Invoice - Return Stub
Holding the control key down and clicking View Invoice will generate an Invoice with a Return Stub.
The Return Stub will be located at the bottom of the first page of the Invoice.
This Return Stub gives the options to:
1. Check a Payment Method
2. Fill in Check information
3. Fill in Credit Card information.
4. A Signature box
Simply Reliable Software’s Weekly Training Series
Proposals and APD
Please join us Wednesday July 29th, 2009 at 12:00 PM EDT for this week’s free training. Tom will be discussing creating proposals and setting up APD. You may begin logging into the webinar at 11:45AM EDT.
Follow this link for more information.
SmartOffice Feature of the Week - BarCode Scanning
Here’s and oldie but goodie folks. BarCode Scanning. That’s right BarCode scanning. Did you know that you don’t need advanced inventory to take advantage of the barcode scanner. You can scan UPC or SRS barcodes (See allocation labels) in every version of SmartOffice. And if you do have the Advanced Inventory Module you can even scan in serial numbers. Any screen that has an orange box on it will accept a scan. You can search for Products, add items to an Invoice, Recieve items froma PO, Deliver items out to a Project and much more. So go get your scanner (see the FAQ for the one we recommend) and get scanning.
Are You Ready For Success?
Sales and business cycles are said to be cyclical. I think that may well be true. But when things get slower it is NOT the time to hide your head under a rock and hope it will get better. It is the golden opportunity to re-evaluate everything; business process, employees, brands, policies, etc. What can you do to A) be prepared when things pick up, B) stay healthy through the tough times, and C) continue to produce profitability?
First keep your head focused on your priorities and goals. If you do not have a written plan defining what you want and how you are going to achieve your goals, go away with yourself and write down what you desire to accomplish. Item #1 the big picture where do you want to be in 5 years, how about 1 year, 1 month, and finally tomorrow.
Now how does what you are doing everyday help you to get to that place? If it isn’t helping, it is hurting, change the behavior.
When someone calls your office or you meet someone in restaurant do you have your 1 minute elevator speech? Can you quickly and simply state what you do, why you do it, and why anyone who is interested in that type service should be talking with you? Work on it write it down. Practice in the mirror. Record yourself. Rehearse. Trust me it will help.
When they want to do business with you have you developed standardized successfully repeatable solutions to offer them or are reinventing the wheel each time you meet a prospect? I think the industry has grown up and it isn’t like that anymore. A prospect wants to be told what is available and choose from your menu. They want realistic cost estimates and expect that the process should be as easy as going to a store and placing an order. And, you know what it can be if you are prepared. This is how our industry can grow 10 fold over the next few years.
What is your current work load? Are the jobs profitable or are you living on cash flow only to have to pay the piper later? It is time to understand your profitability. When things come back full strength, if you are not operating at efficient levels and have costs and processes under control the work load could bury you and produce exactly the opposite effect you would expect. Prepare for success now by looking deep into every aspect of your company. Trim the fat, implement new processes that will verify your profitability. Streamline what you sell, how you install it, how you market it. At the same time there are new disciplines or sub-systems if you will that can provide additional revenue sources to your company such as solar panels and power protection and back up systems.
Seize the Day, Everyday. Stay focused, stay positive. Surround yourself with positive success oriented people. Form a group of like minded success oriented entrepreneurs to discuss business ideas. Some of my best ideas came to me while helping others with their business. Sometimes inspiration comes from the oddest places. Above all Be Prepared. If you fail to plan, then you can plan to fail!
SmartOffice Feature of the Week - Allocation Tags
Here is a conversation that I have had many times since I started working for Simply Reliable:
SRS User: How do I stage items is SmartOffice?
Me: You don’t. We don’t have a staging feature.
SRS User: WHAT??? WHY THE HECK NOT?
Me: Because we recommend that you use our Allocation Tags and pre-stage the items as they come in.
SRS User: Huh.
People are pretty attached to their extra work aren’t they? I know, every warehouse you have ever seen has a staging process. Well SmartOffice does too. We just recommend that you stage an item when it comes in by placing an Allocation Tag on it. It will tell you the Make and SKU of the product but it will also tell you the Project, Zone and Discipline of the job. So you attach this label to the product when an item comes in and everyone in the company will know exactly what it is for. Then you place it in the pile with the other items for that job and you don’t have to hunt around the warehouse for items every time you want to make a delivery.
Oh yea, and you don’t have to have Advanced Inventory to use Allocation Tags. It is included with the base level of inventory. Just select a PO and hit the button for Inventory Labels. Hint: If you print these out when a PO is submitted then there will not be a delay when a shipment is received.
I Want My MTV!
Hey remember when MTV first started? Were you there to watch The Buggles croon out the death of Radio? Well our generation has put to rest a lot of old fashioned ideals I suppose. For instance, does anyone ever read a manual for anything until they just can’t figure it out, the Internet can’t show them, their friend won’t help them? No, I didn’t think so.
