External Supply Planner

Hours and Salary

• Monday - Thursday, 8:00am to 4:30pm
• Friday, 8:00am to 1:30pm
• £30,000 - £34,000

Scope of Responsibilities

The External Supply Chain Planner is responsible for executing ERP-driven supply plans with external suppliers, ensuring material availability to meet production needs while proactively managing risks, capacity constraints, and schedule adherence. This role focuses on the tactical and operational dimensions of supplier management (not commercial negotiation) and plays a critical part in ensuring supply continuity, performance monitoring, and alignment with the production plan.

This role is a member of the External Supply Chain team, part of the wider Supply Chain function.

Key Responsibilities and Duties

ERP Supply Plan Execution

• Interpret and action MRP outputs to create, adjust, and expedite purchase orders and supplier schedules.
• Resolve discrepancies between ERP plans and supplier commitments.
• Lead order error resolution for supply base.
• Monitor accurate and timely PO acknowledgements and delivery confirmations from suppliers.

Supplier Coordination

• Be the first point of contact for daily operational matters with assigned suppliers.
• Communicate changes to schedules, volumes, or priorities to suppliers within agreed planning horizons.
• Escalate persistent delivery issues or risks to the External Supply Manager and Strategic Purchasing counterpart.
• Support and resolve invoice queries.

Capacity & Risk Management

• Assess supplier capacity vs. forecast and identify shortfalls or bottlenecks early.
• Support contingency planning and capacity recovery activities in collaboration with the manager and suppliers.
• Document and track risk mitigation actions.

Supplier Performance Monitoring

• Track supplier On-Time Delivery (SOTD), responsiveness, and delivery quality.
• Maintain accurate supplier performance data in relevant dashboards and KPIs.
• Support and attend regular supplier reviews with data and insights.

Planning Collaboration

• Work cross-functionally with internal stakeholders (production planning, logistics, inventory control, supplier performance, quality, after market) to ensure full alignment of material plans with final assembly requirements.
• Inform internal stakeholders of confirmed delivery plans and exceptions.

Data and System Maintenance

• Maintain accurate ERP planning parameters (e.g. lead times, lot sizes, safety stock
• levels).
• Support root cause analysis of MRP discrepancies and system errors.

Continuous Improvement

• Identify and propose process improvements to enhance supplier collaboration, ERP usage, and supply planning efficiency.
• Participate in lean or supply chain improvement initiatives as needed.

Participate

• In daily review meetings and QRQC sessions
• In Stock Takes, Audits and Assessments
• In rate readiness exercises & capital investment exercises
• In the management of supplier transport, documentation and requests