Accounting Software Shreveport

Sage 100 ERP Integrated Supply Chain and Customer Service Solution

Posted by Keith Perkins on Wed, May 06, 2015 @ 07:59 PM

Sage 100 ERP Integrated Supply Chain and Customer Service Solution

Sage_100_ERP_Sage_CRM_Automate_Order_Processing

Title:   13 Ways to Automate Sage 100 ERP Order Processing with an Integrated Supply Chain and Customer Service Solution

Date: Tuesday, May 19, 2015
Time: 11:00 AM PT / 2:00 PM ET (1hr)

Learn how Scanco, StarShip,  SPS Commerce, MAPADOC, Avalara and Sage CRM work together to bring you an integrated streamlined supply chain, sales and customer service automation solution for Sage 100 ERP. 

During this complimentary webinar learn the following 13 ways Sage 100 ERP customers can automate the entire warehouse sales and customer service process here's how:

  1. Sales and customer service personnel use Sage CRM via the web or a mobile device to access Sage 100 ERP Data without using Sage 100 ERP to:
    • Place and track orders 24/7.
    • View real time customer specific pricing and inventory levels 24/7.
    • View sales orders, invoices, payments and shipments 24/7
    • View customer contact information 24/7
    • View customer sales history, item sales history, invoice history, open invoices 24/7
    • Generate quotes and orders 24/7
  2. Automatically calculate sales tax and insure sales tax compliance
  3. Warehouse personnel reduce time in picking orders and eliminating mis-picks
  4. Sage 100 ERP users get a real time view of inventory levels inside Sage 100 ERP
  5. Print ASN labels from the handheld
  6. Achieve real time validation
  7. Seamlessly integrate the entire Pick, Pack and Ship process with Sage 100 ERP
  8. Automate shipping from the scanned information, parcel and freight
  9. Sending email shipment notifications complete with item to package detail
  10. Reducing carrier address correction fees using the embedded address validation features
  11. Taking advantage of 3rd party insurance to save up to 85%
  12. Easily reporting on late deliveries to obtain refunds
  13. Reducing duplicate data entry and associated errors
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Tags: Sage 100, Sage 100 ERP 2014, SageCRM, Sage 100 ERP

Sage 100 ERP 2014: Cloud Sync Mobile Sales, Mobile Service and More

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Fri, Jul 11, 2014 @ 11:45 AM

2014 Sage 100 ERP New FeaturesThe Sage 100 ERP 2014 new release has some awesome new features including mobile sales that have many of our Sage 100 ERP customers excited about upgrading. In our You Tube video below, we will share with you some of the key features in this new release. We think you will find like our customers did that now may be a good time to upgrade your Sage 100 ERP system to benefit from the improvements in 2014! As certified and experienced Sage ERP consultants we are here to help with any further questions.

Learn about Sage 100 ERP 2014 Mobile Sales, Mobile Service and More:

Click on the video below to learn more about the Sage 100 ERP 2014 release:

 

Sage 100 ERP Mobile Sales and Mobile Service

Sales people in the field can manage customers see orders, invoicing and full catalog of all their items. The full catalog is different than what you see in your ERP. Sage 100 ERP 2014 Mobile Sales now has up to four pictures per item. There is a sister service called Mobile Service. Sage's Mobile Service helps field service customers manage technicians, work orders, scheduling, in the field the technician can see what he wants. From your iphone you see what he is supposed to do next. This doesn’t require the Sage 100 ERP Work Order module; it replaces it.  Mobile service has a website where the back office can log the work orders managed by the technicians. All very helpful where you have technicians in the field.  Made changes to Sage Intelligence. Available directly from Menu, create reports that are Excel powered modify format the way you need them aggregate consolidate etc. If you need more power customizations that is where Sage Intelligence comes in. Report viewer ran out of one on their demo companies, can see how created format under templates. There is a report viewer where you can see a dashboard with Key performance indicators, designer, financial reports, trend analysis, vendors purchases report. All the reports are accessing Sage 100 data and putting it into preformatted excel templates, you can print them and distribute them how you see fit.

