How to Communicate with Suppliers: Request, Agree on Terms, and Check a Delivery

To work with a supplier, prepare a clear description of the goods and quantities, keep a record of the agreed terms, and check that they are met when accepting the delivery. Record any discrepancies you find and send them to the supplier for clarification.

Link correspondence to a specific order. Keep prices, agreements, and delivery-check results with your purchasing history. Use these records to track product quality, lead times, and supplier reliability.

Prepare a request with product specifications

Before contacting a supplier, decide what goods the store needs and in what quantities. Specify sizes, material, design, quality requirements, and any other characteristics relevant to the purchase. Include only the details that actually need to be agreed.

If you are ordering several product options, list the quantity for each. Instead of a general description such as “a batch of T-shirts,” specify the model, color, material, and size breakdown. Ask the supplier to provide a price quote for this exact list.

Sample request: “Please send us a quote for 30 black cotton T-shirts, model A: 10 each in sizes S, M, and L. Please specify the unit price, availability, and possible delivery date.”

Record the agreed terms after a conversation

After discussing the order, send the supplier a written summary. List the goods, quantity, price, agreed payment and delivery terms, and delivery time. Ask them to confirm the summary or send any corrections.

You can use this template for the message: “To summarize our conversation: goods — […], quantity — […], price — […], payment — […], delivery — […], lead time — […]. Please confirm these terms or indicate what needs to be changed.”

Keep the supplier’s reply with the order. If the terms change, make a separate note of exactly what was agreed again. Refer to these records, prices, and delivery documents when checking the order later.

Communicate a refusal clearly

If you decide not to order a batch, state your decision clearly. For example: “Thank you for the offer. We will not order this batch.” This response directly communicates your refusal.

Before promising a future purchase, make sure you will be able to follow through. If you are not sure, leave that commitment out of your reply. Do not make a promise just to soften the refusal.

Check the delivery and record discrepancies

When accepting a delivery, compare its contents with the order or list. Check the items and quantities received. Separately compare the quantities and prices in the documents and mark any discrepancies.

Let’s continue the sample T-shirt order. Suppose you ordered 10 of each size and received the following batch:

All figures in this example are hypothetical. Record the specific discrepancy and contact the supplier: “We expected 10 size M T-shirts in the order but received 8. We received 28 of the 30 items in total. Please check the discrepancy and let us know how you propose to resolve it.”

Keep the supplier’s reply and the agreed follow-up actions. Before future purchases, review the history: whether deadlines were met, what quality issues arose, which discrepancies were recorded, and how the supplier responded.

Edit a prepared supplier order in Torgsoft

If you need to change a prepared order after clarifying the purchase, Torgsoft lets you reopen and edit an order created earlier.

Use this option to make the necessary changes after discussing them with the supplier. Before editing, compare the changes with the written summary of your agreement. After editing, check that you made exactly the agreed changes.

Confirming terms with the supplier and checking the received batch are separate steps. Use correspondence, the order, and the actual contents of the delivery for these tasks. The order workflow is described in “Supplier orders in Torgsoft”.