When you need to set different rules for a customer based on their location (or ship-to address) its not possible with just one customer account. Parent and child accounts can be used when you need to set price, product visibility, users, and everything else about a customer and apply those rules to each ship-to location for that customer.
This article uses the term organization to describe all of a customer's linked customer records. This refers to all of the linked parent and child customer accounts for that customer.
Contents of this Article
ERP Customer Records
Parent and child customer accounts is also a great solution when your ERP records are setup with the same sort of relationship (customer hierarchy). Typically the ERP will treat the parent customer record as a billing master record and orders for each ship-to customer are billed to the parent. The ERP might use different terms as seen in these examples.
Customer Record Examples | EvolutionX | EvolutionX |
Eclipse ERP | bill-to entity | ship-to entity |
Epicor Prophet 21 (P21) | bill-to customer | ship-to customer |
CU TIMS ERP | customer | customer with billing parent ID |
A parent account can be set by selecting from the Parent Account field when editing a customer or creating a new one. A parent account is used when you require some users to have access to make purchases, etc for multiple customer accounts.
ERP Not Supporting Parent Child
Not all ERP's support parent child customer accounts, either through their integration or natively. Where this is the case you can still use the feature in EvolutionX but it will not be natively supported with the ERP.
Understanding Parent & Child Customer Accounts
Parent and child customer accounts offer the ability to set price, product visibility, user access, order history, and much more, for each ship-to location for your customer.
User Examples When using Parent & Child Customer Accounts
In the image below you can see an example of how many customer accounts can be arranged in a parent-child relationship.
Buyer — Each user who needs to login to just one customer location and place orders for it should be added as a user to the child customer (the customer record representing that location). When they login they are always viewing records and ordering for that customer account only and cannot see records from other customers in the organization (see note about approvers from other customers in the organization in this articles).
Manager — If a user should be able to log in to more than one customer in the organization including placing order and seeing order history on each then they are added as a user of the parent. In order to prevent this manager user from seeing the transactions of the parent customer and customer locations they do not need access to you can set "Account Restrictions" (represented by the dashed rectangle in the image below). When this user logs in they are asked which customer they will login as and they are able to switch customers at any time without logging out.
CFO — A user which is added to the parent customer account without any account restrictions will be able to login and switch between any account in the organization, including the parent and the children accounts. When logging in they are asked which customer they are logging in with and can switch anytime without logging out.
Note that we do not support grand-children, so no customer can be a child of a child (see the Customer 4 example in the image below).
Assign a Parent Account to a Customer Account
You can select a customer to become the parent of another customer. You can do this when editing a customer account or creating a new one. Please note that an existing child or parent customer cannot become the child or parent of another customer.
The Parent Account is displayed in the customer account dashboard.
If a customer has a parent account, it will be displayed in the dashboard. Clicking on the account name will take you to the parent account.
The Child Account(s) are displayed in the customer account dashboard.
If a customer is a parent, you will see a count of its child accounts on its dashboard. Clicking on it will take you to the customers’ accounts page which will show you a filtered list of all the accounts belonging to the parent account.
By Module on the Storefront
In checkout
If you are a parent user, logged into a child account for purchasing, when you checkout you will see the Child account name in the company field.
Profile
When logged into a Parent user, you will see your parent user profile regardless of the child account that you may be logged in under.
Quick List
Personal quick lists (only) will be seen across accounts (parent/child) but will be scrubbed based on the products available in the current logged-in account. This means you may not see the products inside a quick list, if the quick list is from another account and you are logged in under a child account. This is because the child account may not have access to the same products. Where this is the case the system will not show those products.
User Roles
My Account Module Permissions
Role Permissions for All orders view (Across account view)
User Roles: View vs View All
Orders tab:
"View all" enabled and "View" enabled
Then the user will see orders for all users in all account they are associated.
For example, if John has access to three accounts (Apple ltd, Orange ltd, and Pear ltd). While he is logged in to the Apple ltd account, he will see all orders across all accounts (i.e. orders from Apple ltd, Orange ltd, and Pear ltd). No matter what account he is logged in under, he will see all orders from all accounts within the orders tab. The orders tab and approvals tab will give him access to order info across all accounts.
Importantly: John will also see all orders created by other users from all the accounts he has access (e.g. Apple ltd, Orange ltd, and Pear ltd). For example, lets say Susan works for Orange ltd. If she makes an order for Orange ltd, John will be able to see his orders and Susans orders.
"View all" disabled and "View" enabled
Then the user will see their own orders only.
For example, if John has access to two accounts (Apple ltd, Orange ltd). While logged in to the Apple ltd account, John will only see orders that he made for the Apple ltd account. He will not see orders from Orange ltd. To see the orders he made for Orange ltd, John will need to change to the Orange ltd account.
For example, lets say Pam has access to Pear ltd. She will only see orders she places for Pear ltd. This is true even though Pear ltd might be a child account of Apple ltd.