Sage 100 ERP 2014 Release Summary:

2 Cloud Sync Features Added

  • Mobile Sales
  • Mobile Service

Other Added Features

  • Improved User Experience Items
  • Sage Intelligence Directly to the Menu
  • Sage Inventory Advisor
  • Improved User Experience Items
  • Main Body Improved User Experience Items
  • Library Master Improvements
  • Main User Maintenance New Fields

Added Fields

  • Added Employee Email, Titles, Auto Complete, Electronic Reporting, efiling, W2’s 1099 or any kind of e-filing.  Print or just mail off what you want to mail off.
  • The W-2’s 16 box codes where before you could only do 4. 
  • In Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable, under repetitive invoices added flashlight, you can see at a glance what is set-up under repetitive invoices
  • General Ledger reports and Financial reports added keep window open button.  Now you can mark this keep open and window will stay open.
  • Change to quick find in Sales Order and Purchase Order lines – Quick Find – Automatically goes to first column in the grid to find it much faster. 
  • Bank Requisition added Quick Find
  • Bank Reconciliation defaults to check number or deposit date, etc.
  • Sage Inventory Advisor Added Cloud Based Service - Allows Inventory Manager or whoever you designate to monitor inventory while they are away from their ERP.  Manage Remotely with all the tools tied into Sage 100 ERP. This is an added service.
  • User experience improvements, user maintenance flashlight, repetitive invoices, quickfind
  • Removed some legacy menu items off
  • Payroll period end and federal e-filing and reporting and 1099 information can now can be accessed from the left hand drop down and you can efile automatically. 
  • Sage Intelligence add-ons are important to this release. 

If you need assistance or would like to learn more about the Sage 100 ERP 2014 release, contact us at Accounting Systems Consulting Group, LLC. As ERP consultants, we have over twenty years of experience in helping hundreds of businesses become more efficient and profitable. 

Posted by Keith Perkins at Accounting Software, a Sage 100 ERP consultant firm serving Sage 100 ERP customers in Shreveport, LA and surrounding areas.

Tags: Sage 100 ERP 2014, Sage 100 ERP upgrade, Sage 100 ERP, Sage 100 ERP consultant

Business Process Assessment: Compare Current ERP System & New Goals

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Wed, Feb 06, 2013 @ 03:53 PM
Business Process Assessment

In this blog series we are covering 8 steps to conducting a Business Process Assessment.   If you haven’t looked into performing a business process assessment for your business, please read our series to learn how to unleash profits by finding ways to work more efficiently.  In our previous blogs we covered;  how to create a business process project management committee, who to nominate as the business process project management committee leader, how to develop a comprehensive business process analysis document to measure and assess the existing business processes, how to define your milestone and project projections and how to prepare a project time line.  

In our fifth part of this series we will cover in more detail why it is important to compare your current IT and accounting functionality against your newly identified requirements or recommendations based on the business process assessment.   We will also offer suggestions on how to create a matrix to compare each business process need against the capable functionality of your internal personnel and accounting, human resource, customer-relationship-management systems.

In our previous blog about setting milestones and project projections we gave the example of Ruth (the committee leader for the Accounts Payable department) who has identified several business processes that took up too much time and led to inefficiencies.  She is looking into possible accounts payable automation software as a solution to integrate with their ERP system.  The priorities of the AP department are to eliminate manual invoice processing, improve invoice approval process and automatically generate an electronic notification to recipient when payment is processed.   

Now let’s review how Ruth will use these next steps to 1) compare your current IT and accounting functionality against your newly identified requirements and 2) how to create a matrix to compare each business process need against the capable functionality of your internal personnel and accounting, human resource, customer-relationship-management systems.

