Corporate or System Account: Adding a Non-Interfaced Vendor and its DCs to Your Account

• Overview
• Adding a Managed Vendor (i.e., System Vendor) and its DC
  • Adding Another DC for a System Vendor
  • When to Import Product List
• Requesting an Account-Specific Vendor and its DCs
• Unpublishing a Non-Interfaced Vendor (Parent Account Only)
• Republishing a Non-Interfaced Vendor (Parent Account Only)
• FAQs
  • From the Search Our Managed Vendors drop-down, the options Sysco Consolidated Master and Sysco - Managed are available? Can I use them and if so, what is the difference?

Overview

A corporate or system account (i.e., parent account) can select a non-interfaced vendor and its distribution centers (DC) that exist in the system to add to its account. Alternatively a corporate or system account can create a new vendor and its DCs in its account.

Once a vendor/DC combination exists in the parent account, then that vendor/DC combination is available for the child accounts to add to their accounts.   

Once that vendor/DC combination exists in a child account, then the parent account has the ability to publish the DC-specific vendor product list to that child account, with latest availability status, pricing, etc. 

There are two types of non-interfaced vendors that can be added to your account:

• Managed vendor (aka system vendor) - a vendor and its DCs that exist in the system and can be selected by an account. With a managed vendor, its products are also maintained in the system, meaning they will be verified and linked to their appropriate food items (i.e., ingredient or prepared food). Note that a managed vendor is also referred to as a system vendor. 
   
• Account-specific vendor (aka user-maintained vendor) - a vendor and its DCs that are manually created by your account. Because the vendor is specific to your account, any products added by your account will only be specific to your account, and as such you will have to request that the products be verified and linked to the appropriate food items (i.e., ingredient or prepared food) in the system (see Suggesting a Vendor Product be Linked to a Food Item). Note that an account-specific vendor is also referred to as "user-maintained vendor". 

Adding a Managed Vendor (i.e., System Vendor) and its DC

As a corporate or system account, to add a managed vendor (i.e., system vendor) and its DCs to your account, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Procurement > Vendors & Products. The Vendors screen appears.
    
2. Click the Add New button. The Add Vendor slide-out panel appears.
    
3. The Search Our Managed Vendors drop-down at the bottom of the slide-out panel contains the vendors available in the system. Search for and select the vendor. Once selected, the vendor slide-out panel appears.
   
   
    
4. In the What is your Customer Number field, enter your customer number with the vendor.
    
5. In the Which Distribution Center/Store do you purchase from? fields, select a DC associated with the vendor. 
   
   
    
6. If the DC is not available, then click the Request New link to refresh the screen with the following fields:
   • Distribution Center/Store Name - enter the name of the DC.
   • Distribution Center/Store ID - enter the ID of the DC.
     
     
     
     When you save the vendor, the system will send your request for a new DC to MealSuite Support. Once approved, the DC will be created and available for use in the vendor account. You will be notified via email and also on the home page (accessed by clicking logo at top left of screen).
      
7. Click Save. The Vendor Name - DC Name is listed on the Vendors Listing screen (Procurement > Vendors & Products). In addition, a message appears asking you if you want to import products. Click No, Thanks to the message, and instead see When to Import Product List section below for your next steps.
   
   

Adding Another DC for a System Vendor

To add another DC for a system vendor:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Procurement > Vendors & Products. The Vendors screen appears.
    
2. Click the Add New button to display the Add Vendor slide-out panel. At the bottom of the screen the Managed Vendors section is displayed, listing the existing managed vendors (screenshot below.
   
   
    
3. For the managed vendor that you want to add another DC to, click its Add Another Distribution Center button and enter the DC details. 
    
4. For each DC added to the vendor, the Vendor Name - DC Name is listed on the Vendors Listing screen (Procurement > Vendors & Products).

When to Import Product List

If the DC was requested (step 6 above), then products cannot be imported until the request is approved by MealSuite. Once you receive approval, the vendor product import process can begin.

