Client and Supplier Portal

Comtec is a translations company that needed a proper home for client work. Their customers wanted to log in, raise job requests, and then see where those projects sat in the process once the work was agreed.

Translation jobs are not simple tickets. They move through quoting, production, client review and delivery, often across several languages, with files, people and deadlines attached. A generic project tool would have forced Comtec to work around the software instead of through it.

They already had systems in place. The new portal had to connect to what they used today, not replace everything overnight. That meant sitting with the team, mapping the real process, and being honest about what we needed from their current stack before a line of interface was designed.

Once clients could see their work, the same gap appeared for suppliers. Comtec also needed a way for the people doing the translation to work inside the same world, and later a way to handle invoices, purchase orders and subcontractor finances without another disconnected tool.

We designed and built a client and staff portal around Comtec’s actual workflow. Clients can raise jobs, follow progress and keep files and people in one place, with a dashboard that shows tasks, status and timelines rather than a flat list of tickets.

The interface follows the job: quotes, projects, files and people. Project views use timelines and status so it is obvious what is live, not started, in progress or complete, including language-by-language progress through production, review and delivery.

After the client portal launched we built a dedicated supplier portal so the wider team could work in the same process. We are now on a third project that will let Comtec raise invoices, create purchase orders and manage subcontractor finances in one place.

Mark Jones described Always49 as an extension of their team: on hand with advice, willing to challenge thinking, and a partner they would recommend. The portals work because they were designed with Comtec, not dropped on top of them.