I work for an advertising publishing company. has anyone ever heard of software called PULSE that can be integrated into Sage Line 50. The company that own the software are telling me that they can import invoice numbers into Sage using alpha numeric sequencing. I do not think this is possible in Sage? I thought invoice numbers were always just numeric. I would be really interested to know if anyone has any experience of PULSE software
Sequential invoice numbers generated by Sage itself *I think* need to be numeric. However. the invoice number field is alphanumeric - so if the invoices are generated externally, they can indeed be alphanumeric.
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Vince M Hudd - Soft Rock Software
(I only came here looking for fellow apiarists...)
Agree with Vince. Not sure if you can do a data dump direct from Pulse as never used their software, but you can presumably dump their data into excel if required then manipulate it to dump into Sage. When you do this you can use whatever alpha numeric sequencing you like. Pulse might be able to export the data in the correct format for you. I have a client who has had their own software built but unfortunately at the moment the data doesnt transpose to sage without some interference by me, but they are working on it!
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Joanne
Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017
Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.
You should check out answers with reference to the legal position
Thanks everyone for your comments - It seems that, as normal, nothing is ever as easy as it made out to be . The purpose of the external software was to make a seamless integration into Sage if we wished. ( their words not mine). I had a go at exporting the invoice numbers generated into excell and then typing the number into sage manually but it will not accept alpha numeric numbers typed in the invoice field. The point is that we have spent alot of time and effort getting account refs etc in Sage in an easy way to locate customer accounts, so we do not want a full import from an external source messing up our accounts data. We wanted to keep Sage separate. Another thing is that if data requires manipulation why bother with it? It was intended to improve efficiency and thus increase sales , but at the moment it seems that it isn't going to be quite like that! I'll keep you posted if it turns out to be a roaring success !! Cheers
Hi Marine
Before you give up completely can I ask where you are trying to enter the invoice info, as I'm thinking you are going in the wrong place. I'm not on my PC today and am out at clients shortly for the rest of the day, so perhaps do me a screen shot?
I only mentioned the data manipulation because that's a problem I've faced when doing such, as I wasn't looking after this client when they started on the whole process and I was never consulted about how to make the process more seemless, however now it's being looked at, so with Pulse it may be that they can provide the data in the exact format you need, or it might need some manipulation that might only take 5 minutes. I have an audit trail transaction file that matches sages requirements exactly and happy to chat through what goes in each box if you need that extra help so that you can go back to Pulse and see if they can provide the info at the source point, then it would be just a case of a date import to sage, easy peasy.
Let me know if you want some further assistance and I will be back on later tonight.
__________________
Joanne
Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017
Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.
You should check out answers with reference to the legal position
If you import into the audit trail it is an alpha numeric.
If you want to import into the invoicing module then it has to be numeric.
I have come across other system we have integrated with Sage where the other system used a range of prefixes and the customer wanted the invoices in the invoicing module.
I got around it by doing a substitution so the AX range had 100000 added to the invoice number the TB range 200000 and so on.
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"I had a go at exporting the invoice numbers generated into excell and then typing the number into sage manually but it will not accept alpha numeric numbers typed in the invoice field."
My initial thought on reading this is that I probably know why that is - and I've just checked to confirm my theory.
I think what you are doing is going to the screen for generating an invoice in Sage. When using that screen, no, the invoice number field isn't alphanumeric; it's numeric only. The reason is so that Sage can automatically increment the number (although if programmed correctly, they wouldn't have to be quite so limited)
If your invoices are generated externally to Sage, however, there should be no need to enter them in Sage using that screen. If you were entering externally generated invoices manually into Sage, you would use the 'Batch Invoice' screen on the customer ledger - doing so that way, and you can use alphanumeric invoice numbers.
The next step up from that would be to import the invoices (which I do for some clients) - and, again, when doing that you can have alphanumeric invoice numbers.
Finally, if the company that produces Pulse is a registered Sage developer, the software will be able to directly access its database and update it - and, again, in this scenario, full alphanumeric numbers are possible.
"The point is that we have spent alot of time and effort getting account refs etc in Sage in an easy way to locate customer accounts, so we do not want a full import from an external source messing up our accounts data."
