Written by DROPS.ST.
Compare suppliers using confirmed quantities, agreed dates and checked receipts over a stated period. Show the number of deliveries behind each result. One successful delivery and a long record of mixed results should not look equally conclusive.
DROPS gives you the sales-side context for this review. Product references and stock belong to the catalogue, while customer-linked orders retain the items buyers selected. Your team can identify which shop commitments need attention when a supplier pattern becomes unreliable.
Keep supplier scores in the approved purchasing process; DROPS sales-order records do not establish native supplier performance reporting or procurement software.
Define the comparison before calculating
Choose a period and compare similar product groups, delivery arrangements and quantity units. Record the supplier confirmation that established what was due and when.
Keep requested-but-unconfirmed goods separate from confirmed commitments. Otherwise, a supplier can appear to miss a promise it never made, or an unconfirmed request can disappear from the review entirely.
Include late and incomplete receipts rather than selecting only the finished deliveries. Mark unresolved records so the figures do not appear more complete than the evidence.
BDC’s inventory guidance recommends selecting performance measures that suit the business, including service-level measures. The scorecard below is an original supplier-review worksheet, not a standard BDC rating. BDC: inventory performance measures.
Use three measures with clear denominators
| Measure | Original worksheet calculation | Keep alongside it |
|---|---|---|
| On-time quantity fulfilment | Units received by agreed date ÷ units confirmed due × 100 | Unit definition and period |
| On-time complete deliveries | Deliveries complete by agreed date ÷ deliveries due × 100 | Number of deliveries due |
| Unresolved exceptions | Count still needing a decision | Reason, owner and next review |
Calculate quantity fulfilment within comparable item groups. Combining one case, one device and one differently measured product as “three units” would obscure the result.
For each line, cap fulfilled units at its confirmed quantity. Extra units of one item should not conceal a shortage of another.
Define “complete” before the review. Physical arrival and completion of the required receiving checks may be different events.
Avoid one composite score until you can explain its weights. A fast response does not cancel out an incomplete receipt simply because both earned points.
Hypothetical example: the better percentage has less evidence
Over a fictional review period, supplier A has eight deliveries due. Six arrive complete on time: 6 ÷ 8 × 100 = 75%.
Supplier B has two deliveries due, both complete on time: 2 ÷ 2 × 100 = 100%.
Supplier B has the higher observed percentage, but only two deliveries support it. That does not prove it will outperform A across the same future workload.
For one comparable item group, A also delivers 100 of 120 confirmed units by their agreed dates: 83.3%. That reveals a quantity issue the delivery count alone cannot explain.
The reviewer examines the two missed deliveries and their explanations before making a purchasing decision. No figure in this example is a market benchmark or real supplier result.
Separate evidence from explanations
Retain the confirmation, checked receipt and agreed date for each exception. Record the supplier’s explanation as an explanation, not as independently verified cause.
Distinguish a revised date agreed beforehand from a date changed after it was missed. Preserve the original record so the review remains understandable.
Also examine your own handoff. An unclear unit, incorrect destination or late approval may contribute to an exception. A scorecard is useful when it leads to a specific correction, not just a blame label.
End the review with a decision
Choose an action that matches the evidence: clarify the confirmation process, obtain a revised service arrangement, collect more comparable results or review the purchasing plan through the authorised process.
Record the action owner and next review date. Keep a small sample provisional rather than disguising it behind a confident ranking.
Where the pattern affects current shop stock, reconcile the approved source before changing the menu. The menu accuracy guide helps keep that correction separate from the supplier assessment.
Review the shop impact with DROPS
Choose DROPS when you want clear product references and customer-linked order items to support decisions about the shop commitments affected by supplier performance. Its common website and connected Telegram order system keeps those sales-side selections organised.
Explore DROPS and open the demo shops. Bring a fictional supplier exception and inspect the product and order context your team would review. Keep the supplier scorecard in its approved process, then use the shop records to make the customer-side response specific.