Buying new dispatch furniture or radiology furniture can be stressful. After making the big decision on which furniture manufacturer will work best for you, it might feel like you are only halfway done. That's because you are. Hopefully, you have picked a company with a strong and experienced team which can help make the delivery and installation go seamlessly. There is probably a lot of pressure to get the new furniture delivered, installed and functioning without disruption or costly mistakes. This blog will walk you through some order completion details that can help ensure a smooth arrival and delivery of your new furniture.

Your next big step you will take is to make sure that the furniture delivery and installation goes smoothly. This all starts with important and necessary post-order documents that must be completed prior to the shipment of your furniture purchase. There are various questions need to be clarified in finalizing and shipping your order. These last few steps of completing your purchase are where you really need to pay attention to detail. This attention to detail now, will save your skin later and ensure a smooth delivery and installation of your new furniture. 

Purchase Orders
It all starts with the purchase order, it is very important to have your Purchase Orders or Letter of Intent signed. Sometimes, this initial step can be overlooked and could cause a costly delay in processing your order. This step of the purchasing process is where an administrator or purchaser signs off in agreement to the final furniture cost quote. This document is basically a contract between the buyer and seller. Without proper sign-off, the purchase order or "agreement" is not valid for either the buyer or the seller, and it slows down the timing of the project.

Customer Profile
The next step is commonly referred to as the Customer Profile. This document contains all the information about the project on one document. Prior to your order leaving the manufacturing facility, all the information must be gathered on the specifics of your project. To minimize delays a customer profile document is typically provided to the buyer which will walk through all of the information needed to keep your project moving on schedule. Some sample questions usually included in a customer profile document are:

1. What are the correct shipping and billing address?  Often times these are separate addresses. 
2. Are the correct contacts listed? Is all of their information correct? Who will be on the job site?
3. Is there a loading dock available?
4. Will there be any additional equipment available? (do you have a forklift available?)
5. In what location of the building will the installation take place? (ground floor, 1^st or 2^nd floor? Is an elevator available?)
6. Is there any security clearances that are required?

All questions and concerns should be addressed at this time, and the document must be signed to acknowledge that both the purchaser and seller understood and agree with all terms. This should be a two way document that is fair to both parties.

Delivery and Staging
Next, make sure that you understand the delivery and unloading procedures for your project. Depending on the size of the project, often times, the furniture will be shipped on a full sized truck (52 feet). This will require a considerable amount of space for parking and unloading. Some circumstances will call for parking spaces blocked off, half of a street to be blocked off, or sometimes an entire alley will have to be closed. This requires some planning and forethought from the buyer to determine how much space is needed for the unloading of product. To unload a full truck it will take about half a day. Once the truck is unloaded, the furniture pieces are usually moved into a staging area.  Often times pallets will need to be spread throughout the parking lot or other staging area to organize the material. This process does take a considerable amount of time, but will help the installation process go more smoothly later.

While not every seller or manufacturer will have the same post purchase requirements or procedures, the purpose of this blog post is to remind everyone how attention to details in the post purchase process can be can prevent delay and headache later. And while this can be a stressful time for everyone, it doesn't have to be. The more thorough and detailed you can be, the more seamless your furniture delivery and installation will be.