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Bonus Depreciation and Bonus Licenses!

Tuesday, November 1st, 2011

In the past, we’ve discussed how there are two levels of pricing for Dynamics GP, Business Essentials and Advanced Management. These licensing models offer anywhere from $35,000 - $100,000 + worth of software functionality. Right now  through December 22nd,  Microsoft is offering the following special promotion:

If you purchase 5 licenses by year end, you pay only $3,000. This is for either version of software, the Business Essentials OR the Advanced Management. This is a potential savings of anywhere from $8,000 - $17,000! Even if the timing is not right, but you know GP is the solution of choice down the road, you could still purchase a very elaborate system for pennies on the dollar and simply hold onto this system until you are ready to implement.

The other interesting note as it relates to year-end, is a piece about Bonus Depreciation (this if you remember was a part of a Tax Relief Act). Basically, this purchase could be completely depreciated if purchased by December 31st:

In general taxpayers who placed-in-service “qualifying property” after September 8, 2010 and before December 31, 2011 can get 100% bonus depreciation for these assets. Not wanting to waste a good set of regulations, the old bonus depreciation regulations will apply until the IRS issues a new set. As it was before, bonus depreciation is mandatory unless the taxpayer elects out of it. The election out can be by class of asset or for all qualifying assets in a company. The basic rules are as follows:
1. The original use of the property must begin with the current taxpayer. 2. Used property cannot qualify, although current improvements to that property may qualify.
3. The property must be purchased and placed in service from January 1, 2008 through December 31, 2012. The “written binding contract” (WBC) rules do apply to the placed-in-service dates. In other words, if the property is purchased or constructed pursuant to a WBC dated before January 1, 2008, it is not eligible for bonus depreciation. However, if the WBC is before September 8, 2010 and the property is placed-in-service after September 8, 2010, it is eligible for 50% bonus depreciation with one exception, discussed below.
4. The property must have a General Depreciation System (GDS) life of 20 years or less.

Don’t forget the other promotional specials going on now through December 22nd! 

Contact us for more information.

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Posted in Best Practices, Dynamics GP, Microsoft |

Ghosts, goblins, and budgets!

Monday, October 24th, 2011

It’s that scary time of year again for ghosts, goblins, and budgets.  Gives me chills just thinking about it.

But it doesn’t have to be too scary.  I’ve been working with several companies on their budgets and have found some things that you may want to keep in mind when importing your budgets.

1)    What version of Microsoft Office are you using?  We have seen where Microsoft Office 2010 has the ability to hide data in cells and could possibly be masking data.  Sometimes you may not know that data is hiding until you export to a text file.  This is not something that happens all the time, but if you find that you have issues importing it could be hidden data.

 

2)    Naming of Fiscal Periods: Typically you would go to Cards->Financial->Budgets and follow the steps in the wizard to create your Budget Template in an Excel spreadsheet.  This gives you the default format that Dynamics GP is expecting when you are ready to import your new budget figures.

 

If you‘ve made changes to the Period Name by going to Microsoft Dynamics GP -> Tools -> Setup-> Company -> Fiscal Periods, you will want to make those same changes to your exported spreadsheet columns.  The export will have the original Period Names for each period, not the changes that you made, and the import will fail because it can’t reconcile the changes for the import.

 

The error you receive will mention incorrect number of fiscal periods, but the real issue is that you renamed the period descriptions, and those have not exported with your Budget export to excel, and it cannot match up those columns when importing back into Dynamics GP.

Hopefully this saves you some time and effort, because we definitely know how hectic this time of year can be.

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Posted in Dynamics GP, Tips 'n Tricks |

How can Business Ready Licensing (BRL) for Dynamics GP save you money?

Monday, June 13th, 2011

At Gilchrist Scott, LTD, we know how important the relationship between clients and their Microsoft Dynamics Business Partner is.  You have made the wise decision to invest in Microsoft Dynamics GP. Now is the time to ensure that you are taking full advantage of all the Microsoft Dynamics features and capabilities to enable confident decision making, drive business productivity, and reduce operational costs.

 

BRL (Business Ready Licensing), was introduced in 2006 to help Dynamics customers get more value from their existing and new solution.  The bundle offers a wide range of functionality to support your business process.  Prior to 2006, customers purchased their solution using Module-based Licensing, adding new modules as needed.  This placed the value in the functionality, whereas BRL places the value in the number of users so customers don’t have to worry about which modules to buy initially.  You own the entire bundle, and may activate unused functionality as needed.  

 

With the special  promotional offers out there, many of our clients are able to move to BRL at a fraction of the cost that it was even a few short months ago. This will enable existing clients to access dozens and dozens of new modules, and freeze their annual enhancement at their current list price.