If Pulse is integrating with Sage, that's where it'll get the customer data from in the first place - so in that scenario, there should be no problem.
"We wanted to keep Sage separate."
If it is being run separately, so that invoices have to be imported, then as long as the customer records are [able to be] set up in Pulse the same way as they are in Sage, again it shouldn't be a problem. Ideally, in this case, you would start by exporting the customer data from Sage and import it into Pulse in order to set it up so that it matches.
"Another thing is that if data requires manipulation why bother with it? It was intended to improve efficiency and thus increase sales , but at the moment it seems that it isn't going to be quite like that!"
As Cheshire suggests, if the software is being set up with import into Sage in mind, manipulating the data isn't going to be an issue. I'm in a similar situation she describes in some cases, because the invoicing system was set up without regard to the needs of getting it into Sage.
Though do bear in mind that if it's being run separately, so that it isn't integrated and you do have to use the import facility, you will have to get any records for new customers into Sage before importing (they will presumably be set up in Pulse in the first instance for the purpose of raising the invoices). If the imported data refers to a sales ledger account that doesn't exist, you will get a list of errors - the lines in the import file that contain such references.
(In my cases, I use those errors as a tool; go through the import, the import fails with the lines with referring to a new customer, check the file to find the customer names, send an email to a client with the list of customers for whom I need full details exported from their software. I then import the customer details they send me, then the invoice data again - this time, unsurprisingly, it loads without a problem.)
__________________
Vince M Hudd - Soft Rock Software
(I only came here looking for fellow apiarists...)
"I had a go at exporting the invoice numbers generated into excell and then typing the number into sage manually but it will not accept alpha numeric numbers typed in the invoice field."
My initial thought on reading this is that I probably know why that is - and I've just checked to confirm my theory.
I think what you are doing is going to the screen for generating an invoice in Sage. When using that screen, no, the invoice number field isn't alphanumeric; it's numeric only. The reason is so that Sage can automatically increment the number (although if programmed correctly, they wouldn't have to be quite so limited)
If your invoices are generated externally to Sage, however, there should be no need to enter them in Sage using that screen. If you were entering externally generated invoices manually into Sage, you would use the 'Batch Invoice' screen on the customer ledger - doing so that way, and you can use alphanumeric invoice numbers.
The next step up from that would be to import the invoices (which I do for some clients) - and, again, when doing that you can have alphanumeric invoice numbers.
Finally, if the company that produces Pulse is a registered Sage developer, the software will be able to directly access its database and update it - and, again, in this scenario, full alphanumeric numbers are possible.
"The point is that we have spent alot of time and effort getting account refs etc in Sage in an easy way to locate customer accounts, so we do not want a full import from an external source messing up our accounts data."
If Pulse is integrating with Sage, that's where it'll get the customer data from in the first place - so in that scenario, there should be no problem.
"We wanted to keep Sage separate."
If it is being run separately, so that invoices have to be imported, then as long as the customer records are [able to be] set up in Pulse the same way as they are in Sage, again it shouldn't be a problem. Ideally, in this case, you would start by exporting the customer data from Sage and import it into Pulse in order to set it up so that it matches.
"Another thing is that if data requires manipulation why bother with it? It was intended to improve efficiency and thus increase sales , but at the moment it seems that it isn't going to be quite like that!"
As Cheshire suggests, if the software is being set up with import into Sage in mind, manipulating the data isn't going to be an issue. I'm in a similar situation she describes in some cases, because the invoicing system was set up without regard to the needs of getting it into Sage.
Though do bear in mind that if it's being run separately, so that it isn't integrated and you do have to use the import facility, you will have to get any records for new customers into Sage before importing (they will presumably be set up in Pulse in the first instance for the purpose of raising the invoices). If the imported data refers to a sales ledger account that doesn't exist, you will get a list of errors - the lines in the import file that contain such references.
(In my cases, I use those errors as a tool; go through the import, the import fails with the lines with referring to a new customer, check the file to find the customer names, send an email to a client with the list of customers for whom I need full details exported from their software. I then import the customer details they send me, then the invoice data again - this time, unsurprisingly, it loads without a problem.)
Says it all Vince!
__________________
Joanne
Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017
Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.
You should check out answers with reference to the legal position
