MBS welcomes three new executives:  Paul White, Sr. Director, ERP Product Management; Adrian Johnston, General Manager, Dynamics Asia Time Zone; and Benoit de la Tour, Vice Presendent, Dynamics EMEA Time Zone.

Paul White, Senior Director, Microsoft Dynamics ERP Product Management

In the Microsoft Dynamics ERP Product Marketing Group, Paul White has recently taken the role of Senior Director of ERP Product Management, responsible for Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft Dynamics GP and Microsoft Dynamics SL and their go-to-market strategies.  Coming from the UK subsidiary where he has been leading a very successful Dynamics business, Paul brings 20 years of experience to his new role where he and his team will develop the breakthrough strategies that will enable us to significantly grow our “ERP volume” business.

Adrian Johnston, General Manager, Dynamics Asia Time Zone

Adrian Johnston has joined as General Manager, Dynamics Asia Time Zone which includes APAC, India, China and Japan.  Adrian joined Microsoft two years ago as General Manager for Dynamics in the Asia Pacific region.  Before coming to Microsoft, Adrian spent 11 years at Oracle Asia Pacific giving him a deep history and expertise in this region.  

Benoit de la Tour, Vice President, Dynamics EMEA Time Zone

Benoit de la Tour has been appointed as the Vice President, Dynamics EMEA Time Zone leader.  Benoit brings over 25 years of experience as a sales and marketing professional in the IT industry. He has spent most of his career working with software vendors, selling BI, ERP and CRM solutions. Benoit joins from Infor where he held senior leadership roles including his most recent assignment as the Senior Vice President & General Manager EMEA.

Both Adrian and Benoit will drive business results and long term growth across their respective regions for MBS. 

Congratulations and welcome — Paul, Adrian, and Benoit!

Payables Management

Exclude inactive vendors in Vendors lookup
You can now exclude all inactive vendor records from the Vendors lookup window.  You also can set a default view.

Exclude expired discounts from payments
You can select a Payables Management setup option to exclude expired discounts from payments when you select checks for a computer check run. If you exclude expired discounts and select a range for due date/discount date cutoffs, the discount date for vouchers is compared with the apply date entered in the Select Payables Checks window. If the apply date is after the discount date for a voucher, the voucher isn’t included.

Select multiple ranges for payables check runs
To narrow the group of vendors and documents you want to pay, you can select multiple ranges in the Select Payables Checks window. You can select a separate range for vendor IDs, vendor names, class IDs, payment priorities, voucher numbers, document numbers, due date/discount date cutoffs, and document currency. In previous releases of Microsoft Dynamics GP, you could select only one range for vendors and one range for documents to narrow the group of vendors and
vouchers to pay.

Vendor approval workflow added
You can submit vendors to a workflow approval process. The process allows multiple approvers, depending on user-defined rules, and allows users who aren’t Microsoft Dynamics GP users to approve workflows. When a vendor is ready to be approved, approvers can be notified and the vendor can be approved, using Microsoft Outlook®, Microsoft Dynamics GP, or Microsoft Internet Explorer®.

Receivables Management

Enter negative cash receipts
You can enter a negative cash receipt for the purpose of decreasing a deposit. The negative amount flows through the system in the same way as a positive cash receipt, but is shown as a deposit with a negative amount.

Enter recurring cash receipts batches
If you receive the same or similar payment amounts from your customers, you can create a recurring batch for your cash receipts to speed data entry.

Exclude inactive customers in Customers lookup
You can now exclude all inactive customer records from the Customers and Prospects lookup window. You also can set a default view.

Exclude inactive salespeople from Salespeople lookup
You can now exclude all inactive salespeople records from the Salespeople lookup window. You also can set a default view.

Set up lockboxes at payment processing centers
You can set up lockboxes at payment processing centers to automatically import cash receipts transaction files into Microsoft Dynamics GP so you don’t have to enter each of the transactions individually.

Next time:  What’s New in GP2010 – Collections Management and Electronic Banking…

Are these what you have been asking for?

Exclude inactive accounts in Accounts lookup
You can now exclude all inactive account records from the Accounts lookup window.

Clear recurring batch amounts
You can now clear the distribution amounts for all transactions on recurring batches after you post a batch. You can navigate through the distribution lines and enter new amounts for each period.

Combine multiple General Ledger budgets into a single, master budget
You can combine multiple General Ledger budgets into a single, master budget, one budget at a time. The master budget can be completely new and have its own budget ID, or it can be one of the two original budgets. This feature is helpful when multiple departments in your organization create their own budgets, which must then be consolidated. The new Combine Budgets window simplifies this process.

Comply with International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) requirements
Microsoft Dynamics GP now includes features that meet compliance standards for IFRS. You can identify transactions for local GAAP, IFRS, or other accounting purposes, and you can define ledgers for each purpose. You can select one or more ledgers for financial reports and inquiries. Also, you can generate distributions automatically as part of the year-end closing or currency revaluation process.

Create budget transactions
You can now create a transaction solely against a budget. You can view a list of budget transactions, make adjustments, and then update the budget from the list.

 Next time:  What’s New in GP2010 – Payables and Receivables Management…

Merchants who cut costs to the bone during the downturn and aren’t yet seeing business recover to post-recession levels are taking the unusual step of ramping up spending on innovation in search of the next new thing, experts said at a retail conference this week. It’s a gamble — retail sales aren’t likely to rebound robustly until unemployment eases considerably, said National Retail Federation President and CEO Matthew Shay.  Click on the link below to read the rest of the story.

Retailers invest in innovation – Related Stories – NRF SmartBrief.