If you want to also publish that vendor product list to your child accounts, then each child account must first have the vendor and associated DC added to their account. You can access the child account itself (via the Accounts drop-down in the top menu of the MealSuite screen) to add the vendor and DC, or have a user in the child account add the vendor and DC. Either way, instructions to add a vendor and DC in a facility account are explained in the following article: Facility Account: Adding a Non-Interfaced Vendor to Your Account.

Once the vendor and DC are added to a child account, then any vendor product list imported to a parent account can then be uploaded to your child accounts. See Importing Vendor Product List from Excel® File for instructions to do so.

Requesting an Account-Specific Vendor and its DCs

As a corporate or system account, to request an account-specific vendor (aka a "user-maintained vendor") and its DCs in your account, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Procurement > Vendors & Products. The Vendors screen appears.
    
2. Click the Add New button. The Add Vendor slide-out panel appears (screenshot below).
    
3. Click the Create My Own Vendor button at the top of the slide-out panel. The New Vendor Request slide-out panel appears (screenshot below).
   
   
    
4. In the Vendor Name field, enter the name of the vendor.
    
5. If the vendor is to be used for demo or testing purposes, then you can select the Test/Demo Vendor check box. You can select this check box to identify the vendor for testing or demo purposes. This setting can then be used as a filter by MealSuite Nutrition Services team when verifying vendor products for food items.
    
6. In the What is your Customer Number field, enter your specific customer number with the vendor.
    
7. Your next steps are to add the distribution centers (DC's) that the vendor is associated with. The DC's you add will then be available to your child accounts to select from when they add this vendor to their account. Complete the following steps:
   1. In the Distribution Center/Store Name field, enter the name of a DC associated with the vendor, and in the adjacent Distribution Center/Store ID, enter the ID of the DC.
   2. To add additional DC's, click the Add link and a new Distribution Center/Store Name field and Distribution Center/Store ID field appear for you to complete. 
      
      
8. Click Request. The system will send your request for a new vendor and DC to MealSuite Support.
9. When the request for the new vendor and DC's is approved, each Vendor Name - DC Name combination is listed on the Vendors Listing screen (Procurement > Vendors & Products). You will be notified via email and also on the home page (accessed by clicking logo at top left of screen).
10. To import a product list, or add individuals products, for your newly-created vendor/DC, see Uploading Vendor Product List (e.g., Order Guide) / Adding Individual Products.

Unpublishing a Non-Interfaced Vendor (Parent Account Only)

A non-interfaced vendor (either a managed vendor or account-specific vendor) can be unpublished by a parent account so that the vendor is not available for selection by any of the parent’s child accounts. If the vendor is currently in use by a child account, it remains in use.

To unpublish a non-interfaced vendor, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Procurement > Vendors & Products. The Vendors screen appears.
2. Locate the non-interfaced vendor you want to unpublish and either:
   • Click its gear icon and select Unpublish.
   • Click the gear icon and select Edit. The vendor slide-out panel appears with a green Publish. notification-button. Click the Publish notification-button to unpublish the vendor. The notification-button changes to Unpublish.

Republishing a Non-Interfaced Vendor (Parent Account Only)

To republish a non-interfaced vendor that has been unpublished, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Procurement > Vendors & Products. The Vendors screen appears.
2. Locate the vendor you want to republish and either:
   • Click its gear icon and select Publish.
   • Click the gear icon and select Edit. The vendor slide-out panel appears with a black Unpublish notification-button. Click the Unpublish notification-button to republish the vendor. The notification-button changes to Publish.

FAQs

From the Search Our Managed Vendors drop-down, the options Sysco Consolidated Master and Sysco - Managed are available? Can I use them and if so, what is the difference?

The options Sysco Consolidated Master and Sysco-Managed may appear from the Search Our Managed Vendors drop-down.

Please ignore these options and do not attempt to activate Sysco via the non-interfaced vendor activation process above. Sysco is an interfaced vendor, and as such has a different activation method. 

As to a reason why these options may show in the drop-down, it is related to a unique process involving third-party integration services to connect to interface-enabled vendors that some accounts use. It is recognized by the MealSuite product team that these options should not appear, and as such may be removed in a future release.