Branches is a great tool to help you run reports on quotes for individual locations, along with limiting access to quotes on a branch level. Find out in this article how you can start taking advantage of the branches tool.

Important: This tool is only available for Professional and Enterprise pack types.

How to activate branches 

In order to have branches activated, this will need to be done by your WebCargo account manager. Bear in mind if this isn’t included in your pack type, this will incur an additional charge. In order to check to see if the branches tool is activated for your account go to Settings, then click on Users and you should see Branches as an option from the dropdown.

How to create a branch

First of all, click on Settings, then Users then select Branches from the dropdown. Click on the + symbol to start creating a branch.

From here, you can enter the name of the branch, the code or abbreviation for the branch, and any address information that is relevant to the branch. Bear in mind that the Branch is the only mandatory field. When you’ve entered all of your branch information click on Add. 

The branch should now be added to your list. If you have more than one branch, follow the same process for each.

How to assign a branch to a user

To assign a branch to a user, go to Setting and then Users. Select an individual user by clicking on the pencil and paper symbol under the actions column. This will allow you to edit the user and assign a branch.

On the first General information tab and you’ll find a dropdown called Branch. Select the branch to assign to this user and then click Save located at the bottom of the page.

Bear in mind that if you apply a branch to a user they will only be able to see the quotes that are generated or saved for that branch.

E.g if you assign a user to the Aberdeen branch, this user will only see quotations created and issued by themselves or other users located in the Aberdeen branch. They may also see quotes created by users who have access to all branches but have been assigned to the Aberdeen branch.

What happens when you have quotes created but you have been assigned a branch?

When assigning a user to a branch, and the user already has quotes created on the platform, the system will ask whether or not to assign existing quotes by this user to the relevant branch.

When this box appears, click OK. All quotes created by this user will be associated with the corresponding branch and will also be accessible to users with access to all branches.

Users with Access to All Branches

Access can be granted to users for visibility of all quotes created, along with the additional assignment of an individual quote to a specific branch. If this is the case, go to Users, then click on the pencil and paper symbol to edit under the actions column.

Then click on the first General information tab and click on the first dropdown Branch. Select All and then click Save.

The user can now indicate the branch a quote is being created for.

How to create a quote associated with a specific branch

Go back to the Air tab and make a rate search. Where you enter your cargo details and select your options, you’ll find a dropdown for Branch.

A user who has been assigned all branches will be able to select any of the branches within the company account. They will be able to make a static rate search and when saving their quotations, these quotes will be visible to all who have access to the branch used for the search.

If a user has access to all branches, they can also set a default branch that is always selected for the static rate search.

Setting a default branch for a static rate search

To set the default branch, go to Settings then Users. Click on the Edit user symbol (the pencil and paper symbol) for the user you want to assign a default branch to.

Then click on the Default values tab. You can then select a branch from the dropdown.

When making a static rate search, you’ll now be able to see the branch is set as default. Whoever has been assigned a default branch can still choose between different branches by clicking on the dropdown.