With permission of Johann, I'm forwarding the mail below to the public
mailing list for inclusion in the list archive: There are a number of
answers which might benefit other (potential) users.
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Erik Huelsmann <ehuels(a)gmail.com>
Date: Sun, Jan 2, 2022 at 10:37 PM
Subject: Re: Questions
Hi Johann,
Thank you for your patience while you waited for my reply. Christmas
and New Year's are traditionally busy times and this year even more
so.
I have attempted to configure your program. I include
some questions
(some daft ones - but rather safe than sorry) that I would appreciate
some answers on before embarking on a more comprehensive evaluation.
No problem. Happy to answer. Before I do, one question though:
generally I tend to handle as many replies as possible through public
channels so others can benefit from the replies. There are cases where
details can't be shared. I do handle those through private
communications channels, including private e-mail. These are very
often linked to (paid) support requests though. Is there a compelling
reason to stay private? Or can we share our conversation with other
(potential) users for their benefit?
Which version is the most up to date and stable one
for such an
evaluation as I would not like to get bogged down with testing at this
stage?
Depending on which features you want to use, I'd advise you to use
1.8: 1.9 has had a few changes where people are currently experiencing
problems when converting orders to invoices. Other than that, I'm not
aware of any problems with 1.9 which would prevent you from getting
your testing done.
Questions:
1. As no COA for my country is available I had to create a new Chart of
accounts from scratch.
I also had to specify the currency as ZAR
The tax tables were also created with corresponding tax accounts in the
GL.
Are the above sufficient to have a program fully functional for
evaluation or are other country
specific modules also required to be installed?
There are no further requirements to use the application for your
country. However, other configuration may be required to take
advantage of certain functions in the application: In order to track
outstanding receivables and payables, you need to create "Contacts"
and within them "Accounts" as one example.
2. Must the user entering transactions be listed as an
emplyee?
Currently, in order to be able to log in, you need to create an
employee for every user. That's correct. (It's something which I want
to change, but it's how it is today.)
3. When creating a part I would assume that the choice
exists to enter a
mark up% or a selling price
but not both as these could in some instances contradict each other when
cost prices change?
That does sound how it should work, but I just ran some tests and it's
not how it actually works: the markup is calculated from the last cost
and the sellprice: I entered a sellprice of 12 and then purchased at
8. When I returned to the part definition screen, the markup showed
50%.
Furthermore must the list and selling prices be vat
inclusive?
That's not how I use the application. There's a checkmark on the
customer which indicates "Tax included", but I think it's impractical
to use it on customers (on vendors it's a different story), because
then sometimes the prices will be regarded as being VAT inclusive and
on other customers, they will be regarded as VAT exclusive, because
you can only register one sellprice (not one with and one without VAT;
nor can you indicate in the part that the price is VAT inclusive).
4. I was able to generate tax inclusive and exclusive
Purchase Orders
depending on how the
Vendors were configured. Is this observation correct or does the program
only allow for tax
inclusive processing. Pardon this dumb question. I really hope it is
permissible!
This is a completely correct observation.
5.When creating GL accounts I also included Heading
accounts. Presumably
these will reflect the
totalled balances of the child and other heading accounts of which it is
a parent?
That's correct. You will find that both for the PnL and the balance
sheet reports the headings will be presented with the totals of the
children.
6. When recording a purchase several workflows seem
possible:
6.1When no warehousing or goods – receive work flow is present an
invoice can be generated from
the PO?
That's correct: you can generate an invoice from the order directly
for the amount received. Once you post the invoice, items will be
added to inventory (without a specific warehouse). The number of items
entered in the "Rec'd" column will be taken out of the outstanding
order.
6.2 An invoice for a vendor can be generated from
within the AR menu
where a PO number is
required in the input?
A specific PO is not required in this case. The goods will simply be
added to the inventory when the the invoice posts. To be explicit:
when you *do* enter a PO number, this workflow leaves the PO untouched
-- it does *not* reduce the number of items outstanding in the PO.
6.3 When using the goods receive workflow (Goods –
Transfer) which is
useful for a picking list
workflow to be included, is it only permissble when a warehouse has been
defined or can it be used
without the existence of any warehouses? (as would be the case for a
small business)
The Goods > Transfer workflow is intended to move stock between
warehouses. If you want to use picking list type workflows for
shipping to customers, I would recommend using orders and the
shipping menu (Shipping > Ship for customer shipments ; Shipping >
Receive for vendor shipments).
6.4 When is the Stock account in the GL updated – only
once an invoice
for the vendor has been
posted?
Yes. And it's decremented when the inovice for the customer has been
posted. I've contemplated making a difference between "being in stock"
and "being in inventory" where the former would be "available in the
warehouse" and the latter "accounted for in the balance sheet". But I
think that's too complex for most smaller businesses, although, if you
think differently, I'd love to hear your opinion too.
Regards,
--
Bye,
Erik.
http://efficito.com -- Hosted accounting and ERP.
Robust and Flexible. No vendor lock-in.
--
Bye,
Erik.
http://efficito.com -- Hosted accounting and ERP.
Robust and Flexible. No vendor lock-in.