A customer profile is a trading arrangement belonging to a company. Most customers need exactly one, and you can ignore the feature. It earns its keep when a single legal customer has to be handled as more than one commercial relationship.
When you need one
- Different contracts. The customer's import traffic runs on one rate agreement and their export traffic on another.
- Different divisions. One group company, several business units, each with its own contacts and terms — but one legal entity to invoice.
- Different trade lanes priced and managed separately.
If none of these apply, the company record on its own is enough. See Companies.
Creating one
From the company, open Customer profiles → New:
| Field | Notes |
|---|---|
| Name | What distinguishes this arrangement — Import, Export, Retail Division. |
| Company | The parent. Set for you when created from the company page. |
| Contract | The rate agreement this profile trades under. |
| Notes | Free text describing the arrangement. |
Name profiles for the arrangement, not the customer — the company name is already on the parent, and ACME – ACME helps nobody.
Contracts
The contract link is what makes a profile more than a label. It is the rate agreement pricing draws on, so quoting against the right profile means quoting on the right rates. Contracts themselves are maintained in Quotations — see Contracts and tariffs.
Contacts on a profile
Contacts can be attached to a customer profile rather than to the company as a whole, which is the point when the import desk and the export desk are different people. See Contacts.
Financial accounts
A profile can carry its own financial account, holding a credit limit, a currency and an account type. This is how one company can run separate credit exposure per arrangement — a division billed in USD with its own limit, alongside another billed locally.
Where no profile-level account exists, the company's own credit terms apply. Do not set both without deciding which is meant to govern; two limits on the same customer is how disputes start.
Practical advice
- Do not create profiles speculatively. Every profile is another thing to quote against correctly, and an operator picking the wrong one produces an invoice on the wrong rates.
- Make the names obvious. Whoever raises the quotation is choosing from a list and will not read the notes.
- Review the contract link when rates change. A profile pointing at last year's contract will quote last year's prices without complaint.
Last updated 13 September 2026