Winning the repeat order for rubber parts after the first lot is accepted

The first lot passed incoming inspection and the payment came on time. Then nothing, until you hear the plant bought its next seals from a trader in a hurry. An approved rubber part is re-ordered on the buyer's clock: when stock runs down, when a lot ages past the store's limit, or when a shutdown needs spares. Win the repeat by knowing that clock as well as the buyer does. Work out when each part will be needed, call before that date with something useful, and never change what was approved without telling the buyer.

Why the second order is not yours to schedule

Once your part is accepted, it becomes a part number on the buyer's system with your name against it. The stores in-charge raises an indent when stock falls to the reorder level, the indent goes to purchase, and purchase sends a PO to the approved vendor.

That works until an indent is urgent, the purchase officer is new and your number is not the first one found. A trader with a near size on the shelf answers in ten minutes and gets the order "for now".

Rubber adds a second clock that a machined part does not have. A rubber part ages in storage, faster in heat and light, and many plants limit how long a lot may sit after its cure date. Past that limit it is scrapped or held for checks, even if nobody used a piece. So a large first lot can end as scrap with your name on the packet.

Work out the part clock

At the first delivery, or soon after acceptance, ask the stores in-charge and the quality engineer three questions. How many does the plant use in a month? Where is the stock held, in main stores or beside the line? Does their quality team set an age limit for this compound, and what is it?

Each accepted part then gets a date. The next order is due at whichever comes first: the day the buyer's stock falls to your lead time, or the day the oldest pieces near the age limit. Use your honest lead time, from mixing the compound to the truck.

The figures below are illustrative.

In the valve seat row the age limit arrives long before the stock runs out. The lot size was wrong, not the customer.

Call before the date with something the buyer can use

"Any requirement, sir?" gives the stores in-charge nothing to act on. A call on the part clock date carries a fact.

• Their stock, as you estimate it: "By our count the DV-50 you hold covers about five more weeks. Shall we plan the next lot to reach you before then?"
• The age of the oldest pieces, with an offer of smaller lots more often if the age limit is the one that binds.
• A raw material price change before it reaches an invoice. A revised rate heard from you first is one the buyer can take to the boss.
• Sister parts on the same assembly. The valve that takes your diaphragm also takes O-rings and a body gasket. A compound their QA has already approved is the shortest route to a second part number, which is the work of upselling and cross-selling.

Never change what was approved without telling the buyer

The approval covered a part made from one compound, in one mould, by one process. Between orders the temptations arrive: a cheaper polymer source, a new mixing house, a worn cavity repaired by welding. The part may pass hardness and dimensions, then swell in the buyer's oil.

The rule is short. Any change to the compound, its source, the mould or the cure goes to the buyer's quality engineer in writing before the lot ships. Send your test results with it, and wait for the reply. A moulder who reports a change gives the buyer a decision to make. One found out by a failure in the field gives the buyer a reason to leave.

Imagine: a Vasai moulder and a valve maker in Ambernath

Imagine a compression moulding unit in Vasai East making NBR diaphragms for a control-valve maker in Ambernath MIDC. The details are illustrative.

The first order was for 3,000 diaphragms, because the purchase officer wanted the rate a big lot brings. The lot passed. The moulder took eight months of silence as good news. Then the valve maker's QA found the last 900 pieces past their age limit for nitrile and scrapped them. The line needed diaphragms that week, and a new purchase officer bought a near size from a trader.

The stores in-charge told the owner all this when the owner finally rang. The owner asked for half an hour with purchase and QA together and brought a part clock, not an apology: lots of 1,000, at a piece rate about 6 per cent higher, shown beside the old one. The cure quarter printed on every packet. A call whenever stock fell to about six weeks' use. And a quote for the O-rings on the same valve body, in a nitrile QA had already approved. QA preferred its approved diaphragm to the trader's near size, and the next indent came back to Vasai.

When the clock is the wrong tool

Skip it where the buyer releases schedules against a rate contract; see running schedules for moulded parts.

A clock will not rescue a first lot that went late or was rejected. Mend that first, as in getting the first repeat order from a new industrial customer. A buyer who re-quotes every order on price is unlikely to be moved by a well-timed call, so quote when asked and spend your calls on plants that buy by part number. See also rubber products.

Fill in the clock for three parts

Pick the three accepted parts you most want repeated. Fill in the part clock for each, and ask the stores in-charge for the numbers you lack. A call date that has passed with no indent marks a part for customer reactivation. To set up the clock across your approved parts, tell us what you need.