When your distribution company starts to grow, gaining local and global customers alike, your accounting department will find it more and more time consuming to prepare invoices.
When your distribution company starts to grow, gaining local and global customers alike, your accounting department will find it more and more time consuming to prepare invoices.
Topics: ERP, Sage, tracking, enterprise resource planning, integration, john shepperson, modules, oates co, sage erp, sales orders, credit card processing
We love our enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, and we espouse that love frequently, so it might be surprising that we admit they aren’t perfect. While searching for an ERP system to buy, you may find that some of the things you want to do – like tracking warehouse inventory and specific lots via barcoding – isn’t automatically done by the ERP. Sometimes a third-party system is necessary to collect data and bring it back into the ERP platform.
Topics: ERP, Sage, sage erp x3, enterprise resource planning, inventory, integration, john shepperson, modules, oates co, data collection, cycle counting, barcoding
When your distribution company starts to grow, gaining local and global customers alike, your accounting department will find it more and more time consuming to prepare invoices.
It’s going to be especially difficult and time consuming if you aren’t using the latest software. If you’re using software that houses information in individual silos – Office, Excel, and/or Outlook, for example – creating invoices that need support documentation will take too long. This is because the information is only available in its silo and not “out” where it’s easily accessible for everyone.
Topics: ERP, oates and co, automation, enterprise resource planning, integration, john shepperson, distribution, foreign currency, globalization, distributors
Factory and plant supervisors who are responsible for moving product down the line to warehousing and then through the distribution chain require an accurate way to identify both products and routes, which is very difficult to do manually.
Sage 100 ERP’s bar coding system, however, can help.
Topics: ERP, Sage, enterprise resource planning, Sage 100 ERP, john shepperson, oates co, manufacturing, warehouse, distribution, database, bar codes, bar coding
Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) is a technology offering that doesn’t get discussed a lot but that has been around for thirty or so years. Electronic Data Interchange is a protocol that allows a sender and a receiver – often two different businesses – to exchange information in a standardized format. This applies to all businesses that choose to use EDI, regardless of country, industry, time zone, and currency. There are several standardized formats, including those that allow private information such that the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act protects, along with others that just assure that information is understandable to all parties.
(A guide to EDI document standards can be found here.)
Topics: john shepperson, oates co, invoice, purchase order, EDI, paperless, electronic data interchange, standards, union pacific railway
Today, business partners work together from multiple continents, spanning multiple time zones – facing multiple challenges. This is especially true when it comes to accounts payable and invoicing. In the past, working with a legacy accounting system was perfectly acceptable and certainly quite common. Now, however, legacy accounting systems that are not scalable, interconnected, and without cloud access are no longer going to cut it for a company that wants to compete in the current economy.
Topics: automation, 100 ERP, accounting, legacy systems, Sage 100 ERP, john shepperson, oates co, accounts payable, duplicate entries, double billing, scalable
Spending time on business analysis will enable you to make better plans for the future of your business. The planning cycle starts with a goal of where to go, an idea of how to get there, and a method for measuring progress. Next comes evaluating the growth, asking what enabled progress, and determining what needs to change.
Topics: Sage, accounting, enterprise resource planning, john shepperson, oates co, credit policy, work papers, roll forward, schedule, debit, reconciliation, month end
It’s happened to everyone – duplicate order entries. It wouldn’t happen if only one person worked in the office and handled everything from order execution to accounting, but that isn’t how businesses are run in the real world. In the real world, of course, more than one person is needed to get the job done, and so duplicate entries can be a problem.
Duplicate entries are most likely to happen when a company is doing business the old way: with legacy systems like Excel, Word, and Outlook. Duplicate orders are difficult to avoid when using this older technology because files, orders, invoices, etc. are often spread out amongst various staff members in various offices on various computers – making it very difficult to keep things organized.
Topics: Sage, sage erp x3, Sage X3, john shepperson, excel, duplicate orders, outlook, word, duplicate entries
Process manufacturing businesses are those that create products that cannot be returned to their original form. This can include many things, like soda, which, once mixed, cannot be separated back into its original ingredients.
Since the economic decline in 2008, process manufacturing facilities worldwide have struggled to make a comeback. Each company has unique issues, but there are common problems that affect the entire industry.
Topics: ERP, Sage Software, enterprise resource planning, business solutions, john shepperson, oates co, manufacturing, process manufacturing, economy
As your business has grown, it’s getting more difficult to generate timely reports on budgets and expenses and/or to align these categories with ongoing projects.
In the past, you’ve spent way too much time searching for and gathering much needed data and relevant information. Multiple open windows led you to more windows and separate programs like Excel and Word. Sometimes you have to open Outlook too, as you need to search your emails to find the latest information about the warranty, serial number, or other parts information for a broken piece of equipment.
Topics: ERP, Sage, accounting, enterprise resource planning, Sage 100, Sage 100 ERP, john shepperson, oates co, distribution, real time, parts inventory, reduce costs
