My Company has been bought out. The new owners now want more management info from Sage. I feel like a fish out of water as I have never been asked to provide that before.
Does anyone know if I study for Sage Accreditation - will that equip me with the knowledge 'they' want. It will cost me about £ 350 or so, but I don't know if it will be worth it.
I am not an accountant, nor do I want to be! I have AAT 1 but that was 20 yrs ago!! I have always just what I call operated the software, probably without really understanding what was going on, but you don't have to. You only need to know what nominal codes they use for the business and post accordingly.
In my experience getting management info from Sage involved more excel skills that Sage skills. I find Sage abit cumbersome for this, so I just export the data to a CSV file and then manipulate this. The Sage certificate is more about using Sage than getting information out of it.
Good luck
Nick
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Nick
Nick Craggs FMAAT ACA AAT Distance Learning Manager
Hi Marina
I think you need to separate the 2 ie using Sage and producing management information.
Would you be confident producing management information if it wasn't on Sage? I am guessing that the course would give you a good knowledge of the product so that you would know where to find the necessary reports. However you may be expected to adjust for prepayments, accruals, opening and closing stock, depreciation etc. If it was me I would then critically analyse the figures before giving them to management and xcheck they looked sensible.
For example if the gp percentage had changed I would ensure that the information on Sage was correct or that I had an explanation if asked. These reports may be discussed by management in their meetings so you need to be confident that the information is accurate. It sounds like you are being asked to take on more responsibility which is great if you want to do so. However, you need to ask for a pay rise if that is the case!
Thank you very much for your comments. If I ask myself the questions - I do not want that sort of responsibility, but I would feel much more secure if I really know the software. So that has helped me Thanks
Have a look at Groupon. I have seen them offering vouchers for Sage courses but probably not accreditation. You may find that there is a course suitable for your needs at a good price.
I wouldn't bother learning about sage on a course, I would look at what it is they want to see in their reports and have a look how to gather the information from sage and as said previously use excel to design the report. You could design reports in sage for more automation but they are hard work and will use up your time.
Once you know what the end product should be then a bit of googling will help you way more than a course on sage, which in my opinion will just be a waste of money.
-- Edited by Rhianrach on Sunday 21st of September 2014 01:00:15 PM
If the new owners are asking you for something that you havent done before then it is unreasonable for them to expect you to know.
Find out exactly what they want. If on finding this you still dont know how extract what they want tell them this but will be happy to do so if you can be shown how to do it or are put on the appropriate training course.
