Dynamics GP | Online Accounting Software Blog

Dynamics GP Inventory Items

June 17, 2013 By Steve Chapman Leave a Comment

Dynamics GP allows you to add inventory items to track physical items and non-stock items. Creating an item record for non-stock items is handy because you can:

include an extended description
add pricing schedules
identify specific GL account numbers for transaction processing

If your tracking inventory quantities, you have 5 inventory valuation methods to choose from. You can have different inventory valuation methods in your inventory. It’s not a system-wide setting. These are the methods:

Average Cost
Actual Cost – FIFO
Actual Cost – LIFO
Standard Cost – FIFO
Standard Cost – LIFO

You will want to take advantage of the Inventory Class ID. This makes it easier to group items for reporting, inquiry, and update.

Make sure you mark the items or the Inventory Class to “Maintain History”. Why this is not s default setting, I don’t know:

Here’s a quick video that shows this in action:

If you’re interested in trying out Dynamics GP, you can start a free trial here:

Filed Under: Dynamics GP Tagged With: actual cost, average cost, Dynamics GP, FIFO, inventory, LIFO, standard cost, valuation

Dynamics GP Series Post

May 6, 2013 By Steve Chapman Leave a Comment

Dynamics GP Series Post allows you to see all pending batches in each functional area in GP. The functional areas would be Purchasing, Sales, Financial, etc.

Batch posting in Dynamics GP can be a slight mystery for new users. The Series Post options in each area can be helpful to review the statuses of batches within the system.

Here’s a screen shot of the Sales area Series Post Screen:

Here’s a quick video that shows this functionality:

Filed Under: Dynamics GP Tagged With: batch posting, Dynamics GP

Management Reporter Simple Income Statement Report

April 17, 2013 By Steve Chapman Leave a Comment

Management Reporter is the standard financial report writer for Microsoft Dynamics. It is the successor to FRx.

It looks almost identical to FRx. So if you know FRx you will have little problem in using Management Reporter.

It’s relatively easy to create a new report in Management Reporter. You can use the Wizard (video here) or just create one from scratch.

To create one from scratch you only need three components:

Report Definition
Row Definition
Column Definition

The Row Definitions will take the most time to create, but you can get an easy start on it by importing the chart of account into your Row Definition from within the Row Definition itself. Just navigate to, Edit >> Insert Rows from Definitions.

Column Definitions can be easily and quickly created. The Column Definitions basically specify the period of time for which the data will be reported. You can include budgets if you want and perform simple calculations to create variance columns.

The Report Definitions basically just specify which Row Definition and which Column Definition to include in a report. You can Reporting Tree Definitions as well to specify subsets of your report.

Here is a Row Definition:

Here is a Column Definition:

Here is a Report Definition:

This is a quick video that shows how to create a simple income statement in Management Reporter:

Filed Under: Dynamics GP Tagged With: Dynamics GP, Income Statement, Management Reporter

Evaluating the Total Cost of Ownership for Your Software

March 28, 2013 By Carl Robinette Leave a Comment

by Derek Singleton , Software Advice

As Cloud technologies continue to evolve, more and more software buyers are seriously evaluating software as a service (SaaS) solutions against on-premise offerings. While there are many factors that influence which deployment model is best for any particular business (e.g., ability to manage IT internally and speed of deployment) the cost of the system is often a key factor. But comparing the true cost of a Cloud-based system against an on-premise system can be time-consuming and is often a complex undertaking.

For instance, most buyers understand that on-premise licenses are typically purchased with a large, upfront investment and SaaS licenses are purchased for a relatively cheaper subscription price. But many forget to consider the total cost of ownership (TCO) of their investment. That is, they don’t look beyond the licensing costs to consider how other factors such as the need to customize the software and integrate it with existing applications can influence the TCO of their software purchase.

Even then there are intricacies like maintenance and support and training requirements that can make creating an apples-to-apples comparison of the TCO on-premise and Cloud software difficult. If you’re not a seasoned veteran in modeling all these costs, comparing them can become overwhelming.

To help buyers ballpark the true costs of each software model, the Software Advice website created an interactive TCO calculator that software buyers can use to compare SaaS against on-premise software over a 10-year ownership period.

The calculator models annual and cumalative costs over this time period and shows buyers at which year of ownership the TCO of a SaaS system will equal that of an on-premise solution, based on user inputs. Although the data comes pre-populated with an example case, users can override every value to see the impact that changing any particular value will have on the TCO as a graph at the top of the calculator automatically refreshes after each update.

While the calculator is useful for getting you in a ballpark, it’s important to note that any business will still have to perform their due diligence to come up with an accurate figure that reflects their unique needs and situation. And there are several influencing factors (e.g. organic business growth) that no general calculator can accurately model. In any case, it’s worth checking it out to get an idea of which system seems right for your business. Check it out here.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Dynamics GP, ERP On-Demand

ERP on-demand makes agile business intelligence accessible to SMBs

March 21, 2013 By Carl Robinette Leave a Comment

ERP on-demand makes business intelligence agile for SMBs If you think that business intelligence is big and costly, and not really within the grasp of small business than you are wrong. It is true that the business intelligence tools of yesterday fit the above description, but we are living and working in today—the era of cloud computing. Thanks to solutions like ERP on-demand, business intelligence tools are more agile and more accessible to SMBs.

