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Dynamics 365 Community / Forums / Microsoft Dynamics CRM (Archived) / Sub-Accounts versus Re...
Microsoft Dynamics CRM (Archived)

Sub-Accounts versus Relationships

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Posted on by Martin Kurpiel 35

Situation:  My organization has an agency as a customer that is entered in CRM as a customer.  The agency has customers that my organization provides services for, these customers are also in CRM as a customer.

Question:  What is the best practice for relating the agency's customers to the agency in CRM; Sub-Accounts, Relationships, or some other method?

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  • alf Profile Picture
    alf 17,915 on at

    Hi Martin,

    The best approach will be the one that best models the relationships that will benefit your business needs.  Here are some thoughts.

     A.  Using sub accounts.  One of the main advantage is that you can open a top account and see the 'Roll-up' of all activities for the related entities:accounts/contacts/sales orders/etc.  It is also a very quick to setup.  One disadvantage is that an account can only have one parent and vice verse.  Working with parent and child accounts is also a little easier for reporting purposes.

    B.  Using Relationships.  The main advantage is that you can track more items such as 'former customer'.  You can also designate an account to be a 'customer' of more than 1 account.  Some of the disadvantages is that it takes a couple more clicks to setup and depending on the reports you are writing or going to write it can be just a bit more complex - but still easily doable.

    Both of the above methods works, and the toughest part is often chose the best approach to model.

     

     

  • Leon Tribe Profile Picture
    Leon Tribe 7,034 on at

    Assuming you are referring to the Account/Contact/Opportunity relationships, another option would be to set up a new 1:N relationship between account and opportunity. This would allow you to add a new lookup on the opportunity specifically for the agency involved.

     Leon Tribe
    Want to hear me talk about all things CRM? Check out my blog
    http://leontribe.blogspot.com/ 
    or hear me tweet @leontribe

  • Ry Profile Picture
    Ry 100 on at

     Hi Alex.

    Re: "you can open a top account and see the 'Roll-up' of all activities for the related entities:accounts/contacts/sales orders/etc."

     I'm hoping for this to be true, but I'm not seeing it.  Is there a step I need to take to make sure the roll-up happens?

     Thanks!

  • Leon Tribe Profile Picture
    Leon Tribe 7,034 on at

    It is true for default entities but will not work for new entities and new relationships.

    Leon Tribe

    Want to hear me talk about all things CRM? Check out my blog

    http://leontribe.blogspot.com/ 
    or hear me tweet @leontribe

  • Ry Profile Picture
    Ry 100 on at

    Thanks for the reply.

    This is for your basic activities/contacts/accounts.  It looks like a rollup of Activity information is good for one level.  So, if you set the ‘Regarding’ field at the Contact level, it will be visible when viewing that contact or its associated Account.  If you set ‘Regarding’ to an Account, it will be viewable at that Account level, and the level of the Parent Account. 

     Is it expected behavior, or should the rollup be visible all the up the chain?

  • Leon Tribe Profile Picture
    Leon Tribe 7,034 on at

    I haven't personally tested it but I'm sure I've read in another forum thread that it rolls up one level only so I believe this is expected, albeit unintuitive, behaviour.

    Leon Tribe

    Want to hear me talk about all things CRM? Check out my blog

    http://leontribe.blogspot.com/ 
    or hear me tweet @leontribe

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