Sage 50 / Peachtree Tips

Sage 50 2017.2 Update New Features

Sage recently started rolling out the second update (2017.2) to Sage 50 2017. Updates are released gradually to users so that Sage’s servers (and technical support) don’t get overwhelmed. Everyone on a current subscription or Business Care plan should receive the download notification soon. You can also go to the Services menu in Sage 50 and choose Check For Updates to see if it’s available to you yet.

So here’s what’s new in this update:

Click-to-Pay Invoicing: If you use Sage Payment Solutions to process credit/debit cards or virtual checks (ACH payments), you can now include a link when you email an invoice so your customer can pay online. The link will take them to a secure web page where they can enter a credit/debit card or their bank information. You can then download their payment directly into Sage 50 as a cash receipt (Receive Money) transaction and it will be applied to the invoice just as if you had entered it yourself.

>>The rest of the new features only apply to Sage 50c users.

Enhanced Sage One Mobile Invoicing: Online invoicing through integration with Sage One was introduced in version 2017.1; you can read more about that here. Three significant improvements have been made to online/mobile invoicing. (1) Your Sage 50 sales taxes are automatically uploaded to Sage One. (2) Your Sage 50 inventory and service items are automatically uploaded to Sage One. (3) Receipts (from customers who use the click-to-pay option) are automatically downloaded into Sage 50.

Sage Contact app for Microsoft Office 365 Business Premium: The Office 365 connection wizard will sync customer and vendor contact information between your Sage 50 company and Office 365 (requires 365 Business Premium). In addition to being able to having basic contact information, the Sage Contact app will allow you to see the last 5 invoices and last 5 receipts/payments within the last 90 days. Contact information changed in the Sage Contact app will sync back to your Sage 50c data. You can schedule the sync to run every 4, 12, or 24 hours as well as initiating it manually.

Improved Office 365 Cloud Backup: This is another feature that was added in 2017.1 but has been now been improved. You no longer have to run Sage 50 as administrator for the Office 365 Cloud Backup to work, and behind the scenes improvements were made to help with backup of large companies. Lastly, the interface for email notification has been updated.

I’m not yet an Office 365 user so I couldn’t make a demo video for the new features, but here is Sage’s video covering the new features in Sage 50 2017.2.

Sage 50 / Peachtree Tips

Item Sales History By Customer list

The Item Sales History By Customer list can show you every sale of every inventory item (including non-stock, service, and labor) along with the customer, date, unit price, and more. And if you double click on any line, it will open that transaction so you can get all the details.

The primary method of accessing this list is through the Lists menu. Just click on Lists > Inventory & Services > Item Sales History By Customer. At the top of the window, you can choose to look at a single inventory item or all. Next choose the date range you want to see. You’ll get a list of all sales for the item(s) you selected. The search function acts like a filter and lets you find information in any column. You can also click on any column heading to sort by that column. For example, you could click on Customer Name to see what each customer is buying or Date to see when an item is being purchased. Like all other lists, you can click on the Settings button at the top to add or remove columns, such as sales rep, invoice number, or last unit cost (sorry but there’s no way to add the actual cost of goods sold).

Remember that all lists can be sent to Excel so if you want to filter on more than one column or add subtotals, such as by customer, just click on the Send To button and choose Excel.

You can also add the Item Sales History By Customer list to the Customer Managements Center. Click on the Customers & Sales tab on the left side of the main Sage 50/Peachtree window, then click on Customer Management and Customize This Page. You will be able to see all the same information as the full list, but filtered down to just the customer you are currently viewing in the Customer Management center.

If you have Sage 50 Quantum, the Item Sales History By Customer can also be added to the My Dashboard area. From My Dashboard, click the Customize This Page button. Find Item Sales History By Customer in the list and click the Add button. When using it from the dashboard, you can limit it to a single item using the Item ID drop down list or click the Show All button to list sales for all items. Click the Advanced Search link to filter on another column.

Sage 50 / Peachtree Tips

Sage 50 Audit Trail Report – Answering Who, What, & When

Have you ever wished you had a way to find out when a transaction was entered into Sage 50 or who entered it? How about a way to find out if something was changed or deleted? Well that’s exactly what the Audit Trail Report is for.

To find the report, go to the Reports & Forms menu and choose Company. There you’ll see Audit Trail Report. If you double click the report name it will display today’s activity. By that I mean activity that took place today, regardless of the date on the transaction. For example, a payment that was entered yesterday with today’s date on it it won’t show on the report, but a general journal entry that was entered today and dated in last month will be included on the report.

