Pandemic to-do list for suppliers, distributors and customers

To better cope with the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, experienced suppliers and distributors advise their colleagues and customers to follow some basic recommendations and procedures. These include:

• Use personal protective equipment (PPE), social distancing, reduced staffing levels, body temperature checks, and enhancing cleaning and disinfecting procedures;
• Follow the rules and recommendations of local healthcare authorities for safely responding to COVID-19;
• Investigate, anticipate and manage risks to the supply chain, and establish a plan to gauge impacts, balance cash flow, and determine what's is needed for operations to continue;
• Build up added inventory or a safety stock of crucial items that are more likely to run low;
• Seek new backup sources for suppliers and networks that are more likely to be disrupted;
• Add more lead time to procurement, shipping and logistics processes to offset new delays;
• Investigate flexible financing and deferred payment options with trusted suppliers;
• Increase networking bandwidth and cybersecurity capabilities for remote workers;
• Learn to us online conferencing tools like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, GoToMeeting and others;
• Maintain an easy-to-use website and add functions for customers and remote staff;
• Enlist trusted partners to operate an integrated supply chain solution, and source products on your behalf;
• Research and employ online forecasting, analysis and procurement services like Z2A, Ariba and others to keep track of markets and proactively organize inventories; and
• Explore application programming interfaces (API) for automating system-to-system price checking, ordering and shipping.