Every business has its own terminology. For example, many of us refer to our customers as “customers”. However, professionals tend to refer to them as “clients”, while conference organizers refer to them as “participants” or “attendees”. The list goes on.  As you would expect, products targeted towards a specific industry will use the appropriate industry specific terminology throughout their product. Products targeted towards many different types of businesses will use more generic terminology throughout their product.  This makes sense – right?

As you would expect, products targeted towards a specific industry will use the appropriate industry specific terminology throughout their product. Products targeted towards many different types of businesses will use more generic terminology throughout their product.  This makes sense – right?

The problem is that many people fall into the trap of concluding that just because a product contains their particular terminology, that it must be ideally suited for their needs. I can assure you, it takes a quantum leap jump to reach this conclusion. Avoid being lured in by a product’s industry specific terminology. Instead, look past the terminology for specific features, functionality, and modules.

The benefits of Microsoft Dynamics® GP are clear, no matter what terminology you’re familiar with:

• Microsoft Dynamics GP’s Integration with familiar products, such as Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Excel makes for a streamlined work flow and is a top feature of the product.
• Microsoft Dynamics GP provides functionality to help you compare budgets, forecasts, and plans to actual performance. It also gives you the ability to update budgets and plans on the basis of new data and analyses to help your business stay competitive.
• There are oodles of Modules within Microsoft Dynamics GP . For example, Receivables Management in Microsoft Dynamics GP helps you maintain tight control over Accounts Receivables by providing the capabilities to help you track invoices, process receipts, and analyze customer activity.

InterDyn LANAC Technology is a leading business consulting and development firm, specializing in Microsoft Dynamics GP, that serves mid-market organizations to provide business and information automation to help them drive increased productivity.

By InterDyn LANAC Technology, a leading Chicago, Illinois Microsoft Dynamics GP Partner

In July 2009, more than 1,400 business technology professionals weighed in on their Windows 7 deployment plans. At the time, we saw a general feeling of discontent with Microsoft’s direction, laced with an undercurrent of malice. A vocal minority gave us an earful about Vista’s failure in the enterprise, but what really fanned the flames was XP’s impending end of life. One respondent, in an interesting-albeit somewhat maudlin-analogy, compared XP’s demise with forcing your perfectly healthy 10-year-old Labrador retriever into a doggy nursing home. Such compelling philosophical arguments aside, most CIOs and IT staffers expressed serious skepticism that Windows 7 would deliver real business value.

What a difference a few months can make.

Click here to read the rest of the story on Practical Migration: How To Master Your Win 7 Rollout

Top 10 Reasons to Upgrade to GP2010 

1.    Better insight:  Dashboards and KPI’s with Drill-Back
2.    Get more out of Excel:  Predictive Modeling and Analysis
3.    Work with over 90 Built-In SRS Reports
4.    Create Professional External Documents:  Word Forms
5.    Tailor Your List Pages:  Navigation List Builder
6.    Create mini-applications:  Extender
7.    Connect easier with People:  Communicator Integration
8.    Integrate Systems Better:  Web Services
9.    Leverage Other Technologies:  64 Bit, Workflow on WSF
10. Upgrades are Easy:  Proven by beta customers going live (most successful upgrade ever!)

If you are interested in learning more, please feel free to give us a call 312.506.3533.

Using your laptop to get work done away from your office or on the road is becoming widely accepted. But this rapid growth in laptop computing has made portable systems the target for theft around the world. If your laptop computer is stolen, company information can be exposed, as well as your personal and financial information.

Use these 9 tips to learn how you can keep your laptop more secure when you’re on the road.

1. Avoid using computer bags
Computer bags can make it obvious that you’re carrying a laptop. Instead, try toting your laptop in something more common like a padded briefcase or suitcase.

2. Never leave access numbers or passwords in your carrying case
Keeping your password with your laptop is like keeping the keys in the car. Without your password or important access numbers it will be more difficult for a thief to access your personal and corporate information.

click here to read more of this article of 9 ways to increase the security of your laptop while on the road

While RMS does a great job of handling most retail functions, there are some industries that require extra functionality not available “out of the box”.  One example is liquor stores and bars.  One customer we work with is a wine bar/shop in Chicago.  They were fine with the selling and ordering of wine within RMS, but being a wine bar and hosting events they needed the capability to record tips and handle tabs. 

For tracking tips, we gave them a custom button that printed a receipt that included a tip line, before the sale was complete.  Customers would fill out this receipt then the whole sale could be tendered with the tip included.  For handling customer tabs, we gave them another custom button that used the RMS “Hold Transaction” function and provided a quick, easy to use interface to recall transactions, add an item, and put the transaction back on hold without having to re-enter the transaction reference.  It has been very successful for them.

For more information on this new product, download our documentation here.

For a limited time Microsoft is offering RMS customers re-enrollment into their service plan without having to pay the fees usually associated with letting your maintenance lapse!  Hurry, because it will end on June 25th, 2010!

This is an incredible offer and well-timed because Microsoft will be releasing a major service pack in the second half of 2010 that it is calling “Feature Pack 1″ because of all of the new features it will add.  Here are some of the highlights:

• New KPI reports including inventory turns, GMROI, inventory valuation.
• Key metrics in manual purchasing.
• Centralized Purchasing Improvements
• Partial Shipments and payments.
• Landed cost.
• Global Vouchers managed centrally across all stores.
• Documentation Updates

Being current on your Microsoft Service Plan is critical because if you have lapsed you be unable to receive this Feature Pack.  Contact LANAC Technology today to discuss getting current or staying current with your Microsoft Service Plan!