New customer portal: transparent and efficient collaboration

The new Waelzholz customer portal creates added value through transparency in completing business processes and gives customers access to information around the clock. In a future stage of development, it will be expanded into an interactive platform. This will enable transparent and efficient collaboration. With the introduction of the portal, Waelzholz is proving itself a digital pioneer in the cold rolling industry.

“We have developed our customer portal to be a flexible and customized solution that takes the individual needs of our customers into account,” explains Pascal Erlmann, Vice President Sales at the Hagen site in Germany and project manager on the sales side. “This is crucial because our customer base is extremely diverse, with different customers themselves at different stages of digitalization.” The aim is to offer customers tailor-made solutions and efficiently support their work processes.

The new portal provides our customers with transparent access to relevant information and documents online around the clock, from anywhere in the world. Comprehensive inventory and product information is currently available, and customers can also access documents such as delivery notes, mill certificates, and invoices at any time. This permanent availability offers real added value for Waelzholz customers and makes their work easier.

An upgrade is already planned, as Erlmann explains: “The next step will be to develop the customer portal into an interactive platform. In doing so, our aim is to enable our customers to go beyond simply accessing information and instead to interact directly with us in the future, for example to place orders, schedule deliveries, or make changes to orders. And to do it all with minimal effort.” Data can be imported into customer systems via individual system settings, saving valuable time that would otherwise be spent on the sometimes complex task of gathering and transferring information. Existing EDI connections between Waelzholz systems and customers will remain unchanged.

One of the main goals of this digital rollout is to strengthen our business relationship with our customers. At the same time, it means greater efficiency for both sides. Customers have round-the-clock access to the data they need and can carry out administrative tasks digitally at any time. By freeing up resources, Waelzholz employees gain more time for strategic and advisory tasks. Andreas Reil, Senior Vice President Global Sales at Waelzholz in Hagen, Germany, explains what this means in concrete terms for the cooperation with customers: "In this way, we aim to strengthen our position as a reliable partner and work closely with our customers to develop innovative and effective solutions for the future. We view the customer portal as an opportunity to further enhance our level of service in order to respond optimally to our customers’ requirements. But even though we are increasingly relying on digital processes, personal customer contact remains a central component of our value proposition.”