Compare current IT and accounting functionality against newly identified requirements

Ruth has mapped out a business process for the check writing and approval in the Accounts Payable (AP) department.   She has identified a few areas that take up time and expense to the AP department’s resources.   Now she is comparing the existing accounting software and how the new areas for improvement will or will not work with their existing ERP solution.  She has reported back to the committee that there are several areas that are manual within their existing solution.  She has researched AP automation software and found a few add-ons or enhancements that integrate with their existing accounting and ERP solution that will help automate their manual and inefficient processes.     Ruth will explore the 2-3 ERP enhancements and report back to the committee her findings and recommendations.  She found one solution that seems to fit the best and is scheduling out demonstrations with the ERP consultant she works with to service their entire ERP system. 

Develop a Matrix

Developing a matrix on an Excel spreadsheet is the most basic way to help the business process assessment committee and the ERP consultant easily identify what is the description of current business process in the AP department, for example.  It will also list all of the issues with current process and also list the recommendations for improvement of the existing processes.  Tracking these business processes is an essential step since there could be a long list to track across departments.  This will allow the business process assessment committee leaders to prioritize what processes should be improved on first.  Now you can sort by priority and set-up an action plan to improve the overall efficiency and profits of the business.  Your business process assessment committee and ERP consultants will be essential in starting the improvement plan moving forward.

Within one business process, like in the example of the AP check writing and the check approval process, there may be a combination of multiple processes that are common given different scenarios.  It is important to outline the various processes that are linked with one activity like check writing, for instance.  This comparison of current functionality with the requirements to change must take place across the entire organization.  This will involve investigating the resources and capabilities of personnel, the current ERP system including accounting, human resource management and your customer relationship management (CRM) systems.   With a little teamwork and involvement across departments your business is now on its way driving toward continuous improvement and maximizing profits. 

If there are inefficiencies eating away at your business profits and tying up costs it is best to detect them and eliminate them before more damage is done!  We have performed hundreds of business process assessments please contact us for more information.

Tags: MAS 90, Workflow, BPM, MAS 200, Process Automation, Busienss Process Automation, business process consultant, ERP Consultant, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment, Business Process Improvement

Business process assessment and needs assessment how are they different?

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Thu, Dec 06, 2012 @ 05:21 PM
Cost Benefit Analysis Concept with Target Pin Marker

What is the difference between a business process assessement and a needs assessment?  

These two terms are interchangeable and can go hand in hand.  We at Accounting Systems Consulting Group, LLC define a needs assessment as the initial intelligence gathered when a prospective customer is interested in replacing their accounting system.  This is a non-billable engagement offered by our team to assess the requirements of your back office accounting and front office customer facing teams.  During the needs assessment we determine the potential cost/benefit to our prospective customer in consideration of replacing the existing business management system or systems.  The needs assessment is a basic assessment to determine whether or not the prospective customer will benefit from a more detailed business process assessment.

The business process assessment is a tool used to reveal process improvement opportunities. Prior to selecting a new accounting system it is important to understand the degree the new system meets the business process automation objectives of each department within a company.  This can be achieved by asking a series of questions applicable to the individual departments and assigning a weight to each question answered.  The business process assessment can reveal "bottlenecks" within a particular department that are hindering the growth and efficiency of the business.

Step One: The technology project managment committee decides which questions apply to each department within the company.  
 
Step Two: The goal here is to get the people within each department engaged.  Each question is answered and given a weight of importance.
 
Step Three:  Analyze the data
 
Step Four:  Match the business process automation objectives of each department and match it to the functionality of each accounting system under consideration by creating a matrix.

Contact us to learn more about our complimentary needs assessment evaluation.

 

Tags: Accounting System, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment

3 Ways an ERP Software Needs Assessment Helps Remove Bottlenecks

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Thu, Nov 29, 2012 @ 07:24 PM
Business Process Assessment

Is your company growing?

Are your ERP software users complaining about lack of functionality they require to efficiently accomplish customer service objectives?

If you answered yes to the questions above, here are some reasons your company will benefit from an ERP software needs assessment.

