Year-End 2022 Edition

Dear Clients,

Not all corporate fiscal years end with December 31st, but it’s certainly the most popular—so this edition of our newsline focuses on the process far enough ahead of that date for you to plan ahead. If you have questions, remember that NexLAN provides FREE telephone and e-mail support toll free at 877-2NEXLAN or via support@nexlan.com. And if you don’t have the “Emergency Contact List” of all our cell numbers for off-hours assistance, then please contact us.

AccountMate

Keep in mind that until you close the fiscal year you won’t have beginning balances on the Balance Sheet for the next fiscal year. And, since there’s only a three-year posting window, if you get a whole year behind then you won’t be able to enter ANY transactions—which we see regularly from clients who aren’t actively using General Ledger in their installations. Yes, it’s true that once you’ve closed a fiscal period then the source transactions aren’t editable, but you can always post back. So don’t confuse “closing” the period with “Posting Period Restrictions.” And the final reason to close is so that you can then post back into The Magic 13th Period of the prior fiscal year and not obscure the operational financial performance of your actual 12th period.

By far the best advice we can give is: MAKE A BACKUP OF THE COMPANY DATABASE AT THE END OF YOUR FISCAL YEAR!!!

Even if you’re not closing the fiscal year, it’s INVALUABLE to have that snapshot for validating the Balance Sheet since the “as of” reports in the system can be adversely affected by back-dated transactions. A backup is easy for a geek to do from inside the Microsoft SQL Server Management Console, but our NexSQLBack utility makes it simple even for non-geeks, just a couple mouse-clicks—so please contact us in the next month if you don’t already have NexSQLBack installed.

For the actual nuts and bolts of the closing process here’s links to detailed written instructions and then to videos—with all information applicable to AccountMate SQL and LAN from Version 8 up to the current release:

• Article # 1257: Period-End Closing Procedures
• Article # 1258: Common Closing Errors
• Article # 1261: Year-End Closing Procedures
• Article # 1262: Year-End Closing Tech Tips
• Video: Closing the Period in AccountMate presents the recommended procedures for closing the period in subsidiary modules and identifies some common issues that may be encountered during closing with tips on how to resolve them.
• Video: Fiscal Year-End Closing in AccountMate focuses on the requirements and procedures for closing the fiscal year in the General Ledger module. It also provides tips to help effectively perform year-end closing.

Here’s the special considerations if you run AccountMate Payroll in-house:

• Regardless of when your fiscal year ends, or if you’re closing the fiscal year on/about December 31st, you’ll need to run <Housekeeping><W-2/1099 Year-End Closing> very near that date. This is usually done as part of the payroll tax update process.
• Video: Closing the Payroll Tax Year in AccountMate discusses the steps to close the Payroll tax year and identifies the reports affected by the tax year closing process.
• Not your CPA talking: The IRS has increased the 401(k) individual contribution limit for 2022 to $22,500. The “catch-up contribution limit” for individuals age 50 and over has increased to $6,500. Please update your employee-specific deduction limits appropriately after closing 2022.
• Release of the 2023 Payroll Tax Update is expected in late December and Rachel will be in touch soon to discuss scheduling this important and required update to your system.

Finally, physical inventory count isn’t technically part of closing the fiscal year, but the two often go hand-in-hand—so if you also have that on your list then be sure to check out our NewsLine on Hot Dogs and Physical Inventory Counts for some valuable insight on the process.

Acumatica

We’ve put together a comprehensive document on the closing procedures for each module, including 1099 processes in the AP module. Please check out Acumatica Period-End and Year-End Closing Procedures, and we’re standing by for questions!

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In other news…

➤Our Nowsight Simple BI for AccountMate webinar was a smashing success! Nowsight Simple BI helps you to see more of the gold nuggests of data that are already in your system, and extract business value from that insight. If you missed the webinar, be sure to check out our page on Nowsight Business Intelligence to watch the recording of the presentation and learn more about the plug-in.

➤We’ve recently made some updates to our Meet the Team page and, yes, those alternate email addresses actually work – so feel free to drop fancypants@nexlan.com a line any time!