What information will show on the report? Any time a maintenance item (customer, vendor, inventory item, job, etc.) or a transaction is created, changed, or deleted the report will show the user ID of the person who made the change and the date and time of the entry/change. It will also show when users log in or out of a company.

In the report options you can set a date range and choose between sorting by date/time or by user name. You can also filter the report by action (All, Add, Change, Delete), transaction reference, or user name.

If you want to sort or filter the report in a way that isn’t offered in the options you can send the report to Excel where you can sort or filter on any column.

I’d like to see this report do more. When it logs a change I wish it would record the details that changed, not just which transaction or item was changed. The same is true for deleted items. So while it won’t do much to help you undo unwanted changes, it can still be a valuable tool in tracking down who did what and when in your Sage 50 database.

Sage 50 / Peachtree Tips

Excluding Credit/Debit Card Payments From 1099-MISC in Sage 50

As if the rules for 1099 reporting weren’t confusing enough, a few years ago the rules changed so that in addition to who you paid, how much you paid, and what it was for affecting whether or not you need to issue a 1099-MISC, now it also matters how the money was paid.

Because the introduction of the 1099-K required third party payment processors (such as credit and debit cards, PayPal, etc.) to report payments to merchants, those same payments should now be excluded from the 1099-MISC to prevent double reporting.

The IRS 1099-MISC instructions, in the section titled “Form 1099-K” state Payments made with a credit card or payment card and certain other types of payments, including third-party network transactions, must be reported on Form 1099-K by the payment settlement entity under section 6050W and are not subject to reporting on Form 1099-MISC.

Don’t worry, you don’t have to issue a 1099-K now. They’re issued by the “payment settlement entity”, in other words, credit and debit card processing companies and other 3rd party payment processors such as PayPal.

How do you you deal with this in Sage 50 (formerly Peachtree Accounting)?

Payment Method is key – When entering vendor payments there’s Payment Method field. If you’ve ignored it in the past, you need to start paying attention to it. But all you need to do is make sure you correctly enter the payment method (cash, check, credit card, etc.) for each payment. If a method you need isn’t on the list, just click the Payment Method link in the Payments window, or go the Maintain menu > Default Information > Vendors. On the Payment Methods tab you can set up as many as 20 different payment methods. You can be general or specific when setting these up. For example you can have separate entries for AMEX, MasterCard, and Visa, or one entry for Credit Card.

1099 Vendor Report – Before printing 1099s, you should always review the 1099 Vendor Report so you can confirm the 1099 amounts. When viewing the report, click the Options button. In the Payments section click on Payment Method and place a check next to each payment method you want to include, such as cash, check, and EFT. Check with your CPA if you have questions about which payment types to include. You can also add a Payment Method column report if you want to by clicking the Columns button.

Printing 1099s – When you’re ready to print your 1099s, you can filter by payment method. In the filter options hold down the Ctrl key on your keyboard while clicking on each payment method that should be included. Then click the Refresh List button near the upper right corner and to review the list of vendors that will get a 1099 before clicking the Print/Email button. The forms will all be printed even though the button says Print/Email.

Sage 50 / Peachtree Tips

Using Webmail with Sage 50

Until last month when Sage released the 2017.1 update to Sage 50, sending invoices or other forms and reports by email required you to have a MAPI compliant email program such as Outlook or Thunderbird installed on your computer. If you wanted to send email using a web based email client, such as Gmail or Yahoo, you were out of luck. But that has finally changed. And the good news is that it’s really easy to set up.

To configure Sage 50 to work with webmail:

  • Go to the Maintain menu and choose Email Setup.
  • Change from the default mail setting of Use a default desktop email program to Use a webmail account.
  • Click the Add Account Information link.
  • Choose between Outlook.com, Gmail, Yahoo, or Other.
  • If you selected Outlook.com, Gmail, or Yahoo, enter the email address for the account you want to use and click OK. If you selected Other, enter your email address as well as the SMTP server name and SMTP port number for your email service. You’ll also need to select whether or not a secure (TLS/SSL) connection is required. If you don’t know what these settings should be, you’ll need to contact your email provider.

For Gmail and Yahoo, you’ll most likely have to set the options in your mail account to “allow less secure apps.” Directions for how to do that can be found at https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/6010255 for Gmail and https://help.yahoo.com/kb/SLN27791.html for Yahoo.

Did you notice that it didn’t ask you for your password? The first time you send an email from Sage 50 you’ll be prompted for your email password. Sage 50 will remember that password until you exit. Each time you launch Sage 50 you’ll be prompted for your email password with the first email you send.