  1. An ERP software needs assessment is a set of questions asked by an ERP software consultant to identify key issues in your companies business processes and business process automation.
  2. An ERP software needs assessment can reveal human related issues versus software related issues within your company's business processes
  3. According to source:  TGI http://www.tgiltd.com/erp-software-selection/erp-software-needs-analysis.html, "An ERP software needs assessment can be the foundation for preparing a complete ROI calculation and analysis.  The ROI analysis is the key to starting the software selection search off on the right track, because it builds the foundation for assessing and selecting the software for your organization's future."
An ERP software needs assessment is a living document that defines ERP software users need based requirements and measures how well their business process needs are currently being met.  This document will express the business case findings from the user's perspective.
An ERP software needs assessment will usually reveal whether or not your organization needs a more in depth business process assessment.  In our next blog, we will explain in further detail the differences between an ERP software needs assessment and a business process assessment.

Contact us to learn more about our free 30 minute ERP software needs assessment.

 

Tags: Accounting System, Needs Assessment, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment

9 Steps to Conducting a Business Process Assessment

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Mon, Nov 19, 2012 @ 01:09 PM
Business process assessment

The business process assessment is a tool used to reveal business process improvement opportunities.  Many times companies have business process challenges that go undetected like termites invading the frame of a home.  The termites proliferate and cause more and more damage as time goes on and you may not be aware until it is too late!  It isn't until you get inside the walls to find that real irreparable damage has occurred.  Just like it is important to have your home checked every so often for termite invasion it is important to have your business checked as well. 

We recommend the following steps to perform a business process assessment:

  1. Create a business process project management committee by selecting one member from each department of your company so every part of your company is represented.
  2. Nominate a business process project management committee leader to manage the progress.
  3. Develop a comprehensive business process analysis document to measure and assess the existing business processes.  This can be achieved by asking a series of questions applicable to the individual departments and assigning a weight to each question answered.  The business process assessment can reveal "bottlenecks" within a particular department that are hindering the growth and efficiency of the business.
  4. Define your milestone and project projections.  Prepare a project time line.
  5. Compare your current IT, accounting functionality against your needs and business process assessments.  Create a matrix comparing each business process need against the capable functionality of your internal personnel and accounting, human resource, customer-relationship-management systems.
  6. Prepare a simple checklist to visualize whether your business process challenges are human related or software related.
  7. If the business process challenges are human related than it may just be a matter of training. If the challenges are software related and can not be addressed with your current systems in place you may realize return-on-investment by replacing your dysfunctional software systems.
  8. Prepare a simple checklist request for proposal and submit it to the paired down list of vendors. It is important to keep this simple, some vendors will not fill out lengthy requests for proposals especially if there is an independent software consultant involved.
  9. Request product demonstrations.  Invite the RFP respondents who checked off the requirements meeting your needs to demonstrate their accounting system, human resource system, customer relationship management system etc.
If there are termites eating away at your business detect them and eliminate them before more damage is done!  We have performed hundreds of business process assessments please contact us for more information.

 

 

Tags: Accounting System, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment

4 Easy Ways to Create a Sage 100 ERP Invoice from Sales Order Entry

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Mon, Sep 24, 2012 @ 04:48 PM

Sage 100 ERP PartnerQuestion:  How exactly is a Sage 100 ERP (formerly MAS 90, MAS 200) invoice created? 

Answer:  A Sage 100 ERP invoice can be generated in one of four ways.

Generally we will have an order placed in Sage 100 ERP either by the phone, imported or keyed-in.  Let's assume someone calls in and orders something, we take the order number, the order date, we'll create a Sage 100 ERP customer or choose an existing customer.  We enter a PO number if one is supplied, we apply a ship date, denote what warehouse it ships from, we assign the sales tax class, terms of payment, ship method and who placed the order.  Then we assign the product items to the order.  Once we assign the items to the order the tax is applied and the shipping is added if applicable.

