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Sage MAS 90 and Sage MAS 200 ERP
NEWSLETTER
Volume 8 Issue 4,
July 2008 |
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Sage Software offers free
Web seminars designed to
help you better manage your
business. Current offerings
include:
. Sage MAS 90 and MAS
200 Job Costing - Control
job costs and increase
cash flow
. What's New in Sage MAS
90 and 200 Version 4.3?
. Maximize Revenue by
Improving Your Billing
Process in Sage MAS 90
and 200
For the current Sage MAS 90
and Sage MAS 200 Webcast
schedule or to register
click here. |
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| Business Activity Monitoring Tools
Put Your Data To Work |
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We have all had days filled with
troubleshooting problems and
remedying mistakes or oversights.
Often these problems could have
been avoided if only we had some foreknowledge
- if somehow we had been alerted to
the situation. Of course Sage MAS 90 ERP
software captures a great deal of important
information about your company and provides
the reports essential to running your
business. But you may not always have time
to read through reports to identify issues
requiring your attention. That's where business
activity monitoring comes in. Powerful
business activity monitoring tools are available
to review your data and alert the appropriate
persons by e-mail when items needing
attention are identified. And these tools can
even update your data automatically based
on criteria you set. Let's learn more.
Mind Your Business
Imagine if you had an assistant to monitor
the situations you deem important, notify
the appropriate people of issues for review
and action, and help to get at the root of each
problem by providing access to the relevant
Sage MAS 90 reports and inquiries. Imagine
further that this assistant never makes a mistake,
and works 24 hours a day, seven days a
week! That is the type of assistance you can
expect from a business activity monitoring
system.
The precise capabilities of business activity
monitoring systems vary. At the basic
level, they all can monitor your database and
automatically e-mail designated persons when
a certain condition occurs. More advanced
systems can act on the information and generate
new transactions in your database to
effectively automate your workflows.
Resolve To Stay Alert
The basic capability provided by all business
activity monitoring systems, commonly
called alerts, monitors the activity in your system
and automatically notifies you, your staff,
your business partners, and even your customers
when important events take place. Alerts
use your existing e-mail system to notify you
of significant events transpiring within your
database. Notifications enable you and your
staff to avoid missed deadlines, steer clear
of problem situations, and to capitalize on
opportunities. Here are some examples of the types of issues alerts can handle:
Alert the purchasing manager when
. an
item is below its minimum stock level at a
warehouse. Never run out of that best seller
again!
. Send an e-mail to the account manager
when one of their customers has an
invoice past due by 30 days.
. Notify your purchasing agent when
the cost of items received exceeds the
Standard Cost.
. Communicate to the sales staff when an
inventory item price changes.
. E-mail a customer when their credit status
changes.
. Notify the sales manager when an order
does not ship by the due date.
. Help prevent fraud or catch data entry
errors with an alert when an Accounts
Payable check over a certain amount is
created.
Alerts can even act as a complete receivables
collections tool by sending your customers
an e-mail when invoices become past
due and simultaneously adding them to a list
for internal follow up.
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Scheduled Or On Demand
You will want to schedule most tasks to run
automatically at specified intervals, such as
daily or weekly, so that the system can notify
you automatically when the selected conditions
are met. However, you also may run
alerts on demand to run a quick check or to
update the list of items meeting the criteria.
Workflow Automation
More powerful business activity monitoring
systems can take action based on events
that occur. For example, you can generate a
work order when an order is received, and
then when the work order is completed, generate
an invoice and e-mail it to the customer.
You can set workflow to route purchase orders
for approval, and when integrated with your
CRM solution, schedule follow-up calls with
customers and leads. More advanced systems
can even monitor and auto-respond to
the content of incoming e-mail messages and
Web form submissions. In addition to sending
e-mail alerts, some systems can send alerts
via fax, pager, cell phone, screen pop up, or
Web browser, so you can be sure to reach the
required person anywhere at any time.
Choosing A Solution
Two of the business activity monitoring
systems available for Sage MAS 90 are
the Business Alerts Professional module and
KnowledgeSync, a powerful Sage Endorsed
Solution. Below we have summarized the
capabilities of each solution.
Business Alerts Professional
. Monitor date and time-sensitive events.
. Receive notifications regarding credit
holds, inventory thresholds, sales ratios,
urgency levels, and priority client
transactions.
