Ostendo Update Notes from 27 August 2008 – What’s New

Ostendo Update Notes from 27 August 2008 – What’s New

Lost Quote Re-Display & Activation

We have added the ability to select Lost quotes in the opening lists for both Jobs and Sales Orders. On selecting the Lost Quote you have the ability to click the convert button to change the status back to an active Quote status.

Job & Assembly Order Mass Closing Screens

We have added 2 new screens for the mass closing of Job and Assembly Orders (found in the Jobs & Assembly main menus). These screens allow for mass selection of specific orders and then a single button click to close those selected off (Only orders in the ‘InProgress’ or ‘Finished’ will be displayed). There are rules that are followed before allowing orders to be closed.

Job Orders

1.       A Job Order can’t be closed if there are linked outstanding purchase orders

2.       If there is an outstanding To Be Invoiced value for the Job, the user will have to confirm they wish to close the order by clicking on the ‘Allow Close’ check box

Assembly Orders

1.       An Assembly Order can’t be closed if there are linked outstanding purchase orders

2.        If the Completed Qty < Ordered Qty then the user will have to confirm they wish to close the order by clicking on the ‘Allow Close’ check box

Archiving Printed Reports

We have added the ability for companies to have pre-determined reports automatically archived. Basically this takes a snapshot of the printed output and copies it to a folder in the Ostendo Archive directory. This snapshot can then be re-printed or viewed at any time in the future via the Archive Viewer found in the main File menu. The archiving is activated by report in the Report & View Developer (File-Report Configuration menu). This feature would be most commonly used for such documents as Invoices & Statements.

Displaying and Overriding Standard Prices in Sales, Job & Direct Invoice Lines

We have added the ability to display, and if the user has been given the security rights (File-System Configuration-User Security & Options), the ability to modify the calculated standard price for the line. Previously if the Order Unit Price was changed, the discount was altered to reflect that change. In other words, we had stored what the calculated unit price was, based on the Customer price level; and then compared that stored price with actual order unit price to determine the discount (conversely, if we changed the discount percentage the order unit price changed). This basically meant that any deviations from pricing rules could be tracked. This new feature will allow that calculated standard price to be overridden, therefore allowing the user to set the Order Price & Discount to suit.

Order History Tabs for Sales, Jobs & Purchase Lines

We included an extra Order Line tab called ‘Order History’. For Sales & Job Orders this tab displays the last prices by order for that customer, for Purchases it displays all buy prices for that code from all suppliers.

Discount Matrix – Effectivity Dates & Pricing Group

We have added the ability to include Effectivity Dates against each of the discount matrix records. This allows for special or promotional discounting to be allocated to the customers price level (whereas our Special Pricing screen effectively sets a fixed price independent of the customers price level).

We have also included the extra option of ‘Pricing Group’ in the Product Level drop down.

Customer Payments – Prompt Payment Discount

We have added the ability to automatically calculate and apply prompt or early payment discounts. The terms for the discount are defined against the Credit Terms screen. There is a new drop down in the Detail tab of the Customer Payments (titled Payment Discount) that allows selection of the following:

Terms Percentage: Uses the pre-defined discount and logic from the Credit Terms settings

Fixed Percentage: Allow a fixed discount to be defaulted to all invoices

No Discount: No discount is automatically applied (you are still able to manually enter a discount amount)

Email FTP

We have added a new screen (File-Reporting Configuration-Email FTP) to allow email attachments to be sent via FTP. The reason for this, is that attachments can be blocked by a companies ISP or by their own security software. When this option is activated, whoever receives an email with an attachment will receive an HTTP link in the email body, so that they only need to click on that link to retrieve their file. Please see your computer support company for more information on how to set-up an FTP host.

Aging & Statement Periods – New Monthly Option Included

We have added an extra option to the Aging & Statement Period screens. You now have the ability to age customer invoices by the calendar month they were raised, rather than the terms or net days.

Mass Rental Availability

We have added a new screen in the main Inventory menu called Mass Rental Availability. This screen displays rental availability for all items for a specified category and specified date range (can also be run from the Sales Order screen if the Sales Type has been flagged as a Rental Order).

Rental Order Enhancements

We have improved the functionality for entering lines by:

1.       Item Codes can be swapped for the Rental Descriptor at the line level (applicable where there is not a 1 to many relationship between the charge out and items).

2.       There is a new rental line availability button that will appear for rental codes that dynamically displays the projected rental availability for the date range of the rental order.

