Internal Compliance Program - Series (12) - Indication of your order and shipping process

Today, in the twelfth article in the hands-on practical advice series on Internal Compliance Programs for Export Control:

Part 12: Risk Assessment - Company Profile - Indication of your order and shipping process

You have presented your business activity, your products and your customers, Before being able to proceed to the Risk Matrix, the final step of your risk assessment process, you should lose some words about your order and shipping process.

Speak about order handling. How are orders accepted and processed in your system? What are specific requirements (e.g., an active customer account, product reference numbers, acceptable order quantities …)? How are your screening new customers? Are there generic model orders? Are amendments to orders accepted? What happens in case a customer is cancelling an order? What are sample request handled? Are reports on open orders issued? How are orders transmitted to production? How are product classification numbers considered in the process? Speak about customer master data.

Next section here is order delivering. What are the steps required to create a delivery? How are delivery notes issued? To whom are delivery notes transmitted? What about amendments to delivery notes? How are specific transportation requests handled? How are shipping documents created?

When are orders invoiced? By what means? What about price quotations (information and conditions included, special prices and terms, rebates and discounts, reports on pricing)?

Provide insights to your processes related to credit notes, debit notes, invoice cancellations and returns. Are there any credit control steps involved? How are contracts and arrangements handled?

What about inter-company transfers? Are there any global work rules? How is export compliance integrated into all these steps? How are audits performed? What about record-keeping and –retention?

How is your company performing customer service? Speak about customer satisfaction, delivery to promise, on-time delivery, customer surveys, handling of customer complaints, training and development, sales support teams.