Company locations
How it works
A company that buys from you often orders for several places: a chain of shops, regional branches, or a head office and its warehouses. Each place can need its own prices, payment terms and people. With company locations, the person ordering picks the place first. The cart, checkout and My Account then follow it.
This page has two halves: setting up locations in the app, and how buyers order for a location on your store.
How locations share settings
Locations form a tree, with the company at the top. There's no separate "region" type: a region is a location with other locations inside it.
Each location inherits from the level above unless it sets its own. For example, every store in the North region uses the region's price list until you give one store a different list. When you change a setting on the company, every location that hasn't set its own follows.
Company
Region
Store
| Setting | How it works |
|---|---|
| Customer group, Price list, Pay later and Sales agents | Set on the company, and changed on any location that needs its own. Each location shows Same as and the level above until you change it. |
| People | Never inherited. Each person is added to the exact locations they order for. |
| Address | Never shared. Each location ships to its own address. On Shopify, that's the address of its Shopify company location. |
| Balance | Rolls up the tree. A region owes what its stores owe, shown in the Owes column. |
| Credit limit | Belongs to the company. There's one limit, shared by every location, and the credit available is that limit minus what the whole company owes. |
On Shopify, companies and their locations are your Shopify B2B companies, kept in sync both ways.
Set up a company's locations
- Check Company locations is on (it is by default): see Turn company locations on or off.
- At Companies (opens in your SparkLayer Dashboard in a new tab), click ⋯ next to the company, then Manage locations.
- Add a location for each region or store. Add regions first, then the stores inside them.
- On each location page, change only what's different from the level above, such as its Price list.
- Add people to each location and choose their role.
Turn company locations on or off
- Go to Settings,Configurations,Ordering (opens in your SparkLayer Dashboard in a new tab).
- Turn Company locations on or off ("Customers in a company choose which location they're buying for, and get that location's pricing."). It's on by default.
- Click Save in the bar at the top of the page.
The locations screen
The locations screen shows a company's location tree, with each location's pricing, people and balance. Open it in either of these ways:
A company's locations
Walk through a working copy of A company's locations, step by step. Nothing you do here changes your store.
- At Companies (opens in your SparkLayer Dashboard in a new tab), click ⋯ next to the company, then Manage locations.
- On the company's page, under Locations, click Manage locations (or Add a location if it has none).
The screen is named after the company, for example "Museum of Play Group locations". Above the list: "Each location uses the company's settings unless you change them. Put locations inside others to group them, like stores inside a region."
| Column | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Location | The location's name, indented under the location it sits in. Click it to open the location. |
| Pricing | The location's own price list, its customer group's pricing (for example "Trade pricing"), or Same as and the level above. |
| People | How many people are in the location, or No one yet. |
| Owes | The location's unpaid balance, or Nothing. |
| ⋯ | Edit location, Add a location inside and the location's name, and Delete. |
A company with no locations shows No locations yet: "Split this company into stores or regions if they need different prices or people. Each location uses the company's settings unless you change them."
Add a location
- On the locations screen, click Add a location to add one at the top level. To add one inside another location, click ⋯ next to it and choose Add a location inside and its name.
- Enter a Location name, for example
Glasgow store. The help text says which settings it starts with, for example "It uses Museum of Play Group's settings until you change them." - Click Add location. You'll see "Location added".
You can also add a location inside the one you're editing: on the location page, click More actions, then Add a location inside.
The location page
The location page holds one location's settings. To open it, click the location's name, or click ⋯ and then Edit location. Change what you need, then click Save in the bar at the top. You'll see "Location saved", and you go back to the locations screen.
Location
| Field | What it does |
|---|---|
| Location name | The location's name. |
| Sits under | Where it sits in the tree: the company (top level), or another location. Moving it "brings the locations inside it too". You can't move a location inside itself or one of its own locations. |
Prices and rules
| Field | Options | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Customer group | Same as the level above, or any of your groups | "Sets their prices, payment methods and order rules." |
| Price list | Same as the level above, or any of your price lists | Leave it as Same as unless this location needs its own prices. |
Paying
| Field | Options | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Pay later | Same as the level above, On or Off | "Order now and pay by invoice, up to their credit limit." With an unpaid balance, the card also says what the location currently owes. |
People
Who can order for this location, and their role. See People and location roles.
Sales agents
| Field | Options | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Sales agents who look after them | Same as the level above, or a group of sales agents, such as UK reps | "These sales agents can see them and order on their behalf." |
IDs in other systems
The same optional fields as a company: Accounting system ID, Shopify company ID and Other system ID.
People and location roles
Location roles decide who can order for each location. A person joins the company first, then you add them to the locations they order for:
- They join the company. A person belongs to a company through the Company on their customer record. That happens when you invite them as a buyer and choose the company, or when they're a contact of the company in Shopify and sync across.
- You add them to locations. On each location page, add them under People and choose their role.
One person can be in several locations, for example a buyer who orders for both Leeds and Manchester.
| Role | What they can do |
|---|---|
| Buyer | "Places orders for this location." The default for anyone you add. |
| Approver | "Checks and approves orders before they're placed." |
| Manager | "Everything a buyer can do, plus managing this location's people." |
Add people to a location
- Open the location page.
- Under People, choose someone from Add someone from and the company's name. The list shows the company's people who aren't in this location yet.
- Click Add. This saves straight away ("Added to the location").
- In the Role column, choose Buyer, Approver or Manager, then click Save in the bar at the top.
The list shows each person's name and email, and their role. With nobody added, it says "No one is in this location yet."
