All contact will be stored in the same database structure regardless of what type of contact they are. Initially, these have been identified as:
Clients - Direct Customer
Agent - Travel Agents, Tour Operators, Affiliates
Suppliers - Sales Purchases and Back Office

Even though Direct Customer details are normally input when a booking is made, Users of ACRES will also be able to input contact details directly even if no sale is made in order to facilitate marketing campaigns. Details will also be automatically populated from Internet registrations and requests.

Where a Supplier is flagged for Sales Purchases, Users will be able to define which product areas they purchase from the Supplier. Accommodation, Car Hire, Flights, Holidays, Insurance, Tours. When the sales module is developed, only Suppliers who have been defined for the product area being sold will be displayed.

Business Clients would also be defined in the Agent category along with any individual who required statement facilities for their bookings.

A Contact will be able to belong to more than one Contact Category. For example, a Travel Agent may purchase from Calibre and Calibre may also purchase from the Agent.

When a Contact is defined, an ACRES wizard will allow Users to add one or more Contact Types. For each Contact Type, there will be a series of fields to be completed such as Commission amounts, Sales Taxes, Credit Terms, Prepayment Terms. These fields will come into play when ACRES is fully automated.

Once a Contact has been created, one or more locations for the Contact may be created. This will enable the use of a single Contact name that may have multiple contact locations such as an airlines with many national and/or international locations and may also have multiple contact personel with each contact location.

ACRES will have the ability to Add / Edit / Delete Contact subject to security permissions and checks.

Need to consider whether to set City, Region and Country Tables all as SYSTEM and/or PRIVATE.

A Property Owner would be defined in the same way as a Sales Supplier regardless of whether User book with the Property Owner or not.