help me set up message forms for multiple customers

with the answering service I am using excel which has the messages forms for
each customer set up on individual worksheets. Looking for any easy way of
taking messages, faxing messages and tracking messages that anyone might
have. Sorry I am not familiar with access but do know excel somewhat.

Access would be a great way to go, unless you find a commercial product that
does what you need. The advantage of using Access is that you could
customize it to do just what you want. The disadvantage is that you will
either have to spend some time learning it or pay someone to set it up for
you.
-John Welch


"abc answering service"
wrote in message ...
with the answering service I am using excel which has the messages forms
for
each customer set up on individual worksheets. Looking for any easy way
of
taking messages, faxing messages and tracking messages that anyone might
have. Sorry I am not familiar with access but do know excel somewhat.

Access is a good choice to handle the data you describe. but this forum is
not appropriate to teach you how to build an entire database - even if you
did have some familiarity with Access AND relational design principles.

if you want to learn to build a database in Access, be prepared to invest a
significant amount of time and effort in the process. before you even begin
using the software, you need to learn the principles of data modeling. see
http://home.att.net/~california.db/tips.html, focusing first on tips #1 and
#2, in that order. these newsgroups will be an excellent resource when you
have specific questions/problems as you develop your database.

hth


"abc answering service"
wrote in message ...
with the answering service I am using excel which has the messages forms
for
each customer set up on individual worksheets. Looking for any easy way
of
taking messages, faxing messages and tracking messages that anyone might
have. Sorry I am not familiar with access but do know excel somewhat.

"abc answering service"
wrote in message
...
with the answering service I am using excel which has the messages
forms for
each customer set up on individual worksheets. Looking for any
easy way of
taking messages, faxing messages and tracking messages that anyone
might
have. Sorry I am not familiar with access but do know excel
somewhat.

abc answering service,

Employees
EmployeeID INTEGER -- PK
FName TEXT(48)
LName TEXT(48)

Customers
CustomerID INTEGER -- PK
FName TEXT(48)
LName TEXT(48)

ContactTypes
ContactTypeID INTEGER -- PK
ContactType TEXT(48)

Note: ContactType may equal e-mail, phone, fax, mail, etc.

Contacts
ContactID INTEGER -- PK
ContactTypeID INTEGER -- FK ContactTypes
EmployeeID INTEGER -- FK Employees
ContactDirection CHAR(1)
ContactStart DATETIME
ContactEnd DATETIME

Note: ContactDirection would be "I" for inbound contacts, and "O"
for outbound messages.

Note: EmployeeID may well be entered automatically based upon who is
currently logged into the MS Access application (its selection
should not be manual).

ContactCustomers
ContactCustomerID INTEGER -- PK
ContactID INTEGER -- FK Contacts
CustomerID INTEGER -- FK Customers

Note: ContactCustomers exists because conference calls or
multi-signature letters may constitute simultaneous contact by
multiple customers, and some contacts will have no identifiable
customer, and so there cannot be a CustomerID column in Contacts.

Messages
MessageID INTEGER -- PK
ContactID INTEGER -- FK Contacts
MessageDate DATETIME -- *
MessageNotes TEXT(255) or MEMO

* A Composite Unique Index with ContactID

Note: MessageDate is the system date and time when the message is
saved. This allows for multiple messages

Note: EmployeeID is the person taking or sending the message.

MessageFor
MessageForID INTEGER -- PK
MessageID INTEGER -- FK Messages
EmployeeID INTEGER -- FK Employees


Hmm, the MessageFor table is not quite right. Some messages are for
employees, and some are for customers. You can't have both columns
in the same table and have one column of each be empty in each row
(because of the foreign keys). I'm going to bed shortly, so I'll
leave this one as "an execise for the student".


Well, those are some basics that can be built upon, and I hope they
may be of assitance.


Sincerely,

Chris O.