If someone isn't in the Add someone from list, they're not in the company yet: invite them and choose the company first.
Remove someone from a location
- Under People, click Remove next to the person.
- Click Remove to confirm.
"They stay in the company, just not in this location."
Move or delete a location
To move a location, open it, change Sits under, then click Save. The locations inside it move too.
To delete a location:
- Click ⋯ next to the location and choose Delete. Or open the location and click More actions, then Delete location.
- Click Delete location to confirm.
The locations inside it are deleted too. Its people stay in the company. This can't be undone.
How buyers order for a location
The rest of this page is about your store: what someone at the company sees when they sign in, and how they switch between locations.
Sign in
Choose a location
Prices and payment follow
Check out
The location chip
The location chip shows which location someone is ordering for. On your store, it sits in the widget's top bar, to the left of the avatar.
| What it shows | When |
|---|---|
| A pin and the location's name | The person is ordering for that location. |
| Up and down arrows beside the name | There's more than one location to choose from. |
| The pin on its own | A sales agent's top bar is full. The location's name is in the chip's tooltip. |
| No location | The person hasn't been added to any location yet. |
| No chip | The company has no locations. |
Choose a location
- Click the location chip in the top bar.
- In Choose a location, click the location to order for.
The cart, checkout and My Account switch to that location straight away. A notification confirms it, for example Ordering for and the location's name. Underneath, it shows the location's price list and whether it can pay later (or what it owes).
More detail
- Current location comes first, with its place in the tree (for example a region, then the store), so it's never lost at the bottom of a long list.
- Recent, for companies with more than six locations, lists the last three locations the person ordered for.
- Everything else follows, grouped under the region it's in. Someone who can only reach some locations sees Your other locations, and a company with no regions shows Other locations.
- Each row shows the location's name, its address and, on the right, its price list as a short badge such as 30% off (hover to see the list's name). Pay later off marks a location that can't pay on account or by invoice.
- With more than six locations, a Find a location search appears. Every word typed must match the location's name or a place above it, so a region's name plus a store's name finds that store. Press Enter to choose the first match.
- Use the arrow keys to move through the list, and Escape, the backdrop or × to close it.
If the person can only order for one location, the box says so, and says a company admin can add them to more. If they're in no location, it names the company admin to ask.
What changes with the location
| Where | What changes |
|---|---|
| My Cart | Each line's unit price comes from the location's price list. For example, on a list that's 30% off RRP, a product with an RRP of $100.00 costs $70.00. The crossed-out sub-total is the RRP total. A price a sales agent changed by hand on a line keeps the agent's price. |
| Checkout: Details | The Shipping Address is the location's own, with a note saying it's delivering to that location's address and a Change location link. |
| Checkout: Review & Pay | With Pay later off, the pay-later methods (such as Pay on Account and Pay by Invoice) are hidden and card payment is selected. The Order Summary has an Ordering for row naming the location, with Change. |
| Checkout: Complete | The confirmation message names the location the order was placed for. The confirmation goes to the email address of the person who placed the order, not the company's. |
| My Account: greeting and My Details | The signed-in person's own first name, name and email address, not the company's. |
| My Account: Recent Activity | The location's orders, each naming the location it was placed for. A region also shows its stores' orders. A location with no orders says so, with Change location. |
| My Account: Financials | The payment terms, the location's unpaid balance and the company's credit limit, with a note of how much of the shared limit is left. |
| My Account: Address Book | The location's address, as the default shipping and billing address, with Change location. |
| My Account: Company Users | The company's people, each with the locations they can reach (or "No location yet"), their role (Admin or Standard) and (you) beside the signed-in person. |
| Account menu | Under the company's name, the person's name and their location. A sales agent's menu doesn't change. |
See My Cart, Cart and checkout and My Account for the rest of each screen.
Who can order for which locations
Someone can order only for the locations they've been added to. Where those locations sit in the tree doesn't matter: being added to one store doesn't give someone its region, or the other stores in it.
| Who | Locations they can choose | What else they can do |
|---|---|---|
| Company admin (one of the company's Admins) | Every location | Manage the company's people and locations: Add new address, Invite new user and the actions on Company Users. |
| Anyone else at the company | Only the locations they've been added to | Order for those locations. They don't see Add new address (in My Account or at checkout), Invite new user or the Company Users actions. |
| Sales agent | Every location of the company they're ordering for | Order for any location, and manage people and locations like an admin. |
To give someone more locations, add them on the location page. A company admin, or a sales agent who looks after the company, can do it too.
FAQs
They haven't been added to it. People only see the locations they've been added to, even if they're in another store in the same region. Company admins and sales agents see every location. To fix it, add them on the location page under People.
They're not in the company yet. A person joins a company through the Company on their customer record: invite them as a buyer and choose the company, or add them as a contact of the company in Shopify.
Add a location with the region's name, such as North. Then add the stores inside it with Add a location inside. A region is a location with other locations inside it.
No. The credit limit belongs to the company and is shared by every location. Financials shows the current location's unpaid balance and how much of the company's limit is left.
The location they're ordering for has Pay later off, so only card payment is available. Check the setting on the location, the locations above it and the company. A location uses the nearest setting above it unless it has its own.
With company locations, the cart uses the price list of the location being ordered for. Check which location the location chip shows. Then check which price list that location uses, or the location or company above it.
The checkout uses the location's own address. To deliver somewhere else, choose a different location with Change location. Company admins can also add addresses.
They stay in the company, just not in that location or the locations inside it. Add them to another location if they still need to order.
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