Servicing agreements with customer

The standard requires that when there is a servicing agreement with the customer, the supplier verifies the effectiveness ofang supplier service centers, special-purpose tools, and training of servicing personnel. 

1 Define the service levels that you intend to provide up to and after warranty expires. 

2 Define the measures you need to take to honor your obligations to service products supplied to your customers. 

3 Provide servicing staff with current instruction manuals for the equipment they are servicing. 

4 Create forms for reporting servicing calls, time spent, components changed, etc. 

---

Cost allocation schemes were replaced by more flexible service contracts that made costs and services rendered much more transparent. These contracts range from more traditional time- and mate-rials-based arrangements to full service agreements, where the service providers and their customers agree on certain output parameters such as uptime/plant performance rather than on input parameters such as maintenance cost. Price negotiations with the customers became the key imperative of this transition phase. 

Customer service provides the single source of customer information. It becomes the key point of contact for administering the product/service agreement. Customer service provides the customer with real-time information on promised shipping dates and product aveiilability through interface with the organizations production and distribution operations. 

Same as in level 4, but in addition warehouse performance metrics are included in the customer service level agreement (SLA) signed with customers. 

Return to the FlexMan data in Exercise 4. The company has signed a service-level agreement with its customers and committed to carry safety inventory from one month to the next that equals at least 15 percent of the following month s demand. Thus, FlexMan is committed to carrying over at least 0.15 X 1,800,000 = 270,000 routers and 0.15 X 1,600,000 = 240,000 switches in inventory from December to January. 

Whether or not you have submitted a formal tender, any offer you make in response to a requirement is a kind of tender. Where a customer s needs are stated and you offer your product, you are implying that it responds to your customer s stated needs. You need to ensure that your tender is compatible with your customer s needs otherwise the customer may claim you have sold a product that is not fit for purpose . If the product or service you offer is in any way different than the requirement, you need to point this out to your customer in your tender or in negotiations and reach agreement. Always record the differences in the contract. Don t rely on verbal agreements as they can be conveniently forgotten when it suits one party or the other. 

An agreement formally executed by both customer and supplier (enforceable by law) which requires performance of services or delivery of products at a cost to the customer in accordance with stated terms and conditions. 

MRA is cited in the metrological documents that underpin the December 2000 European Union/United States trade agreements (Fig. 2). It has even more power in the market place because calibration customers can use it to shop around and find NMIs anywhere in the world that can offer the services they want. They can check out the accuracy offered and with a few e-mails or telephone calls can find details of their quality of service such as price and turn-round. Many of the NMIs are now experiencing competition for their services and some are seeing 10% or more of their customers coming from outside their home base. 

Consider the in-stock availability offered to the customer (with a nearly zero lead time) by the retailer if the retailer and manufacturer were to carry inventory. It is clear that the retailer s choice of inventory would reflect retailer margins and costs associated with excess inventory. Such a choice of customer service level may not reflect what is best for the overall supply chain, something that is discussed in the chapter on coordination. Thus, a focus on availability will encourage the manufacturer and retailer to establish coordination agreements that can increase the delivered service level to the customer. 

It is crucial to relate the failures to the possible level of affections in customer relationship, and measure these with the service level agreements (SLA), established with the customers and determined by the market as standard. 

As a result, through these equations we have a way to calculate the intangible costs as consequence of a customer complain due to an incident or fault related to maintenance of the service. But in the sector of DNSPs where contracts and standards spin aroimd of service level agreements (SLAs), it would have to align the estimated costs with these service features. This is because the quality measured has to be the perceived and demanded quality by the customer and not fix>m internal performance the costs have to reflect the price of nonperformance (Crosby, 1979). 

A vital component of the value proposition is the role it performs in identifying the roles and tasks cf partner organizations. Here the issue is one of communication to both partners and customers. If the roles and tasks are made explicit, this serves to create credibility for the value chain within the eyes of the customers and increases their confidence in dealing with the organization. Four aspects should be considered cooperation, commitment, coproduction, and coopetition. Cooperation implies an agreement within the value chain structure that an ongoing commitment to improving product-service offer and value production and delivery processes exists, and that this is prosecuted for the benefits of both customers and partners. Coproduction seeks to identify where the production process is most effectively conducted. The IKEA example used by Normann and Ramirez is widely published and is an excellent example of dispersed production across distributed assets to... 

Possibly require those who serve you to prepare PPs, as discussed in Chapter 5, and to share them with you. Ask the potential service provider to provide examples of PPs— without violating confidentiality between that service provider and his or her previous clients, owners, or customers. As part of the agreement or contract, require that both the service provider s responsibilities and your responsibilities will be in writing. 

---