Create Required Orders – Splitting Requirements and Fixing negotiated Buy Prices

We have added 2 new features to the Create Required Orders screen:

Split Requirements (Only applicable to Requirements generated from Replenishment)

This allows (via the Related Button) the requirement to be split across multiple Suppliers. Applicable where one supplier can’t supply the total quantity required.

Fixed Buy Price

This allows for fixed negotiated buy prices to be entered, and therefore passed through to the Purchase Order

Serial Kits

We have added a new screen called ‘Serial Kits’ found in the main Inventory menu. The idea behind this screen is to allow for the capture of components that are held against a serial controlled item. An example of this might be that a Computer system is purchased directly from a supplier and then sold on to a customer, however that computer system might be made up of several components, each having their own serial numbers and warranties etc. If a serial controlled Item Code is flagged as a serial kit (optionally a List can be defined, so that the contents can be populated automatically when receipted), a new record is automatically created in the Serial Kits screen when the Item Code is receipted, after which specific serial numbers etc can be keyed in against the components if applicable. You also have a flag against that serial kit indicating whether warranties should be created for the components.

Sales Deliveries – Process Enhancements & Scanning Mode

We have added several new fields (including employee, date & time) for capturing the delivery activities through the picking, packing and shipping process. There are also new rules defined in the Sales Rules screen to allow for alteration to that process (see Help).

To support the use of scanning (or speed keyboard entry) we have provided an additional rule in Sales Rules called ‘Delivery Line Entry Mode’. This has a drop down with 3 options:

Standard: This sets the mode of operation to how it works currently – All delivery lines are displayed in the top grid, and each have to be selected for picked lines to be keyed in.

Scanning: This sets the entry grid at the top and allows the user to scan/enter the code, serial number or barcode in any order (like POS entry), so long as the line is valid for that delivery and the quantity picked is within the customer delivery tolerance.

SingleScan: This is the same as the Scanning mode except for the fact the quantity is pre-filled with 1 and then automatically saves the line.

Inventory Availability – Free Stock Option

We have added the ability to display the Free Stock available, in the caption of the Inventory Availability button for each Order Line. This figure is dynamically calculated, and the logic comes from a new setting in the Item Rules screen called ‘Free Stock Option’ – the options are:

Not in Use:

The Free Stock is not activated

By Required Date:

The Free Stock is dynamically calculated based on the Required Date of the Order Line and the time the line was actually entered. In other words all order demands that have a required date on or before the current lines required date, are subtracted from the quantity on hand to give the quantity that is freely available to promise.

By Order Date:

The Free Stock is dynamically calculated based on the Order Date of the Order Line and the time the line was actually entered. In other words all order demands that have an order date and creation time before the current lines required date, are subtracted from the quantity on hand to give the quantity that is freely available to promise.

Colour Coding for Order Statuses in Opening Lists

We have added a new field into the Sales, Jobs, Assemblies and Purchase tables called ‘STATUSCOLOUR’, which if displayed in the opening lists (via the List Customisation) will display a pre-defined colour representing the order status (much the same as the tracking colours).

Job Task Bill – Price Changes based on Content Changes

We have changed the manner in which the option ‘Price is changed with Cost, Mark-up or Margin’ is treated when the task bill line contents are altered. Previously if any changes were made (new content lines added, deleted etc) the unit price for the task bill line would remain the same, but mark-up & margin would change; now we keep the mark-up & margin constant but change the Line unit price.

Job Calendar – Enhancements

We have added a few new features to the Job Calendar; following is some detail of each of the features:

Saving Filtered Settings

If the calendar is filtered via the various filtering options, these settings are retained when closed and re-opened later.

User Defined Info Hint

Against each Job Type (In the Job Types screen) we allow the definition of the hint text (with the ability to use merged database fields) that will appear in the calendar as you move your mouse across each job task. So this means that any information held in the Job can be displayed dynamically (eg: Phone, Contact & Address Details). See help for how to format the hint field.

Non-Scheduled Job Tasks

We have included a new field for Template Tasks and Job Tasks called ‘No Scheduling’. This option if selected, sets the duration of task to zero and also means the task won’t be displayed in the Job Calendar. The idea behind this is, there maybe many tasks in a Job, but say only 1 that is used for scheduling.

The other reason for this setting; is to allow Templates to be used when creating a Job from the Calendar, via selecting a time and then right clicking to create the Job (only templates that have 1 scheduled task will be available for selection).

