AI staff for small manufacturers with a busy sales office
The machines are rarely what holds a small manufacturer up. It is the request for quotation nobody has costed, the purchase order waiting to be keyed, the supplier certificate that lapsed in the spring. AI staff can draft the quote, key the order and chase the certificate in the systems you already run. Your people price, approve and sign off.
Why does the office run behind the shop floor?
Requests for quotation
A drawing and a quantity arrive by email. The estimator costs the material, the machine time and any subcontract finishing, asks the production planner for a lead time and types up the quote. In a busy week the enquiry waits its turn, and a buyer who asked three suppliers hears from the other two first.
Order entry and acknowledgements
Customer purchase orders arrive as PDFs. A sales administrator checks each against the quote, keys it into Sage 200, Epicor or MRPeasy and sends the acknowledgement, and the planner raises the works order. A price, a drawing revision or a delivery date that differs from the quote is easy to miss and surfaces at despatch.
Supplier invoices and matching
Purchasing raises the order, goods inwards books the delivery, and a purchase ledger clerk matches the supplier's invoice to both before it is paid. A short delivery, a price change or a missing goods received note stops the match, and the query sits in an inbox until the supplier puts the account on stop.
Certificates, calibration and approved suppliers
The quality manager keeps the approved supplier list, supplier certificates, the certificates of conformity with each batch and the calibration date of every gauge. An ISO 9001 auditor asks to see the calibration records and how suppliers are controlled. It lives in spreadsheets, and the lapsed one is found at the audit.
Roles for Manufacturing
Quote and proposal preparation
Reads the request for quotation, pulls material prices, similar routings and past quotes from your system, and drafts the quote. Your estimator checks the costing, sets the price and lead time, and sends it.
Order processing
Reads each customer purchase order, checks it against the quote and keys it into your order system with a draft acknowledgement. Any difference in price, revision or delivery date goes to the sales office.
Purchase invoice processing
Matches material and subcontract invoices to the order and goods received note, codes each to its works order and queues it. Short deliveries and price rises go to purchasing; a person approves every payment.
Supplier onboarding
Sends the new supplier questionnaire, collects the ISO 9001 certificate, insurance and bank details, and chases what is missing. Your quality manager decides who goes on the approved supplier list.
It drafts.
You approve.
We manage.
You don’t need a complex new platform. Your AI worker operates inside your existing tools under human supervision.
Human-in-the-loop
High-impact actions (sending emails, updating compliance records) wait for explicit human approval before execution.
A full audit trail
Every action is logged with who approved it, and we go through it with you each month.
Nothing to maintain
If a workflow breaks or a system changes, we fix it. Keeping it running is our job.
UK-hosted and kept separate
Your data is stored in the UK, and is never used to train AI models.
Questions owners ask
Can an AI agent price a job from a drawing?
No, and we would not ask it to. It gathers what the estimator needs: the material price, the routing of a similar part, the last quote to that customer and the questions the drawing leaves open. Your estimator judges the job, sets the price and the lead time, and sends the quote.
Will it work with Sage 200, Business Central or MRPeasy?
Sage 200, Business Central and MRPeasy each publish a way for other software to connect; MRPeasy offers it on one plan only. For Epicor the route is confirmed with you and Epicor for your version and licence. An agent connects the way each maker allows, and if yours has no way in you hear that before you commit.
Who signs off a certificate of conformity or a supplier approval?
Your quality manager, as now. An agent can file a supplier's certificate, read its expiry date, tell you when it has lapsed and ask for the new one. It does not judge whether a batch conforms, release anything to a customer, or add a supplier to the approved list.
We already have an MRP system. What is left to do?
The work between the inbox and the system. An MRP system plans what has been keyed into it. Someone still reads the drawing, keys the purchase order, matches the invoice and chases the calibration certificate. An AI worker can take on that work, inside the system you already have.