. Merge data into e-mail messages.
. Include e-mail attachments to provide
additional information.
. Send automated responses to customers
and vendors.
. Keep employees informed for better
decision making.
. Track important business events.
. Improve customer service for better
customer retention.
. Provide response to changing business
conditions 24 hours a day, seven days a
week.
. Includes a range of pre-built alerts for
A/R, A/P, Job Cost, Purchase Order, Sales
Order, Inventory, and General Ledger
that you can easily customize to your
needs.
KnowledgeSync
. Enterprise-wide solution featuring
scalability, flexibility, and dependability.
. Trigger personalized alerts about any
business conditions via e-mail, fax, pager,
cell phone, screen pop up, and Web
browser.
. Automate the delivery of forms,
documents, and reports to clients and
staff.
. Execute workflow to deliver invoices and
purchase orders, and schedule intelligent
follow-ups.
. Monitor and auto-respond to the content
of incoming e-mail messages and Web
form submissions.
. Dynamically analyze data between
multiple business functions (e.g.,
Accounting and CRM).
. Includes a range of pre-built alerts that
you can easily customize to your needs.
Here we have just provided a brief overview,
please give us a call to discuss the best
business activity monitoring tool for your
company.
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| Benefits Of Keeping Your Sage MAS 90 Solution Current |
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Are you still running on an older version
of Sage MAS 90 ERP? Sage MAS 90 has
always been a powerful accounting product -
maybe that's why you didn't feel you needed
to upgrade - but every release has been carefully
designed to help customers operate their
businesses more efficiently and securely, save
time and money, and improve customer service.
In this article, we'll recap the significant
global features added in 4.0 and later releases
that we think you should consider.
Work On Your Business
If you're like most business owners, you
may find yourself mostly working in your
business, not on your business. You're putting
out fires and making tactical decisions about
orders, products, and schedules. You don't
have hours to spend analyzing your data, and
yet if you did, the results of that analysis could
have a profound impact on your business.
You may discover unprofitable products and
eliminate them, or identify top customers and
offer additional purchase incentives.
Business Insights
If you feel you should be performing this
type of analysis and haven't found the time,
the Business Insights (BI) group of capabilities
have been designed just for you.
BI Explorer, added in version 4.2, is an
easy-to-use, on-the-fly inquiry and analysis
tool. A familiar grid interface gives you access
to information from all areas of the Sage
MAS 90 system. Turn your data into factbased
knowledge using the powerful sort,
group, and filter capabilities, and save the
views you've created for future use.
BI Reporter was added in 4.0, and is
designed for you to find the data you need
and generate a report quickly and easily. The
wizard-based tool displays data in a logical tree
view, making it easier to locate the fields you
need. You can specify options, such as date
range, each time the report is run, and you
can add it to a menu, refine it using Crystal
Reports, or export it to Excel.
The BI Dashboard is a series of 12 charts
that give you an instant picture of overall
business performance. In 4.3, the Dashboard
received a face lift, along with the ability to
print graphs to a PDF file.
Customize Any Report
Have you ever wanted to customize a standard
Sage MAS 90 report? With version 4.0
and above, you can. All reports are built in
Crystal Reports, so you can easily customize
any report, and output reports to several
formats, including Excel, Word, PDF, and
e-mail.
Personalized Report Settings allow you to
set report defaults so you don't have to reselect
them each time. Do you print the A/R
Aging weekly with past due items only, and
the full report at the end of the month? You
can save them with an appropriate title and
run as needed.
Faster Data Entry
Perhaps the biggest time saver in the 4.0
versions is the dual-grid data entry screens.
Designed with direct user input during development,
the dual-grid brings data entry speed
and flexibility to a new level. In most screens,
you enter data in only a handful of fields,
allowing the system to default the information
into the others. With the dual grid, you
can place the most commonly accessed fields
in your main grid, and speed through entry.
If you come upon an entry that requires a
change to one of the other fields, a click of a
button takes you into the secondary grid.
Dual-Pane View Of Transactions
Similar in concept to the dual-grid data
entry, the dual-pane view allows you to see
a list of transactions in one pane, and the
detail related to a specific transaction, in
the other. The dual-pane view allows you to
respond more quickly to customer and vendor
inquiries.
