Responding to Mercury Messages

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Contents 1 Responding to Incoming Messages 1.1 Responding to Incoming Order Messages 1.2 Responding to Incoming Ask Messages 1.3 Responding to Incoming Answer Messages 1.4 Responding to Incoming Cancel Messages 1.5 Responding to Incoming Confirm Messages 1.6 Responding to Incoming Deny Messages 1.7 Responding to Incoming Reject Messages 1.8 Responding to Incoming Forward Messages 1.9 Responding to Outgoing Orders 2 Requesting a Price Change 3 Acknowledging Messages 4 Rejecting Incoming Orders 5 Deleting Messages from Message Center

When you receive messages from other florists, you may need to respond to them. For example, if you receive an Ask message, you need to send an Answer message. If you receive a Cancel message, you either need to send a Confirm or a Deny message.

To respond to a message in Message Center:

1. Perform a search to locate the message to which you want to respond.
2. Select the message from the results list and click the Respond button. A menu with valid responses opens. Select the response.
3. When the window for the response opens, craft the message.
4. Click Send.

You can only respond to messages that have a Mercury Message number.

Responding to Incoming Messages

Depending on the incoming message type, there are several tasks you can perform.

Responding to Incoming Order Messages

When you receive an incoming order message from another florist, you can:

• Accept the order and fill it. You must attach the message and complete it in Order Entry. Once you attach the message, it is removed from the Requires Attention list.
• Send a price change request.
• Send an Ask message to ask a florist a question about the order.
• Forward the order to another florist. Once you forward the order, the message is removed from the Requires Attention list.
• Reject the order. Once you reject an order, the message is removed from the Requires Attention list.

Responding to Incoming Ask Messages

When you receive an incoming Ask message, you need to answer it using an Answer message. The Ask message is used both to ask you a question and to request price changes. If the incoming Ask message is requesting delivery confirmation, you can answer it using the Delivery Confirmation message (which is sent as an Answer message).

Once you answer the message, it will be automatically acknowledged and removed from the Requires Attention list.

Responding to Incoming Answer Messages

If you receive an incoming Answer message, you can either send another Ask message to the florist (see Sending an ASK Message on page 4–19) or acknowledge the message so it no longer appears in your Requires Attention list.

Responding to Incoming Cancel Messages

When you receive an incoming Cancel message, the sending florist is asking you to cancel their order. There are two responses you can send: Confirm if you agree to cancel the order, or Deny if you will not agree to cancel the message. Typically, you should confirm the cancellation unless you have already begun work on the order.

Once you confirm or deny the message, it will be removed from the Requires Attention list.

Responding to Incoming Confirm Messages

When you receive an incoming Confirm message, the filling florist has agreed to your request to cancel the order. You can then acknowledge the message to remove it from your Requires Attention list.

After you have acknowledged the Confirm message, you should either cancel the order in Order Entry or send it to another florist in Order Entry. In either case, double-click the message to open it in Order Entry and perform the necessary tasks.

Responding to Incoming Deny Messages

If you receive an incoming Deny message, the filling florist to whom you sent the Cancel message is indicating that they are unable/unwilling to cancel the order. In the overwhelming majority of cases, this is because work has already begun on the order. You can acknowledge the message to remove it from your Requires Attention list.

Responding to Incoming Reject Messages

When you receive an incoming Reject message, the florist to whom you sent the order cannot fill it. In many cases, when this happens, the florist will automatically forward it to another florist. However, if you receive an incoming Reject message, that did not happen. You need to open the order in Order Entry (by double-clicking it from the Message Center results list) and either select a new filling florist or cancel the order.

Although you can also acknowledge the incoming Reject message, the original order message will still appear in the Requires Attention list until you either cancel it or send it to another florist.

Responding to Incoming Forward Messages

When you receive an incoming Forward message, it is to let you know that an order you sent was forwarded to another florist. The incoming Forward message includes information about the florist who received the order. You need to acknowledge the message to remove it from your Requires Attention list.

Responding to Outgoing Orders

Although there are fewer possible scenarios dealing with outgoing orders, you can also respond to outgoing orders for the following scenarios:

• Requesting a price change. If you need to update a price after the initial order was sent (for example, the customer wants to add more money to the order), you need to respond using a Price Change request.
• Sending an order cancellation. If you need to send a cancellation message after the order has been sent, you need to respond with a Cancel message.
  If you send a Cancel message to a florist, the order is automatically marked as incomplete. You can then double-click that order in Message Center to open it in Order Entry, allowing you to either cancel the order in or send the order to a new florist. Until you cancel or resend the order, the order will appear in Message Center as requiring attention.
  

  It is customary to wait for a Confirm message when you send a Cancel message, but it is not necessary to receive it in order to cancel it in your system or resend it to a different florist.

• Sending an Ask message to the filling florist. The majority of time, this is to inquire about the order’s delivery status.

Requesting a Price Change

A possible response to a message is to request a price change. You can do this as the filling florist (the more common scenario), or as the sending florist wanting to update a price after the initial order was sent.

To request a price change:

1. Open Message Center and perform a search to locate the order message for which you are requesting a price change.
2. Select the message from the results list and click the Respond button.
3. Select Price Change. The Create Ask Message window opens.
4. Enter information for the price change and click Send.

Acknowledging Messages

Acknowledging messages allows you to remove messages from the requires attention list without having to send a message in reply. Essentially, it allows you to mark that you have read the message.

You can acknowledge the following Mercury Message types:

• Incoming Ask (ASK) messages
• Incoming Answer (ANS) messages
• Incoming Deny (DEN) messages
• Incoming Reject (REJ) messages (although you can acknowledge this message, you must still either cancel the order or resend it to remove the message from the Requires Attention list)
• Incoming Confirmation (CON) messages
• Incoming Forward (FOR) messages
• Incoming General (GEN) messages

When you acknowledge a message, the Acknowledgment window opens. You can then select your employee name from the Employee list, and then click Save to save the Acknowledgment. Once you acknowledge a message, it no longer shows up under the requires attention list and the message status is set to Acknowledged. If you acknowledge a message that is associated with an already attached (opened in Order Entry via Message Center) order, the acknowledgment is recorded in Order Notes for the order.

You cannot acknowledge a message that has previously been acknowledged; that option is no longer available as a response.

When you send an Answer message as a response to an Ask message, the Ask message is automatically acknowledged. Delivery Confirmation messages are automatically acknowledged when they are received.

Rejecting Incoming Orders

You may need to reject an incoming order. Some reasons for doing so include it is past your delivery cutoff time, the order is outside of your delivery area, or you do not have the product requested.

You should forward the order to another florist instead of rejecting it if another florist can fill the order instead. Only reject an order if you feel that no other florist can fill it.

To reject an incoming order in Message Center:

1. Enter search criteria to locate the incoming order message. Click Search.
2. In the results list, select the message, click Respond, and then select Reject from the pop-up menu. The Create REJ Message window opens.
3. Fill out the window and click Send.

Deleting Messages from Message Center

Certain messages can be deleted from Message Center entirely:

• General (GEN) messages
• Unattached, non-FTD orders

In the case of General messages, this allows you to keep the Message Center organized. For users who also send with non-FTD wire services, this allows you to remove order messages that would otherwise appear in the Requires Attention list.

To remove a message from Message Center:

1. In Message Center, right-click on the message and select Delete Message.
2. You are informed you are about to remove the message and will no longer be able to access it. Click Yes to confirm the deletion.

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