Sales quotations
Sales quotations are not supported when logged into a child account unless your user is associated only with this account and not attached to the parent account.
Saved carts
Saved carts are similar to quick lists above. They will be seen across accounts (parent/child) but will be scrubbed based on the products available in the current logged-in account. This means you may not see the products inside a Saved cart if the Saved cart is from another account and you are logged in under a child account. This is because the child account may not have access to the same products. Where this is the case the system will not show those products.
Addresses
These are the addresses for the current logged-in account. Addresses are held at the account level only and can't be seen across accounts.
Saved Cards
You should see these across all accounts. They are held at the User level
Users
These are users that are held against the account you are logged into. You won't see parent users when in a child account.
Contract items
You will see the items that are on the contract for the account that you are currently logged in under. Your contract list won't include items across accounts.
Call-off orders
You will see items from the call-off items associated with the account you are logged in under.
Reports
You will see reports associated with the account you are logged in under
Dashboard Tiles
Addresses
Disable the Addresses Tile for users who are on accounts using Parent & Child customer records. This is not supported for parent & child accounts.
By Module on the Admin User settings
Advanced Settings
When Ordering
These will be respected across all accounts regardless of what account the user is logged in under (parent or child)
Default PO Structure
These will be respected across all accounts regardless of what account the user is logged in under (parent or child)
Address restriction
Restricting parent users to certain addresses in the child accounts is not currently supported.
The restrictions for Parent Users for addresses are only when logged in to the parent account.
Cost center restriction
Restricting cost centers in the child accounts is not supported
All cost centers within a child account will be available to the parent user when they are logged in under a child account
Budget approvers are across accounts (parent/child). You can choose to have any user approver any other users budgets regardless if they are in a parent or child account
User Budget
These will be respected across all accounts regardless of what account (parent/child). Order totals (exclusive of tax) are summed across all the user's orders regardless of what account they are purchased under. The sum total of all the user's orders is what is used to calculate a breached budget.
Budget approvers are across accounts (parent/child). You can choose to have any user approve any other users budgets regardless if they are in a parent or child account
Approver controls
These are respected the same way for each account the user is logged in under. For example, if "pre-approve quick list items" is enabled then the user will be able to order quick list items under any account (parent/child) without approvals being needed.
Approver Settings
When Approving orders
Approvers are across all accounts (parent/child) in the customer's organization. You can choose to have any user approve any other users, regardless if they are in a parent or child account.
For configuring different approvers for different Child Accounts set the approver as the Account Admin of the Child Account and under the requestors users settings do not select an Approver. The Account Admin will default as the approver for that Child Account.
Approver Budgets
These will be respected across all accounts regardless of what account (parent/child). Order totals (exclusive of tax) are summed across all the user's orders regardless of what account they are purchased under. The sum total of all the user's orders is what is used to calculate a breached budget.
Executive Approvers
Approvers are across accounts (parent/child). You can choose to have any user approve any other users order regardless of whether they are in a parent or child account.
Awaiting Approvals tab
This tab will give you access to all orders awaiting approval that you, the user, are associated. This allows you to approve orders, from any parent/child account you are associated, from one tab.
Approver emails : Your customers will be able to approve orders directly from their email.
FAQ and Limitations
Grandparent > Parent > Child :
More than 2 levels of parent / child relationships are not supported. A parent can have multiple children but a child cannot have multiple parents. Also, a parent can't be a child of another account. A child of a child is not permitted.
Users from a grandparent can be setup on one account and granted access to other customer accounts to avoid having to manage multiple users. This has some restrictions and full details are found in our Other Customer Account Access for User Article.
User roles follow the User :
A user role follows the user regardless of which customer they login as in the organization. We don't support separate roles for the same user per customer account. If the User is an Enterprise Admin role in the Parent account they will have the same access rules when inside the child account.
Users restrictions:
Users can be restricted to just the parent account, just a child account, or a combination of both. It is not recommended that a user is setup at the parent if they only need access to one child customer account (although this might happen over time if a child customer account is closed). If a user only needs access to one child account you can add them on that customer account to give them the best experience.
Switching between customer accounts:
A user of the parent customer account can easily switch between any customer account in the organization (or the customer accounts in their restriction list) without logging out. The parent and child customer accounts is not designed to be used where a user needs to switch between customer accounts which are unrelated.
See how to switch between accounts and how to add an extra button to help customers.
Checkout Can Use the Parent Billing Address:
When a user is active on a child account and goes to the checkout, the billing address will be inherited from the Parent account if a billing or global address is not setup on the child account. This can occur when synchronizing data between the ERP and EvolutionX where the child account does not have a billing address.
Using the API:
Using the API a developer can set the parent of a customer account using the parent_id field of the customer object. The API returns the list of child accounts in the customer object too.
Approver Emails - Add Account Name:
Make sure you have the account name showing on your approver email templates. If you don't see it then you can simply add it in.
Account Name {customer_company_name}
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