Add Your Own Fields
In 4.0 versions, it is easy to add your own
user-defined fields (UDFs) to any data file
in General Ledger, Accounts Payable, and
Accounts Receivable. The UDFs are treated
like any other field, and can be passed through
to invoices and history, and used on reports.
Batch Control And Auditing
With the Batch Manager, in versions 4.0
and greater, you can make batches public
or private. Each batch is flagged with audit
information including the user who created
or updated the batch and the date and time
the batch was created or updated.
There are many more benefits to upgrading,
please call us to discuss the specific benefits
of upgrading for your organization. |
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| Tips & Tricks |
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Modifying The Sage MAS 90
Business Alerts Default E-Mail
Address
Sage MAS 90 Business Alerts comes with
a Default To e-mail address in every
alert. You can modify the Default To
address by editing the E-Mail Agent in the
Agent Control Panel as follows:
In Business Alerts, 1. expand the Processes
folder.
2. Select the alert to modify, and click on the
+ button next to the alert.
3. Click on the + button next to Monitor
an OLE DB Data Source.
4. Right-click Send E-Mail, and select
Configure Step.
5. Enter the new default address
information. |
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| In The Spotlight: EDI: Not Just For Large Companies |
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Simply defined, EDI (Electronic Data
Interchange), is a method of electronically
exchanging business documents, such
as purchase orders, directly between your
accounting system and that of your customer.
EDI standards were first developed in
the 1960's and early systems were complex
and expensive - within the reach of only the
very largest companies. The advent of the
Internet made EDI processing simpler and
more affordable. Let's take a closer look at
EDI today.
The EDI Opportunity
If you operate multiple warehouse locations, or even a large warehouse with multiple
pick and pack stations, this Extended Solution could be a solution for you.
Picking Sheet Printing to Multiple Warehouse Printers (SO-1198) adds the ability
to print Picking Sheets to printers designated by warehouse. A Printer Name field is
added to Warehouse Code maintenance. As you print Picking Sheets, the program will
direct the Picking Sheet to the printer you have specified, based on the warehouse code
referenced on each item line.
EDI Benefits
For wholesale distributors, the biggest benefit
of EDI lies in the ability to sell to those
very large retail organizations that only accept
EDI transactions. These companies have hundreds
of locations nationwide and once they
have selected your product, will likely order a
huge volume. Your organization could experience
a big uplift in revenue.
Imagine the ability, with the click of a button,
to import a customer's purchase order
and have that purchase order automatically
become an order in your system. It would
save hours of data entry and eliminate data
entry errors. Then when you ship the order,
the invoice is automatically sent to the correct
billing address, and can be received automatically
into the customer's accounting system,
eliminating errors and payment delays.
How EDI Works
There are three main components to EDI,
mapping, translation, and connectivity. Your
trading partners require that the information
be sent in a certain format. Transactions such
as invoices are mapped at each end into a format
that can be recognized by the EDI translator.
The translator interprets the transaction
it receives from your accounting system to
the format required by your trading partner.
The connectivity component transmits the
information securely from one computer to
another. Older EDI systems use VANs (valueadded
networks) to transmit information.
Today, the Internet can be used for connectivity
at a much lower cost.
Easy And Affordable
Today's EDI systems are cost effective, easy
to use, and quick to implement. Even smaller
organizations can afford to adopt EDI and
enjoy the benefits. The connectivity used,
your industry, and the trading partners with
whom you want to do business all have a
bearing on choosing the right EDI system for
your organization. Several solutions are available
that integrate with Sage MAS 90 and
Sage MAS 200 ERP. Give us a call to discuss
the right solution for you. |
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© Copyright 2004-2010 Tango Marketing, LLC. www.tango-marketing.com All Rights Reserved. This newsletter and its content have been registered with
the United States Copyright Office. This content is licensed by Tango Marketing LLC and can be distributed by licensee until 07/31/2010 at which time the licensee must cease
distribution and use of this content unless permission in writing is obtained from Tango Marketing LLC. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is strictly prohibited.
The capabilities, system requirements and/or compatibility with third-party products described herein are subject to change without notice. Sage, the Sage logos, and the Sage product
and service names mentioned herein are registered trademarks or trademarks of Sage Software, Inc., or its affiliated entities. All other trademarks are the property of their
respective owners.
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