With the simplicity and cost effective business intelligence solutions provided by ERP cloud, SMBs can become predictive, analytical organizations on par with big businesses.

But that is only half of the story. There is more to ERP cloud than just enhanced forecasting ability. With on-demand ERP can rapidly adapt to changes as the market and the economy shift.

With ERP on-demand, business intelligence gets you the information you need faster and with analytics dashboards SMBs can perform their own analysis without the help of costly analysts. And because deployment is faster than traditional systems you can get started faster.

Speed is critical for business intelligence to be of any use. Because hosted ERP allows for real-time business intelligence your people will be better equipped to make those crucial decisions in a timely matter.

Filed Under: Dynamics GP, ERP Hosting Tagged With: business intelligence, Dynamics GP, ERP On-Demand

Say no to Shadow IT: Deliver the cloud strategy from the top, down

March 13, 2013 By Carl Robinette Leave a Comment

It’s an image that every IT professional cringes at—a salesperson or sales manager pulling out a credit card and subscribing to customer relationship management or other cloud-based solution without any having a conversation with the IT department first. This best way to prevent this from happening is for the IT managers and executives need to step up their innovation strategies and deliver the cloud strategy from the top, down.

David Linthicum recently blogged about this at inforworld.com, and discussed the importance of a cloud strategy from the top decision makers is so important.

Until recently many IT professionals would take a lets-wait-and-see approach to new technology initiatives. Today users are much more computer literate than they used to be. They have the will and the knowhow to purchase applications they think will make them perform better.

The first step to stopping shadow IT is for IT decision makers to define, refine, understand, and publicize your cloud strategy. Claiming ownership of the way your company utilizes cloud is critically important when it comes time to implement your plans. That means you are going to have to become familiar with the overall strategies of the company and needs of the users.

Implementing ERP on-demand solution will likely satisfy the needs of all the users, but unifying everybody on the same system to ensure consistency is a task for decision makers. That is why it is so important to deliver the cloud strategy from the top, down.

Filed Under: Dynamics GP, ERP Hosting Tagged With: Dynamics GP, ERP On-Demand, SaaS

The power of offsite data storage

March 12, 2013 By Carl Robinette Leave a Comment

Early in his career Earnest Hemmingway famously lost a suitcase that contained everything he had ever written up to that point. The documents were never recovered and he was forced to start from scratch rebuilding his body of work. While Hemmingway’s career survived the setback, losing critical business data can be a harrowing experience. That’s why the power of offsite data storage has become such a popular discussion topic.

A recent article at softwarethinktank.com offers a few reasons why using data center services is such an important part of doing business today, and ERP on-demand will help you utilize offsite backup.

Cost Effective

One great reasons to choose an ERP on-demand solution with offsite backup is that it is a cost effective solution. The sheer upfront cost of setting up a homegrown backup infrastructure is enough to make most SMBs think twice. Combine that with recurring cost of security and maintenance, the money you save by opting for the cloud becomes very attractive.

Outside Resources

Many small businesses do not have access to all the IT resources that they need to stay ahead of the competition. With an ERP on-demand option, SMBs are able to rely on their provider’s IT, and because they are hosting the solution they utilizing independent contractors is greatly simplified.

More Internal Resources

Earlier I mentioned the cost of security and maintenance of a homegrown back solution. With a hosted solution, your people will have more time to focus on more critical operations, automatically improving workflow efficiency.

Customer Care

Now that your people are not bogged down by IT maintenance, more resources can be deployed for satisfying customers, and because of the power of offsite data storage information is now easily accessible. They can serve the customer with improved insight thanks to the business intelligence model within the ERP on-demand solution.

Filed Under: Dynamics GP, ERP Hosting Tagged With: Cloud ERP, Dynamics GP, ERP On-Demand

ERP On-demand: Five reasons to consider a cloud enterprise software

March 7, 2013 By Carl Robinette Leave a Comment

ERP On-demand: Five reasons to consider a cloud enterprise software Since the beginning of cloud computing it has become a solution for many small businesses and organizations. Low up front cost and lower overall investment requirements have mad cloud enterprise solutions very attractive to start-ups and small business owners with tight budgets. But there is more than that to cloud. A solution like ERP on-demand gives business more than just cost savings. Here are five reasons to consider a cloud enterprise software.

Time to Value

With cloud computing your solution starts showing its value sooner, because the software as a service can be deployed faster and easier. For example, with on-demand ERP you start using your solution immediately so you can start streamlining your business sooner.

Licensing Costs

You don’t have to pay those massive recurring licensing costs. Avoid additional cost with the simple monthly fee of ERP on-demand.

IT Savings

Since your hosting provider has a dedicated team of IT professionals you can save money on personnel.

Reliability and Performance

With their focus entirely on providing IT services, your cloud ERP solution provider is dedicated to maintaining up-times that outpace the best on-premise systems.

Goodbye Servers

Let’s face it, datacenters are a huge liability. They consume space, energy, and payroll dollars spent maintaining them. They’re loud and hot too. With a cloud-based solution you are outsourcing your data center so that your resources can be spent on more business critical applications.