4 Ways to Create a Sage 100 ERP Invoice

  1. The simplest way to create an invoice is to go directly into Sage 100 ERP invoice data entry and invoice the sales order
  2. Another way to turn a Sage 100 ERP sales order into an invoice is to communicate to the shipping department to ship the product.  Once the shipping occurs accounting can create the invoice to send to the customer.  
  3. Another way to create a Sage 100 ERP invoice is to come directly into shipping data entry and the shipping department can indicate what items on the sales order were shipped.  This automatically creates a Sage 100 ERP invoice.
  4. Another way to create a Sage 100 ERP invoice is to auto generate the invoice.  When we use the auto generate invoice feature we can invoice one or many sales orders at a time.

Please watch our short video tutorial demonstrating all 4 ways to create a Sage 100 ERP invoice from sales order entry.

 

Tags: MAS 90, MAS 200, Sage 100 ERP Sales Order, Sage 100 ERP, Sage 100 ERP Invoice

Is your chart of accounts in Sage 100 unrulely?

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Mon, Sep 10, 2012 @ 03:45 PM

Wish you had more control over your Sage 100 ERP Chart of Accounts?Sage Authorized Partner

You do.  As the person in charge of your company’s chart of accounts (COA’s), you can control new accounts and changes to existing accounts.  Always make a backup before making changes.

  • Restrict the Sage 100 ERP Chart of Account (COA):  Account numbers can consist of the main number + segment(s).  To restrict how new accounts come into existence, turn the option for “on the fly additions” off in your general ledger options.  Now to create a new account, we would use the general ledger utility to “generate new accounts” based on valid main and valid segment combinations.  Further, restrict who has access to account maintenance.
  •  Fix existing Sage 100 ERP accounts:  two utilities are available to assist you in either renumbering accounts or merging accounts.  Go to general ledger, utilities, and chose either Delete Accounts or Change Accounts.
  • Correct account descriptions:  Some businesses like proper case while others prefer all upper case descriptions.    You can correct this in account maintenance.  Also, you may wish to correct segment descriptions in your descriptions for uniformity.
  • Restructuring your COA:  you may find that you did not allow enough range of account numbers in any particular segment of your COA (for example, current assets).  You can modify this in setup, account group maintenance to expand or contract an account group.

 

If you need assistance, contact us!

Tags: Sage 100, Sage 100 Demo, Sage Software, Sage Products, Sage 100 ERP

Is it possible to automate Sage 100 ERP sales order entry?

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Tue, Sep 04, 2012 @ 01:49 PM
Data Entry Work From Home

Does your business consume valuable employee resources keying in orders? 

If so, consider two alternatives to this practice. 

One:  Set-up a Sage 100 ERP integrated e-commerce website that integrates the orders back into Sage 100 ERP.  Not only will you save time not entering orders, but you could also have invoice history on the site.  Customers can view their invoices online thereby culling down the customer inquiry phone call to your business. 

And two:  use EDI services with customers that are EDI-compliant.  This practice also integrates into Sage 100 order entry.  Now your valuable employee time can be spend adjusting and approving orders contracting your order processing time and making your business more profitable!  

Tags: MAS 90, Accounting System, Sage 100 Sales Order Entry, Accounting Software, MAS 200, Sage 100 ERP

Sage 100 ERP: Can I flag customers on credit hold in Sage CRM?

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Thu, Jun 21, 2012 @ 12:17 PM
stop sign

Question:  Can I flag customers on credit hold in Sage CRM?

Sage CRM uses the data in Sage 100 ERP (Formerly MAS 90 MAS 200) to flag customers on credit hold.  Based on permissions the Sage CRM user can be prevented from placing orders for customers on credit hold.  Also based on permissions, the user can collect on past due invoices in order to place a new order.  By using Sage CRM and Sage 100 ERP together, the back office and the front office are kept informed of important decisions to make in regard to customers.

Please watch our short video clip to learn more!



Image provided by by kougar on Flickr

Tags: Sage 100, Sage 100 Demo, Sage 100 tutorial, SageCRM, SageCRM Tutorial, Sage CRM, Sage 100 ERP