Purchasing department

Only those who are up to date on existing contracts can effectively design new agreements. Knowledge of the volumes concluded to date and the results of previous cooperation with suppliers is the basis for further successful purchasing management. Answers to the following questions can play a decisive role here:

• Which framework agreements have not been used?
• What are the conditions for a particular product?
• How many open orders still exist at the moment?
• What volume has been handled with this supplier in the last 12 months?
• Etc.

In other words, a systematic periodic supplier evaluation with appropriate criteria can help here.n.

Controlling Contract Management

Current data and facts are particularly important for the work of a controller, including contracts. In addition to the contract options, active, passive and special agreements also play a role. With regard to the controlling of framework and consortium contracts, up-to-date information on the status of contract utilization (service notes and invoices) is important. Satisfaction with a supplier can be evaluated and measured using a structured supplier evaluation integrated in DOCM (see the chapter Supplier Evaluations).

Business management

A business enterprise is based on a multitude of different contracts: purchase, rental and leasing contracts for machines, office equipment, vehicles or other hardware and software, SLAs and service contracts or other company-relevant agreements. For day-to-day operations, online availability of the contract terms, warranty provisions and service rules specified in the contracts is important. This applies equally to specialist departments such as IT and process controlling, but also to workshops, fleets, personnel departments, etc.

Legal department

The lawyers are said to have a special view on the contracts, i.e. they are interested in every detail of a contract, be it in case of renegotiation or in case of dispute. The entire contract text including all preliminary information is available via the integrated document management of DOCM. Thus all digitally recorded documents are available, even in several versions that have been assigned to the contract. The full text search of SharePoint also enables a search in all stored documents (preliminary drafts of a contract as Word or PFD, possibly uploaded e-mails, etc.).

Departments

Those responsible for a particular department can obtain an overview of the status of their contracts online at any time. If they wish, they can also be informed in good time by e-mail about an upcoming contract renewal.

Contract initiator / Requester

The contract initiator can obtain an overview of the process status of the contracts initiated by him online at any time. He or she can also be informed by e-mail if the contract status changes.