Regards,

Kevin E. Stroud
kestrou@nexlan.com
NexLAN, LLC
https://nexlan.com

February 1 AccountMate SQL/Express Core Product Training

Registration for the next scheduled offering of AccountMate’s 6-week Core Product Training opens in early December. Classes are held online two days per week on Wednesday and Thursday for six weeks, from February 1 to March 9, 2023.

Check out the details:

• Course Overview (including how many free seats you qualify for if you’re on Lifecycle Maintenance, and info about sending different people in your company to sessions on different modules)
• Course Outline
• Course Schedule

Bring up the training at your next team meeting and find out if any of your users want to learn a new module to expand their skills or fill in gaps in areas that they learned on the job and now want to better master in AccountMate. Recent new hires, and employees who’ve taken on new responsibilities, may wish to take the full 6-week class to come up to speed on what your AccountMate system offers them.

Call or email us if you have questions or if you’d like to register.

Ideas for Doing More to Manage Supply Chain Challenges

Am sure you’ve figured out ways to respond and manage the supply chain issues that have popped up in recent years. Yet there’s more supply chain work that can be done to position your business to remain competitive and thrive when the next issues pop up in 2023 and beyond.

A good place to start is to assess the paths of data that currently flow within your company, and to/from external businesses like your suppliers and customers. Draw a map to identify the places where the data flows to an endpoint and stops. Consider how your financial data and your money flow; how your physical items flow; how your sales orders flow; and how your supplier and customer communications flow. Pinpoint where information flows automatically versus manually—or not at all.

Then explore ways to extend the flow beyond the current endpoints to bring more visibility, faster, to the people who could make use of the information. So that you can proactively take smarter actions, based on newly visible trends or developing problems—before they get bigger and you get trapped with fewer and more costlyoptions when they finally do become visible on their own.

Examples:

• If you work with vendor-managed inventory or consigned inventory, might you extend the flow of data so that you and your partner companies can each better monitor inventory levels and automatically trigger low stock alerts, purchase order generation, and shipments to move stock to replenish other locations?
• If you’re now managing more vendors than before, to maximize your options when supply fluctuates, might you benefit by extending your automation and data flow to those vendors by automating vendor bidding and approvals for stock and non-stock items? Imagine automatically emailing requests to suppliers, digitally collecting bids, and converting winning bids directly into vendor records and purchase orders.
• If you’re currently providing or receiving regular reports to/from your suppliers, might you benefit from having an always-current secure private dashboard with that data available for both you and your suppliers to access anytime?

It’s the idea of removing friction from your system, via a single, fully-integrated system where the data automatically flows to wherever it can add value.

Bonus: Most things you do to improve data flow across your company and into your supply chain, also result in direct benefits for your customers and their experience in working with you.

Mitigate Supply Chain Disruption with Acumatica Cloud ERP is an 11-page PDF chock-full of ideas. Just scroll through it asking yourself for each item, “Have we automated this—could we be doing more here with data flow and easier visibility?” You’re sure to end up with a few ideas for process and technology improvements to put your company in a stronger position to handle the next new supply chain challenges. Reach out to us with questions or to ask how other companies do something (“industry best practices!”), or to get an automation project in motion to improve an aspect of your supply chain management.

AccountMate Tech Note: How to Determine the Physical Count Variance During and After an Inventory Physical Count

A physical count variance is the difference between the actual quantity or volume of an inventory item counted during the physical inventory count and the quantity shown in the inventory records. While it is not unusual that in every physical count variances may occur, it is important to obtain physical count variance information by means of a variance report. This variance report is prepared to record and help rectify inventory control problems. Most, if not all, organizations require that variances be kept at an acceptable level; the variance report can be used as the basis for management to demand that unfounded variances be investigated, and the causes are determined and resolved.

Article #1095: How to Determine the Physical Count Variance During and After an Inventory Physical Count assists you in understanding how AccountMate records physical count variances. This article also lists the functions and reports that are available in the system and guides you as to when would be the appropriate time to perform and generate them.

AccountMate Tech Note: Understanding the Inventory Acceptance Feature

The practice of inventory acceptance confirmation provides buyers the opportunity to inspect, approve, and receive delivered goods. The seller can only invoice a shipment once the customer has confirmed his or her acceptance of the delivered goods. This practice is beneficial to a business because it will lessen the incidence of sales returns and helps avoid misunderstandings relating to the delivery and receipt of goods.