I have been doing training for Simply Reliable for just under two years now. Every Wednesday like clockwork I am on the Internet with a subject designed to help you our clients and associates use SmartOffice to it’s full advantage. But did you know that we record these? yep, it’s true! Log on to simplyreliable.com/support/videotraining and you can view the past few months of my weekly sessions.
BUT WAIT THERE”S MORE….. I have recorded a series of trainings in the same section which takes you through the fundamentals of SmartOffice. These are numbered 1-7. If you watch them in order and then practice what is shown you will be a SmartOffice Whiz in no time flat. Included next to each video is a PDF of the course outline to make it easier to follow along. These are a great resource for a new employee or someone who may want to take an initiative to be more valuable in your organization. Log on, use them they are a free resource to our clients.
I would love to hear feedback on a couple of items; New subjects you would like covered, should we alternate the time so that West Coast and Europe can more easily participate? What do you think?
We are here to help you make the most out of your business process. Let us know how we can help.
Are you Online?
So here I am…Driving through the Massachusetts countryside - well I am not driving that would just be unsafe posting to a blog wheile driving. I’m riding throught the Massachuttes countryside and it strikes me as I surf the web on my 3G internet connection that we have had several internal discussions about this very topic. You see we are currently developingt on our next major rebuild of SmartOffice and the issue has come up several times about a web based solution. Our office is divided about the topic. Some of us are of the opinion that the internet is so prevalent in our society that you are rarely offline and that the benefits of being able to login from anywhere in the world through a standard web browser outweigh the few times that you may be out of range. Others are not so sure. So I am here to ask you. Which of the following models would be best for your company?
The same as we have now, which is a local solution that has to be connected to the local network in order to function. The big improvement that we would offer over the current system is that you would definitely have to be connected to operate but we could enable this connection to work over a VPN or even a TCP/IP (internet) connection. So you would not have to use Terminal Services if you choose.
Option 2 is a hybrid solution that would allow you to go offline and it would synchronize back with the home server when you returned to the home network. There are some draw backs though. We would either have to lock and check out proposals/projects when going offline or reduce the functionality when in an offline mode. Meaning maybe you could create a proposal offline but then you need to manage the project from the home office. (or something like that.)
The last option would be a purely online solution. It would be accessible through a web browser (which means that you could use it on any operating system you wanted) but you would have to be online to access the data. This method might require that we change our pricing model to charge per user instead of per license of the software so this may mean an more or less of an investment for some companies.
Now in reality we are working on a solution that will harness the best of all of these solutions but I want to know what you think anyway. If you had to choose from these three options (and only these three), which would you choose? Post a comment and help us settle an internal argument.
SmartOffice Feature of the Week – ETA
Ever wonder exactly when an item is due in? Well sure you have. That is what the need in hand date is for right? Well not really. What if a product is ordered early, or late? Or what if it is backordered? How do you note that in SmartOffice.
That is where ETA comes in. This is a new field on a PO. It is auto populated based on the lead time for the product and the date that the item was placed on the PO. If something happens, like the PO is not submitted that day or the items is backordered you can always change it on the edit PO screen.
Need to know the ETA for all of the items on a given proposal or work order? Well we have you covered there too. Just check out the Product Status Report.
Fast Deletion
Holding down the control key (ctrl) and clicking any deletion button, that is a red circle with a white ‘x’ through it, will delete a record* automatically.
This is good to use when deleting a mass amount of records.
Be aware that there will not be a pop-up window asking if you are sure that you want to delete each record.
Records cannot be recovered after being deleted.
*Records are any contacts, proposals, work orders, products, etc.
The Request is Your Friend
This week I am going to take a few minutes to talk about the Request Screen. This is part of the Inventory tab and is the center of the SmartOffice Inventory system. Whether you have the Advanced Inventory or you use the Just-in-Time inventory model the Request is crucial to managing your inventory.
SmartOffice manages inventory in four basic steps: Request, Order, Receive and Deliver. So what is the request and why is it important? Well it must be important it is first, isn’t it? Yes, it is first but it is also the most important step. This is where your project manager sets the date(s) that all of the products for a project must be received. This is the need in hand date. In conjunction with a product lead time setting the need in hand date will automatically create a need to order date that tells your purchasing person what products need to be ordered on what day. See in SmartOffice the purchasing process is driven by the project manager. Items are pushed through the system instead of pulled through by the purchasing person.
How many times has your purchasing person had to walk around the office asking everyone if they need anything from a particular vendor? We have heard of companies having whole meetings to determine what needs to be ordered that week. When was the last time you had a project delayed because there was a miscommunication in the office and a part was not ordered or delivered on time? The PM says that she asked the purchaser to order something and the purchaser says they never got the message. Well teach them to use the request system and you will have a full history of exactly when items were requested and who placed the request.
Used properly the Request screen will be your project manager’s best friend. They will be able to see the status of every product they need for every project…down to the smallest connector. You say you don’t have a project manager. Well who is responsible for making sure the job is finished on time? Is it your sales person? Or is it the president of the company? No matter what hat(s) this person wears or what size your company, give the request process a try. Not only will it help you control your inventory and make your staff more effective, it may just make your clients happier too.
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