Customer Types & Corporate Hierarchy
Classify customers by Type (Individual, Company, Government, Non-profit) and link branches to head-office parents, so corporate hierarchies are modelled properly instead of buried in near-duplicate records.
- Parent-branch relationships, modelled properly
Link branches to a head-office parent. Every customer shows its ancestors breadcrumb and a Branches tab. No more guessing who owns who.
- Type every account correctly
Individual, Company, Government, Non-profit: a Type field surfaces on every list and drives reporting, tax, and compliance logic downstream.
- Cycle guard on hierarchies
Try to make a customer its own parent and the system stops you at the write path: no silent corruption, a clear validation error instead.
- Time-limited group memberships
Assign a group with an expiry date and the membership drops off on schedule, perfect for promo cohorts, trials, and campaign segments.
What it does
Adds two structural dimensions to every customer record: a Type (Individual, Company, Government, Non-profit) for classifying what kind of entity you're dealing with, and a Parent customer link so related accounts can be grouped into a corporate hierarchy. It also extends customer group memberships with an optional expiry date, so time-limited segments (promo recipients, trial cohorts) drop off automatically. For status, credit hold, archive, and permanent delete see Customer Lifecycle.
What it replaces
Without type classification, reporting on "how much government business did we do last quarter" means exporting to a spreadsheet and tagging rows by hand. Without hierarchy, multi-branch customers end up as either one record (hiding branch-level detail) or a pile of near-duplicates (making roll-up reporting impossible). And without group expiry, temporary segments linger until someone remembers to clean them up manually.
Who it's for
- B2B distributors and wholesalers serving chains, franchises, or multi-site customers where each branch orders independently but bills centrally.
- Companies selling to mixed segments (consumers, businesses, government departments, non-profits) where reporting and compliance depend on knowing which is which.
- Sales teams running time-limited promotions where a customer should enjoy group pricing until a specific date and then automatically fall off.
- Anyone with parent/child account structures: holding companies, group buying cooperatives, head-office/branch retailers.
What problems it solves
- "Head office pays, but each branch orders separately." Link each branch to the parent customer. The show page renders an ancestors breadcrumb and a Branches tab listing every child account.
- "Is that account a company or a government department?" The Type field surfaces the distinction on every list and detail view, and drives future reporting, tax, and compliance logic.
- "We can't accidentally make a customer its own parent, right?" A cycle guard catches circular hierarchies at the write path: assigning a descendant as an ancestor returns a clear validation error rather than silently corrupting the tree.
- "We gave this customer our Winter Promo pricing but forgot to remove them in March." Set an expiry date when you assign a group. The membership drops off automatically, and the pill renders in a muted strike-through style so it's obvious the promo has ended.
- "Can we filter to just head-office accounts, or just branches?" The filter has a three-state Hierarchy toggle (Any / Roots only / Branches only) plus a Parent-is picker to scope the index to a specific parent's direct children.