The capture, review and interpretation of data describing a supplier’s contractual performance.  Vendor rating is a building block of supplier relationship management.  Suppliers are rated against a series of dimensions, allowing performance to be compared against that of other suppliers, or tracked through time to identify trends.  Dimensions of performance that may be measured include delivery performance, quality performance, service, pricing performance etc.  Capturing the data is easier for goods than for services and it is also easier to capture information where there are fewer delivery points.  ERP systems often incorporate supplier relationship management modules that allow the systematic capture of data.  See also Performance Regime.