Customer quote

From "can I get pricing?" to a signed PDF in fifteen minutes

The customer quote workflow is the most-run flow on the platform. Customers email or call asking for pricing on assemblies, often by their own internal SKU. The AI gathers context (who they are, what they typically buy, current cost basis, AR status), proposes line-by-line pricing, Mike reviews, the system renders an HTML artifact + PDF, and the email goes out.

The contract is stored in workflow_definitions WHERE workflow_type='draft_quote' — risk level 2 (low-med), expected duration 15 minutes, three HITL gates at steps 1, 2, and 4.

The defining property: nothing about pricing is invented. Every line traces to pricing_master, assembly_cost_rollup, or an explicit override that Mike typed into chat. The AI narrates; the database decides.

Trigger conditions

• Customer emails quotes@ or orders@ asking for pricing on an assembly.
• Sales call wraps up and Mike needs to send a follow-up quote.
• RFP comes in via the intake page (Dropbox or upload) and needs a structured response.
• Existing customer wants pricing on a new pack/format of an item they already buy.
• Mike wants to test a price point before formalizing it into the pricing_master.

Customer Z requests pricing on assembly A123

The five beats

1. 01

   Gather context (auto)

   The get_customer_360 chat tool pulls the customer record from the D1 mirror, the trailing-90-day order history, current AR aging buckets, and any flags from customer_health_scores. This becomes the prompt context for the line-builder.

   Reads customers, so_lines, customer_health_scores, ar_aging

   Time ~600ms
2. 02

   Build lines (HITL)

   propose_quote looks up each assembly's cost in assembly_cost_rollup, applies the customer's negotiated margin band (or the platform default if none), and writes draft rows to quote_lines with status='draft'. A proposed_action row lands in Mike's queue.

   Writes quotes, quote_lines (draft), proposed_actions

   HITL step 1
3. 03

   Approve lines (HITL)

   Mike taps Approve in /proposed-actions.html. The quote rows flip to status='approved' and the atomic claim (R560 pattern) prevents double-approval. Mike can edit individual lines before approving — those edits write back to the same quote_lines rows.

   Writes quote_lines.status='approved'

   Time Mike approves within 5–30 min typically
4. 04

   Render PDF (auto)

   render_quote_pdf generates the HTML artifact (Pages Function at /quote/) and converts to PDF via Browser Rendering. Both land in R2 under quotes//. The HTML link is what gets put in the email body.

   Writes R2 quotes/

   Time ~4–8s
5. 05

   Send to customer (HITL)

   A draft email row in outbound_email_log with status='pending_review'. Mike skims, taps Send, the email goes out via Email Routing. Event quote.sent is appended to the events ledger. The customer-facing tracked link is logged for open/click tracking.

   Writes outbound_email_log, events

   HITL step 4 (send)

What's different after the workflow runs

• A row in quotes with status sent and a link to the HTML artifact at /quote/.
• Per-line audit trail in quote_lines tying back to pricing_master and assembly_cost_rollup.
• An outbound email row with status='sent', message ID, and tracked open/click links.
• An event quote.sent in the events ledger so customer health + sales velocity watchers see it.
• Mike's chat history retains the full transcript for next-time recall.

What can go wrong and how to recover

Adjacent workflows + diagrams

Code paths + invariants