For a few weeks now I have been putting off dealing with a PO I received because I just know I won’t be able to match it to a set of projects for the same client I have in my database. How typical! So typical in fact I’m almost ashamed of having been had for the umpteenth time! And yet it happens, more often than we’d like to think.
Sometimes clients put off sending POs to translators/LSPs because they simply have other, more pressing things to do. And if you’re not 100% on it, you end up delivering the job without a PO to show for it. Sometimes, even when you kindly ask your client to send you the PO at his/her earliest convenience, they don’t do it promptly, then a few more days go by and — again — if you’re not on top of things, you may just end up forgetting yourself, because you have other, more pressing things to do. And when, weeks later, you go back to that item, you discover you have forgotten all the specifics about the job, the PO, your request for it etc. and you have to trace your steps and go back to the beginning. In the worst case scenario, you sometimes have to chase a PO for weeks, spending precious time doing something that should have been automated to begin with.
There was a time when Purchase Orders were sent out together with the job assignment they referred to. Mostly this is still the case, but in my experience, when there is no clear PO system at the clients’ end, or when there is no clear distinction between the PM and the person in charge of issuing POs, things can very easily get lost in the cracks. And when that happens, patience, accuracy and quiet obstinacy on your part are usually the only remedy.