Order Inventory Availability Screen

When companies stock, sell and use inventory, one of the biggest challenges and constraints is the prioritisation of that inventory – This is particularly relevant in Distribution or Manufacturing environments.

Some of the common questions are:

Which Sales Orders/Deliveries can be picked and shipped today?

Which Assembly Orders or Job Orders can be started today?

What shortages do we have if we were to meet the customer requirements?

Put simply this new screen addresses those questions and a few more.

This new screen can be found in the main ‘Requirements’ menu, with defaults for running the screen in the Requirement Rules.

When running the screen you are presented with several options:

Priority Sequencing

This allows you to define 3 levels of hierarchal rules when prioritising demands. You’ll notice that there is a Customer and Order Priority selection (Both the Customer and Order screens allow for entry of a priority number – the smaller the number the higher the priority).

How Stock is Allocated by Order

This drop down provides for 3 options (Determined by Order Full Delivery Flag, Only Full Order Fulfilment Allowed, Partial Order Fulfilment Allowed):

1.       Determined by Order Full Delivery Flag: Each order has a new field for setting whether or not the order needs to be fully picked or can be partially picked. The default when creating new Sales Orders comes from the Customer screen, for Assembly & Job Orders the default comes from the Requirement Rules.

2.       Only Full Order Fulfilment Allowed: If this option is selected only orders that can be fully supplied will be flagged as available (to pick or start)

3.       Partial Order Fulfilment Allowed: If this option is selected any order that can be partially allocated will be flagged as available.

Order Classes & Statuses

Allows the selection of the type of demand order to include and the status of each.

Demand Up to Required Date

This defines the demand order horizon date.

Future Supply Order Settings

This allows the selection of any future supply orders to be included in the shortages list. In other words what supply orders need to be followed-up / expedited for shortages.

Restrict Options

This allows the restriction of the run to either a specific site (this will only select demand orders for that site, and only warehouse for that site) or for a specific purchase receipt (this is pre-filled if run from the Related button in the Purchase Receipts screen). If a specific purchase receipt is entered only stock items on the receipt will be included in the run.

After selecting the appropriate options and clicking the OK button you will be presented with the Results screen. From this screen you are able to edit and perform various actions:

What can be modified in the results grid?

1.       Priority: This is actually the order priority, and if changed here will set the actual order priority to that value

2.       Available: This flag indicates whether this order can be picked or started based on the rules defined, but can be overridden. Remember this field is used when performing the various actions that are available from the toolbar (eg: Releasing orders, creating Deliveries & mass printing of order sheets)

3.       No Shortages Allowed: This flag indicates whether the order can be partially picked or not (comes from the actual order). If changed this will update the actual order.

Actions that can be undertaken

1.       Releasing Orders: If the order is a Job, Assembly or Counter style Sales Order, then the status will be changed to ‘InProgress’ if ‘Open’. If the Sales Order is a delivery style then Sales Deliveries can be created in mass assuming that there isn’t an existing delivery.

2.       Printing Documents: Order sheets and pick lists can be printed in mass for all Orders flagged as Available.

There is a shortages tab and report that provides a list of inventory items that were short for the demand horizon selected, and if supply orders were included, a list of purchases.

Order Creation – Improvements

We have added a couple of small speed improvements for order entry:

• We now automatically insert a new order line when a new order is created
• When in the Lines Tab of an order you are able to create a new order by using the Ctl-F5 key (rather than having to use the mouse to change tabs before creating a new order)

New Help Files

We have included 3 new Online Help Files in this version; they are as follows:

FAQ: Numerous Frequently Asked Questions that relate to all areas of Ostendo

Training: Various topics on working through operational processes

Tutorials: Short tutorials on functional areas of Ostendo

Various Small Fixes & Improvements

Various other smaller issues and enhancements that have been reported to us have also been fixed in this update.

Ostendo Update Notes from 11 July 2007 – What’s New

Ostendo Update Notes from 11 July 2007 – What’s New

Foreign Currency (Purchasing Only)

We have added the ability to define the currency code against a Supplier (The currency code definition screen is under the Financial Configuration menu). By default if the currency code is left blank against the Supplier, the system assumes local currency (there is no need to define a local currency in the currency code table, the formatting for the currency symbol is from the windows regional settings – as they have always been).

When setting up the currency codes it is important to define the 2 cost centres for receipting, all foreign currency amounts are split out into 2 components, the amount in local currency and the amount for the currency exchange difference (please refer to the Reference Help for further definition).

A currency code can only be linked to a Supplier if that Supplier doesn’t have any existing orders in the system.