 

If your company is interested in a License Model Transition, now is the time to do it.  Microsoft’s year-end promotions offer this transition at a deeply discounted rate, but only until June 24th.  Please contact us now to discuss!

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Posted in Best Practices, Dynamics GP, Microsoft, Specific GP Modules |

SmartList Export Solutions for Dynamics GP

Tuesday, May 31st, 2011

If you use SmartLists in Dynamics GP, you have most likely used the Excel button to export a SmartList to Excel.  What you may not know is that there is another option called SmartList Export Solutions that is available for you to use.

Examples of things you can use Smartlist Export Solutions for are to automate totaling and formatting of SmartList data in an existing Excel Spreadsheet.   And you can export SmartList Data to the same spreadsheet over and over again.  You also gain additional functionality by being able to use macros that automate various tasks like clearing data from an existing spreadsheet, creating a new sheet within a workbook before adding data, adding up columns etc..

To Setup a Smartlist Export Solution

1)      You’ll want to save a SmartList with the columns you want, as a Favorite

2)      Export your Favorite SmartList to Excel

3)      Save the Excel Spreadsheet to the location of your choosing  and close out of Excel

4)      View your Favorite SmartList in Dynamics GP

5)      Select Smartlist>>Export Solutions from the Menu

a.       Name:          Enter a Name to identify the Spreadsheet that you will be exporting to

b.      Document:                 Enter the Path or browse to where you previously exported and saved the SmartList in Number 3

c.       Preparation and Completion Macro:  If you added a macro to the Excel File enter those names here

d.      Visible To: Enter who you would like to be able to use/see this solution

e.      Application:  Select Excel

f.        Works for Favorites:  Check the box next to the Favorite that this solution is associated to

g.       Save and Close the Export Solutions window

Back at the SmartList window open your Favorite SmartList

1)      Click the Excel Button

a.       You will now have an additional choice of Export Solution (Quick Export is the usual way of exporting a SmartList)

b.      Click Export Solution and your spreadsheet will open

                                                               i.      If you created a before and/or an after macro these will run ahead of and/or after your is exported

It can be that simple, or you can design macros for different tasks like creating pivot tables etc..  This gives you quite a few more options when exporting SmartLists to Excel, especially when you do the same type of export month after month, and this should save you lots of time once the solution is in place.  Happy Exporting!

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Posted in Best Practices, Business Process Knowledge, Dynamics GP, Specific GP Modules, Support, Technology, Tips 'n Tricks |

SQL Server Reporting Services – Why should you deploy?

Monday, May 23rd, 2011
Curious about SQL Server Reporting Services’ features and benefits? Darren Woodbrey discusses security, subscriptions, drillbacks and report models in this post.
 
 
 
 

 

I am excited to join the team here at Gilchrist Scott Ltd.  This is my very first blog post and it’s obvious that I should start with SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) as I have a wealth of experience with it, and it seems like most customers can’t see the benefits until it’s deployed.  So that is the goal of this post, to convince you that SSRS is a platform you should deploy as soon as possible!

SSRS has been around for a while now, but only in the last couple of versions of GP has it been tightly integrated into the UI.  Reports can now be launched directly from GP Lists, and since GP 2010, the reports are separated into series (Sales, Purchasing, etc) with a link off of each navigation ribbon.  This makes them very easy to launch from within GP.  Some of the great features of SSRS that enable you to get business data out of GP easily and quickly are as follows:

Web Based / Security - Different from Crystal Reports, SQL Reporting Services does not have to be installed on all the workstations where the reports are launched.   The reports are created and then deployed to the Reporting Server, which is hosted just like any other web site.  SSRS also has built in security by report so you can restrict access based on the windows user or group.

Subscriptions – SSRS has a feature called subscriptions which allows you to schedule the delivery of reports through e-mail or to a folder.  This is certainly a very cool feature that enables you to take those reports you run on a regular basis and set them up to be delivered right to your email inbox.  This streamlines your reporting process and cuts down on time.  The reports can be sent in a PDF or Excel format among others.  You can also choose to run reports to a Windows file share.  This is great for “point in time reports” that you may need to go back and look at a later date.

Drillbacks – Drillbacks are an SSRS feature that allow links to be embedded into the report that will launch GP windows.  I have created Inventory reports for instance that have embedded links on the item number field that, when clicked, will pop open the Item Inquiry window in GP with that item already loaded.  This is great for when you need more information on certain items in the report in order to make smart business decisions on the fly.

