Ritchey customers flock to integrated web ordering system
1 min read
Livestock tags and health products manufacturer Ritchey says it has made major productivity gains by integrating its ERP with online ordering and the DEFRA animal registration system.
Traceability of livestock is mandatory in the UK, requiring a unique serial number from DEFRA, the government agriculture ministry, for each animal tag.
Previously, that meant a three-way process, with order information entered by Ritchey sales staff onto a PC database, re-entered into the company’s Access Supply Chain ERP system for manufacturing planning, and once again into the DEFRA registration system.
Not only was it labour intensive and error prone, but the three systems were rarely synchronised. The PC database, for example, was updated only when tags were despatched.
So Access Supply Chain worked with Ritchey to build an interface between its system and the company’s website. Now, sales order entry takes place once only, with the customer entering the data.
Agricultural merchants order online, on behalf of farmers and, as they do so, the data is sent automatically to DEFRA and the Access Supply Chain system.
Tony Wheeldon, Ritchey’s group IT manager, says: “Now the customer has ownership of the data. The website guides them through the order process, so by and large errors are avoided. But if there are any problems – with herd numbering for instance – they are referred directly back to the customer from DEFRA. It happens almost instantaneously.
“We’ve got complete visibility all the way from sales order to despatch, which we didn’t have before, and we have completely eliminated the effort required for inputting data. There are no time delays and the potential for error has all but disappeared. It’s a massive productivity gain for us.”
