Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP Software is a business management system that can integrate itself into all internal and external areas of a business including the Finance, Manufacturing, Sales, Human Resources and Customer Service departments. In a nutshell an ERP system can assist in the flow of communication throughout the various departments within a business in real time. An ERP system also eliminates the need for data to be recorded multiple times by each department. This is because the ERP system will notify all the relevant departments when a change is made thus improving data consistency within the business.

When choosing an ERP vendor, companies will spend a large portion of their time looking at the actual system and this will definitely prove to be beneficial but they will often overlook the support that the vendor is able to provide when things go wrong. It is vital that the vendor has a support team that is appropriately equipped to be able to deal with problems in an efficient manner as they occur. A problem with your ERP system will often result in your ERP commitments stopping altogether. A good support team should also be able to provide advice, guidance and even additional ERP tools. Here is a checklist of 5 things that you should ask a software vendor about their support team before purchasing ERP software from them.

  1. Who will answer my support related calls? -If the first point of contact is a front line receptionist, the problem will take much longer to resolve since the receptionist will not have a detailed understanding of the inner workings of an ERP system and will therefore log the problem and pass it onto a member of the support team. A support department that connects you straight to a member of the support team will be able to resolve the problem much faster.
  2. How qualified are the support staff? – Are the support staff adequately trained to be able to deal with any problems that your company may have on a daily basis? You should determine what qualifications they possess and whether they are trained on the job or whether there is a structured training scheme that takes place prior to the staff taking their first support related call.
  3. How is the success of the support team measured? – If the success of the support team is measured by the number of calls that they can blast their way through on a daily basis, then you may find that the support team do not provide the level of service or advice that you expect and are only interested in moving on to their next call. A software vendor that measures the success of its support team by looking at the level of customer satisfaction from the support calls will have a much more helpful support team.
  4. Who supports the support team? – Regardless of how many years training a member of staff has undergone, there will always be a problem that a member of the support team cannot answer and will need to pass the query onto a much more knowledgeable person. It is therefore important to determine who oversees the whole support process and to identify whether they possess adequate skills to complete this role.
  5. If a problem occurs, how can the support team be reached? – The support team should allow you to be able to contact them using a number of methods such as over the phone, email and via an online portal. An online portal can be very beneficial since it can provide a readily available list of frequently asked questions which you can browse through in order to find a solution to common problems.