Report Models – Report models are groupings of tables that are linked together and then published to the report server.  This allows users who are not familiar with complex table linking to be able to create reports for themselves, taking the report writing away from the IT department and allowing them to work on other projects.  The report creation process is done with a program called Report Builder.  This can be downloaded from the Report Server and installed on the users system simply by clicking on a link.

I think you will agree that this is very cool stuff!  So for those of you who do not have SSRS deployed; give us a call at 207.761.2133 or email us to schedule some time to get SSRS installed and start migrating you current reports or creating new ones.  If you do have it deployed and would like to start using it more, we can help with report creation, report model deployment,  and any questions/issues you may have.

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Posted in Dynamics GP, FRx / Reporting, Specific GP Modules, Technology |

The Importance of running File Maintenance in Microsoft Dynamics GP

Thursday, July 15th, 2010

I like to compare running Check Links to changing the oil in your car.  It is a bit of insurance that things will run smoothly in the future.  Your car may be operating just fine, but an oil change is necessary.  Without one you know there will be trouble down the road.

The same could be said about Check Links.  When you run Check Links it examines the GP tables, checking corresponding information in related GP tables, and fixes damaged data.  Many times Check Links is run to correct a specific error that a user is experiencing, however it should be run periodically as a part of your scheduled maintenance plan.  Contact your Microsoft Dynamics GP partner for scheduling recommendations.

Prior to running Check Links it is best to have a full back-up and have all users exit GP.

To run Check Links go to: Microsoft Dynamics GP>Maintenance>Check Linksnew-picture-15

Note that the series is selected from a drop down list first.  We recommend you run Check Links separately for each series as the process can be timely.  Also, it may be difficult to determine which series the error originated if all series are selected at once.

First select the series from the drop down list. A list of Logical Tables will populate in the left hand column.  Click on the ‘All’ button at the center of the screen.  This moves all of the tables into the ‘Selected Tables’ column at the right.  If you only need to run check links on one table, simply highlight the table on the left and click ‘Insert’.

Next, click ‘OK’. Select ‘Screen’ for the report destination as the report could be quite lengthy.  You will have the opportunity to print the report once it is printed to screen if you desire.

Many users opt to start Check Links just as they leave for the day, or during lunch to reduce end user interruption.

If you would like more information in regard to Dynamics GP Check Links give us a call at 207.761.2133 and ask for extension 302.

 

 

 

 

 

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Posted in Dynamics GP |

What’s New in Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 – Foundation Enhancements

Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010

Foundation Enhancements will be the final entry of my ‘What’s New in Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010’ series.

Below are some of the awesome changes:

Emailing

·         Email Functionality

With the new e-mail functionality in Microsoft Dynamics GP you can embed documents into the body of an email or send as an attachment!

Home Page

·         View Reminders as Cues

You can choose to view pre-defined reminders as text or cues on your home page.  A cue is an icon that increases or decreases in height to indicate the number of records in a particular reminder category.

·         View Reporting Services Metrics!

·         Create your own metrics on your home page!

Lookups

·         Set a default view for many lookup windows!

Define and save a default lookup view for your master records.  This is available for Item, Account, Employee, Customer, Vendor, and Salesperson lookups!

Microsoft Dynamics Online Connect

Connect displays a series of slides that allow you to perform self-help support, get information and perform training from the Microsoft Dynamics GP home page!

Navigation Pane

Now you have control over which series buttons and associated lists for modules display for users!

Right-click menu enabled

You can right-click in a text or numeric field to see a shortcut menu which contains options from the Edit menu!

Security

·         Display security roles and tasks

Restrict roles and tasks assigned to a user instead of viewing all tasks, roles, and items!

·         Copy user security settings

Save time and improve accuracy by copying one user’s security settings to another!

·         Automatically log on to GP and a company

Users now have the option to log on to GP and a specific company automatically!

Word Templates

Predefined Word templates for several document types based on the standard reports in GP.  Create your own or modify an existing template, and then assign the template to a company!

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Posted in Dynamics GP |

GP 2010 Release 5/1 Creates FREE software Promo

Wednesday, April 14th, 2010

With the new release of Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 next month we wanted to let you know about some of the changes around licensing and pricing.  A few important points we wanted to bring to your attention:

The price of Smartlist Builder will be going up effective May 1st.  If you’ve been considering this purchase now would be a great time to take advantage of the lower rate.

Free additional Dynamics Business Portal users for customers who currently own Business Portal. 

Free additional Dynamics MOSS clients for customers who currently own Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server.

For more information or to place your order for free additional BP users or MOSS clients please call our office at 207.761.2133.

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Posted in Dynamics GP |