Step 1.2 — Sales Introduction Email
Phase: Phase 1 — New Shipper Onboarding Owner: Sales (composition and send) with Accounting CC’d as passive observer Trigger: Accounting has received and validated the Shipper Onboarding Intake Form from Sales (Step 1.1 complete).
🎯 Ideal State
Immediately after Accounting confirms the intake form is complete, Sales sends an introduction email directly to the Shipper’s billing/AP contact — not the primary Sales contact.
Element Value From Assigned Sales rep’s individual Forza email To Shipper’s billing/AP contact (from intake form) CC accounting@forzalogisticsgroup.comEmail content: Standardized template in Microsoft-365-Outlook (Outlook template or SharePoint playbook). The template:
- Introduces Accounting as the person handling billing setup
- Explains next steps will come from Accounting directly
- References Sales rep as the primary ongoing relationship
- Notes that the Shipper will receive a call from HaulPay (562 area code) for billing detail confirmation, plus an NOA email from Accounting
- States expected timeline
Why direct to billing contact: If the intro goes to the Shipper’s Sales contact asking them to “forward to billing,” it adds a hop that frequently dies. The billing department has no relationship with Forza at this point and no urgency. This also gives the billing contact context before HaulPay’s 562 area code call — without context, that call can feel like spam.
🤖 SYSTEM AUTOMATION
Template-driven but human-sent. Merge fields (Shipper name, billing contact name, Sales rep signature) keep composition fast and content consistent regardless of which Sales rep sends it.
🛑 HARD GATE
This email is sent before HaulPay’s credit check process is initiated and before any NOA outreach begins. Gives the Shipper’s billing contact context for all subsequent outreach.
📍 Current State
- No standardized intro email template exists.
- Inconsistency across Sales reps: some send an intro to the billing contact, some send it to the Sales contact asking them to forward, some skip it entirely, some only loop in billing when the NOA is sent.
- Because no structured handoff (Step 1.1) exists today, Sales often doesn’t have the billing contact’s information when the intro email would be sent.
- HaulPay’s 562 area code call to the Shipper sometimes happens before any Forza-led billing introduction — creating confusion for the Shipper.
Who does this today: Sales — inconsistently.
🚧 Gap
- No standard email template for the billing intro.
- No standard trigger or timing for when the intro is sent.
- Missing a consistent warm handoff to the Shipper’s billing function before HaulPay outreach begins.
- No tracking mechanism to confirm the intro email was actually sent.
🛠️ Gap Closure Actions
- Action 1 — Draft and approve a standardized Sales → Billing Introduction email template for Microsoft-365-Outlook (Owner: Casey + Sales + Accounting | Dependency: Step 1.1 intake form built so billing contact is reliably captured | Effort: Low)
- Action 2 — Document the trigger and timing: intro email sent within 1 business day of Accounting confirming intake form receipt (Owner: Casey + Sales | Dependency: Template complete | Effort: Low)
- Action 3 — Add a confirmation checkbox or field in the onboarding tracking mechanism so Accounting can verify the intro was sent before proceeding to HaulPay credit check (Owner: Casey + Accounting | Dependency: Tracking mechanism built | Effort: Low)
- Action 4 — Train Sales on the template and timing (Owner: Casey + VP of Sales | Dependency: Template and SOP complete | Effort: Low)
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