Article #1326: Understanding the Inventory Acceptance Feature discusses the procedures for activating and setting up the feature. It also enumerates affected sales processes including the General Ledger entries generated from transactions. 

AccountMate Tech Note: Understanding the Effects of the Inventory Acceptance Feature on Inventory Quantities and General Ledger Entries

The Inventory Acceptance feature provides users the capability to track the sold items that are subject to conditions, monitor the shipped items that require acceptance, record the shipped items’ acceptance or rejection, and record the returned items’ receipt. With these capabilities, it is important to understand the effects that the Inventory Acceptance feature has on the inventory quantities and the generated journal entries. 

Article #1327: Understanding the Effects of the Inventory Acceptance Feature on Inventory Quantities and General Ledger Entries, discusses the effects each inventory acceptance transaction has on the inventory quantities and the generated journal entries. It also discusses the relevant reports. 

Acumatica Technical Tips

Q: Is there a way to generate a customer statement showing the detail of both open and closed documents? I am trying to pull the customer statement with detail to indicate what has been paid or received and what is still open.

A: You can run the AR Balance by Customer report. On the Report Format drop down, be sure to select All Documents.

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Q: How can we apply a partial payment in Acumatica? After the invoice is released, the invoice is $100, and the customer paid only $70. When we applied the $70 in the payment, it shows “the document is out of balance.”

A: Create a payment from the Payment and Application screen for $70. Then in the Documents to Apply tab, add the respective invoice and make $70 the Amount Paid, then Release the Payment.

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Q: When receiving drop ship items, I cannot add serial numbers. We need to be able to track the serial numbers for drop ship orders as well.

Also, where do I add serial numbers to stock kit items?

A: To enter lot/serial numbers, select the Required for Drop-Ship check box on the Lot/Serial Classes (IN207000) form for the lot/serial class of the item.

Then it will be possible to click the Line Details button and specify lot/serial number.

For the kit items, add the serial numbers during the assembly process. Click the Line Details button and it will pop up a Line Details box for you to enter the serial number.

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AccountMate Technical Tips

Versions: AM12 for SQL, Express, and LAN
AM11 for SQL and Express
AM10 for SQL, Express, and LAN
AM9 for LAN

Modules: IC, PO

Q: We have an item for which we have several received goods transactions based on the Received Goods Report; however, the item’s on-hand quantity and average cost never get updated. Why?

A: This happens if the Update On-hand checkbox is not marked in the Inventory Maintenance ► Settings (1) ► General area. The Receive Goods function will update the item’s on-hand quantity and average cost only if the item is set to update on-hand quantity.

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Versions: AM12 for SQL, Express, and LAN
AM11 for SQL and Express
AM10 for SQL, Express, and LAN
AM9 for LAN

Module: PR

Q: I entered the wrong pay period when applying payroll. I have already printed the checks and generated the ACH file. How do I correct the pay period dates?

A: To correct the pay period dates, you must void the check and unmark the Keep the applied payment checkbox in the Void Payroll Check function. Then, apply payroll again and enter the correct pay period dates. Print check or generate the ACH file for the applied payroll.

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Versions: AM12 for SQL, Express, and LAN
AM11 for SQL and Express
AM10 for SQL, Express, and LAN
AM9 for LAN

Module: SO

TIP: On-hold sales orders are different from sales orders on credit hold. They are two separate features.

On-hold sales orders are the sales order for which the Create Sales Order ► Information ► On-Hold checkbox is marked. This prevents the sales order from being shipped due to reasons other than customer credit issues (e.g., the company is waiting for further instructions before shipping the order).

Sales orders on credit hold are the sales orders for customers who exceeded their credit limit at the time the sales order is created. This feature is enabled when the SO Module Setup ► General (1) ► Enable SO Credit Hold checkbox is marked.

The Exclude On-Hold Orders checkbox in the Open Sales Order Report user interface is for on-hold orders, not for sales orders on credit hold. The sales orders on credit hold are not displayed in the Open Sales Order Report. Generate Credit Hold Sales Order Report to get a list of sales orders on credit hold.

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