used to make payments on account in Bookings. Click the “New Card” button, load the detail as prompted by the field labels, and click “Authorize”. What will happen is a $1.00 charge will be “virtually processed” to legitimatize the card. The charge will not actually hit your client’s account; the number is simply being stored for future use (explained in greater detail in the Bookings chapter).
Reports
Unstored Fax/Quick Letter/E-Mail: These are used to produce a quick fax, letter or e-mail that you may not want to permanently store. (If you do, click on the “Save Message” button you will see at the top of each layout). Any of these documents can be sent to one recipient or by a “blast” to multiple records in a “found set”.
Information Request List/Labels: This report is usually run by date or date range to retrieve a list of individuals having requested information, the date of their request, what they requested and in what quantity. In addition to the list, you can generate mailing labels and can request that the information requests be marked as “closed”. As soon as the records are closed, TourTools™ will create a To Do reminder for you, to follow up on the information request one week later.
Info Request Report: This report gives you totals of what was requested and in what quantity, without identifying who did the requesting.
Source Report: Run this report to get totals on the source codes that were loaded on the Client level or on the “Info Request” level.
Zip Code Totals: This report reflects the number of records in your database summarized by zip code.
Labels/Envelope: Use to generate labels or envelopes for your found set.
Quick Let/PDFs: Use this to send an e-mail (the Unstored E-Mail), with or without attachments, which can be saved or not in the Client record as you choose. Unlike the e-mail functionality related to an “Activity” in an individual record, this can be used to send “bulk” e-mails to multiple Clients (the only limitation would be imposed by your e-mail server). If, within your “found set” there are Clients with no e-mail address, the cover message will print, prompting you to mail the document if you wish.
Group Profile: A second place from where you can generate the Group Profile.
Passport Information: This report is actually a form that can be used to solicit from your traveler their passport and emergency information, and may also be a document you produce for an escort accompanying a particular tour. In such a case, you would perform a “find” on the tour code from the “Use Find” layout and then run the report.
Emergency Information: Use this report as you would the Passport Report. This form reflects the information included on the Emergency Info screen as well as birth dates, anniversary dates, etc.
If you have any questions that are not answered here Contact TourTools Support for assistance.
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