The AI Quote Desk that drafts your quotes from emailed RFQs
Merlin's Quote Desk reads RFQs that arrive by email, matches each line to your own price sheet and drafts a complete quote with line items, quantity breaks, customer pricing, lead times, terms and a PDF in minutes, 24/7. Prices and totals are calculated in code from your price sheet, unclear lines are flagged instead of guessed, and a human rep approves every quote before it goes out.
From quote request to finished quote in two minutes.
Nothing goes to a customer until someone on your team approves it. Watch full screen
Faster quotes. More orders. Hours back every week.
Win more orders
Buyers often go with the first solid quote they get. Merlin gets yours out in minutes, day or night, and follows up on the quotes that go quiet.
Get your team's time back
A desk that gets 60 quote requests a week at 15 minutes each spends about 65 hours a month building quotes. Merlin takes most of that routine work off their plate.
Grow without hiring
Handle more requests with the team you already have, in English and French, while good inside-sales people are hard to find.
What does the Quote Desk do?
Most inside sales teams lose hours every week retyping RFQs into a quote. A customer emails a list of part numbers or descriptions, a rep looks each one up in the price sheet, checks quantity breaks and the customer's pricing, adds lead times and terms, then builds the PDF. The Quote Desk does that assembly work so your rep starts from a finished draft instead of a blank form.
It works on RFQs sent to your sales mailbox, including web-form submissions your website emails to you. It answers in the language the customer wrote in, English or French, and uses the part numbers and descriptions from your price sheet. Speed matters: in a 2020 Paperless Parts buyer survey, 67% of buyers said they expect a quote within 24 hours.
How does Merlin price a quote?
The AI has one narrow job: deciding which catalog item matches each request line. Everything numeric is calculated in code from your price sheet. Unit prices, quantity-break tiers, customer-specific pricing, extended totals and lead times all come straight from your data, so the AI never invents a price.
When a rep corrects a match, for example by choosing a different part for a customer's shorthand description, Merlin remembers that choice as a learned alias and uses it next time. Your price sheet can come from Excel, CSV or an ERP report; see Excel price sheets for the format.
What will it do, and what won't it do?
| The Quote Desk will | The Quote Desk won't |
|---|---|
| Match request lines to items in your price sheet | Guess at a part it can't match with confidence |
| Apply quantity breaks and customer-specific pricing | Invent a price or discount that isn't in your data |
| Flag unclear, unmatched or missing-spec lines for a rep | Send anything without a rep's approval |
| Flag quotes over your set amount, first-time customers and low-stock items | Cost custom fabricated parts from drawings |
| Draft in English or French to match the customer | Change your terms or lead times on its own |
How does approval work?
Every draft lands in a review queue. The rep sees each line, the matched item, the price source and any flags, edits what needs editing, then approves and sends. Nothing leaves your mailbox without a human click. Each draft, approval and send is written to an audit log, and the owner sets what each teammate is allowed to do.
Before you go live, Merlin runs in shadow mode for 1 to 2 weeks: it drafts on real RFQs while sending is switched off, and your team compares its drafts with the quotes they actually sent. We explain why this design matters in why every AI quote needs human approval.
What data does it need?
- Your sales mailbox: Gmail or Google Workspace today, Microsoft 365 / Outlook coming soon.
- A price sheet with part numbers, descriptions, unit prices and quantity breaks, from Excel, CSV or an ERP export.
- Optional customer-specific pricing, lead times, stock levels and standard terms.
- Your approval rules: the dollar threshold that triggers a flag, and who can approve.
If your ERP can publish a scheduled export to a link, Merlin refreshes from it every 6 hours. There is no native real-time ERP connector in the standard product.
Which plan includes the Quote Desk?
The Quote Desk is the workflow we start every customer on with a $3,500 CAD 30-day pilot and one success metric agreed in writing, for example a median quote response time under one hour. If the metric is missed, no monthly fee is owed. After the pilot it is included in Starter ($2,000/month, with Quote Follow-up) and Growth ($3,000/month). Full details are on the pricing page.
Frequently asked questions
Does the AI set prices?
No. The AI only decides which catalog item matches a request line. Prices, quantity breaks, totals and lead times are calculated in code from your price sheet.
What happens when a line can't be matched?
It is flagged for a rep with the original request text. Merlin never guesses a part or a price.
Can it quote in French?
Yes. Merlin replies in the language the customer wrote in, English or Québec French, using part numbers and descriptions from your price sheet.
Do I need to connect my ERP?
No. An Excel or CSV price sheet is enough to start. If your ERP can publish a scheduled export to a link, Merlin refreshes from it every 6 hours.
How long until it's live?
After setup, Merlin runs in shadow mode for 1 to 2 weeks so your team can compare drafts with real quotes before anything can be sent.
