Winsupply, Johnstone, CED, Hajoca: Why Your Accounts at the Same Brand Don't Talk to Each Other (and What That Means at Month End)

You opened a Winnelson account. Then you bought at the Winnelson two towns over and they wanted a credit app. The CED across town couldn't see your CED account. Two Johnstone statements showed up with two different company names. None of that is a mistake — it's how those houses are built, and it changes your month end.

Three ways a brand can be more than one company

• Locally owned locations. Every Winsupply location (Winnelson, Winlectric, Winair, Winwater) is a separately owned company with a local president who owns a stake. Johnstone is a cooperative: stores share the brand and catalog, but each store group is independently owned. The local company's name is what prints on the ticket, and the account is theirs alone.
• Decentralized branches. CED, City Electric, and Hajoca are single companies, but each location runs its own customers, credit, and statement. Hajoca locations often keep the local trade name they had before joining — Hughes, Moore — so the ticket may not even say Hajoca.
• One parent, several operating brands. Rexel (Gexpro, Platt, Mayer), Sonepar (Northeast Electrical and others), Watsco (Carrier Enterprise, Gemaire, Homans). Each brand is one account system; the parent is invisible to you unless you buy from two of its brands, in which case those are separate accounts.

What it means for your paperwork

• One supplier per location in your books, however many share the sign. Give each its own vendor record and account number.
• Set up job references and authorized buyers at each one. The job account you set up at the Dayton Winnelson doesn't exist at the Springfield Winnelson.
• Expect one statement per location,and reconcile each on its own. Don't net one location's credit memo against another's balance — they can't see each other either.
• Returns go back where they came from.A ticket from one branch generally can't be credited at another.

The upside nobody mentions

The person who can fix your problem owns the store or runs the branch. A mis-keyed account, a return that never became a credit memo, a price that didn't match the quote — walk in with the invoice number and it tends to get handled that day, by someone with the authority to handle it. That's the trade-off, and for a lot of subs it's a good one.