Purchase Shipments (Landed Costing)

We have added a new screen for recording Purchase Shipments (either offshore or local). This screen allows the recording of charges, such as freight and duty, and also the Purchase Orders that make the shipment up. The key feature is to calculate the landed costs of all lines in that shipment by spreading the additional charges incurred for that shipment, and therefore attribute those costs to either inventory or the specific Jobs or Assemblies they were ordered for. This functionality can be critical for companies importing goods, or where local freight costs are large and the company wishes to include those in the cost of goods for the purchased products.

Some of the features of this screen are:

1)        The ability to link purchase orders from different suppliers and currencies into a single shipment

2)        The ability to add up to 6 additional charges to that shipment with each charge individually allocated to all the shipment lines by (weight, volume, cost, quantity or duty precent), and each charge can have its own currency.

3)        The shipment can be tracked via tracking codes, estimated and actual arrival dates, departure and arrival ports, and numerous other fields for shipment information

Report & View Developer

We have added the ability to modify and develop new Reports, Pivot Views, Analysis Views & Charts. Previously there was only the ability to modify the report form layouts, now there is the ability to modify what data is available, the selection conditions and even which menus and screens the report or view is associated with. To allow for this we have designed into the reporting framework, 2 layers, the System layer and the Company layer. The concept is that any reports or views that have either been modified or created from scratch are stored in the Company layer, therefore leaving the System layer to hold the standard layouts and queries – this ensures that any updates we bring out do not overwrite any company specific changes.

Say you wish to modify the ‘Purchase Order’ layout:

1)       Firstly you would go to the ‘Report & View’ Developer screen and click the Add button.

2)       After clicking Add you will presented with the ‘New Data Output’ screen – from which you would select ‘Copy from another’ radio button

3)       Then lookup the ‘Purchase Order’ report and select it

4)       Once back at the ‘New Data Output’ screen the ‘Copy to Company’ radio button will be selected

5)       Click on the ‘Create’ button. This will copy the queries and selection criteria to the ‘Company’ layer in the database, and also make a copy of the actual report layout file into a sub-folder (the name will be the same as the company ID you are currently logged into) in the Ostendo Reports directory.

6)       Now you can modify the Purchase Order layout from within this screen (by clicking on the Edit button when in the Detail tab) or via the ‘Report Layout Editor’ in the Reporting Configuration menu

Important Please Note: By introducing this new feature for any reports/layouts that you have modified you will need to do the following:

1)       Follow the steps above for each of your modified reports (likely to be Invoices, Quotes, Purchase Orders etc…)

2)       Copy in your modified report layout (it might be wise to have a copy of all the modified report layout files in one place first) into the sub-folder (named based on Company ID – eg: DEFAULT for the main company) in the Reports directory.

Please refer to the Reporting Help file for further explanation of how this all works.

Creating Purchase Invoices from Purchase Receipts

We have added the ability to create the Purchase Invoice when posting the Purchase Receipt. Although the Purchase Invoice is created and all lines are matched, you will still need to pull up the Invoice for final signoff and posting.

Extra Fields for Items, Descriptors & Catalogue Items

1)       We have added Actual Area as a field in the ‘Item Dimensions’ screen to be used for calculating total surface area in the Jobs & Assembly modules.

2)       We have added Duty % to the Items screen, for use in the Purchase Shipments screen.

3)       We have added Weight, Volume, Area & Duty % to Descriptors for the same reasons as above.

4)       We have added Weight, Volume & Area to be used for calculating total weights, volumes & areas in the Jobs & Assembly modules.

Speed Order Entry

We have added a feature to all the Order Entry screens (mainly applicable to Sales Orders) for speed entry of lines. If the ‘Order Speed Entry’ is set in the appropriate Rules screen the following will occur:

1)       If the user keys in the ‘Code’ field and then uses the ‘Enter/Return’ key, the focus will be moved to the ‘Qty’ field and then if the ‘Enter/Return’ is used again, the current line will be saved and a new line will be inserted waiting for the next code.

2)       If the user wishes to adjust the unit price, instead of using the ‘Enter/Return’ key on the ‘Qty’ field, the ‘Tab’ key can be used to move to the Unit Price field and then after making the adjustment the ‘Enter/Return’ key then saves an creates the new line.

Financial Order Flows

We have added 4 new Financial Flow Reports (Sales, Purchasing, Jobs & Assemblies). These can be run from the General-Reports menu and pictorially display the (Debits & Credits) financial flow for each order style.