Always match the customer’s original embroidery order to the packing slip as you open up the boxes of blank goods. These blank goods can be dropped off by the customer or be sent to you by the distributor.
If you are a contract embroiderer, your customer should have sent you his order before you received the goods from the distributor or manufacturer.
Sometimes the customer will drop off his order and garments at the same time. As a general rule, they never look at the packing slip or check it before they deliver the order to you. They just assume that what they have received from the manufacturer or distributor is correct.
Many times the original orders will not match the packing slip. If there is a discrepancy in the amounts, sizes, or colors, you must find out exactly what you have before you call the distributor or your customer.
If the garments are packed in plastic bags, remove the bags and check the sizes. The size tag on the outside package is not always the size that is marked on the garment. This is the first thing to check.
Lay out all of your garments in stacks by sizes and then count each size. Make a list of each size with the amounts. If the colors are not correct, list the colors with each size and the amount.
Now you can call the distributor or the customer and let them know exactly what you have and what the order states that you should have. I have found, being a contract embroiderer, that my customer will often substitute a color, size, or style if the distributor was out of a particular item and forget to write it on the order.
Distributors will often substitute a size with a different one and neglect to include this on the packing slip. The person responsible for picking the order may pick up another size and add it to the order instead of letting you know that you are short that one size.
The number one rule here is to make sure that your order matches the packing slip, or find out why it does not, before you do any type of production on your product. Once an item is embroidered, you cannot exchange or replace it.
Do you have problems with customer orders not being correct?
Joyce Jagger
The Embroidery Coach