Wegner LLP, CPAs & Consultants

May 14, 2008 Hello From Sage Insights!

2008-05-14T13:52:50-07:00

As promised, I am posting from the Sage Software conference in Washington D.C. I have been here since Saturday, taking classes, talking to Peachtree program developers and tech support, visiting many vendor booths and gathering lots of information which I will share you with you over the next few weeks.

Among the classes I attended were a two day class in writing custom Crystal reports in Peachtree, shorter sessions in Peachtree Database Design, Advanced Trouble Shooting for Peachtree and the Pervasive data base. I enjoyed a live demo on the new Peachtree 2009 release and had an opportunity to "play" with this hands on. I also received an advance copy so i can evaluate it on my own. This new version will be released next week. I'll be posting information about it when I get back to the office.

There are over 2800 people attending this conference and it is full of activity! I have met with lots of other certified consultants, some of whom I knew before and made new connections with other CC's. There are many years of experience shared by these fellow CC's and everyone has a different focus or concentration. Lots of resources to benefit all of us and I will share the bounty with you!

May 14, 2008 Hello From Sage Insights!

2008-05-14T13:52:47-07:00

SUBSCRIBE TO THE BLOG VIA EMAIL

2008-05-08T09:26:47-07:00

For your convenience we have added a new feature that allows you to subscribe to this blog via email. Just enter your email address in the box at the left and every time there is a new post or a comment on the blog you will be notified via your email address. There will be a link to the blog right on your email. This way you don't have to go in and check the blog -- you will be notified when there is a new post.

May 8, 2008 REPORT ON APRIL 29 USERS GROUP MEETING

2008-05-08T09:23:28-07:00

Thank you very much to Bruce for presenting on budgeting at our April 29 meeting. Everyone appreciated benefiting from his many years of experience working with Peachtree as a user.

There was a lot of discussion about using the budgeting feature and also lots of questions and interest in using inventory. As a result we decided to have a brief presentation on inventory at our next users group meeting (Any volunteers to present?).

The other topic of interest at this meeting was using payroll and paid time off options.

In addition, Christin demonstrated the new feature in our blog that enables you to subscribe to the blog via email.

We welcomed several newcomers to our meeting in Baraboo. There was a lot of discussion between our users at this meeting and lots of sharing of best practices and problem solving.

Our next Users Group Meeting is July 29.These User Group meetings are for YOU. Please come and participate. Use the blog in between to share!

Hope to see you on the July 29. Check our blog for Peachtree News You Can Use!

PLEASE JOIN US AT THE PEACHTREE USERS GROUP MEETING APRIL 29

2008-04-23T14:14:00-07:00

Our quarterly meeting of the Peachtree Users Group is this Tuesday, April 29. Registration and networking begins at 7:30 and the program is from 8-10 AM.

Location: Wegner Training Center, 2110 Luann Lane Madison WI 53713 OR Wegner's Baraboo Office, 123 2nd Street, Baraboo WI 53913

You can register on line by going to the site below:

http://www.wegnercpas.com/resources/seminar-details.asp?id=61

There is no cost to attend. This is a user led group to provide a forum for discussing Peachtree questions and challenges with other Peachtree users. Wegner's Certified Peachtree Advisor, Dale Kunin CPA.CITP, will be available to offer input and answer specific questions.

One of our user group members volunteered to provide a brief presentation on using the Peachtree budgeting function at this April 29 meeting.

There will be time to address other topics as well.

PLEASE JOIN US.

April 23, 2008 - Peachtree 2009 offers amazing new features!

2008-04-23T14:04:35-07:00

Well tax season is actually over and I have enjoyed a few days off. Now I am back at work and available for any Peachtree issues that may occur as well as regular posting to the blog.

Remember we have our quarterly Peachtree Users Group meeting on Tuesday morning, April 29. Please contact our office 608-274-4020 or www.wegnercpas.com for additional information.

In early Feburay I posted a discussion on whether you should upgrade to Peachtree 2008. Now my advice is WAIT FOR PEACHTREE 2009! Sage was offering some pretty attractive prices for customers to upgrade to 2008 last month. However, Peachtree 2009 will be released in a couple weeks. I will be attending the Peachtree annual conference at the beginning of May and I will get to see it live. I have already participated in a webinar that highlighted the features in Peachtree 2009. Once of the most exciting features that Peachtree 2009 will introduce is the ability to report on historical financial data beyond the two open years in both the general ledger and the financial statements. This is obviously a response to user requests. I will be able to tell you more about it when I come back from the conference, but I saw screen shots of this feature and it is what we have been wanting! (By the way, I will post to the blog while I am at the Peachtree conference so watch for that information the week of May 12).

Other enhancements include an improved payroll set up wizzard with a much more user-friendly employee maintenance screen. For those of you who use Peachtree Payroll this will be a significant improvement. And for customers running out of user licenses, the Peachtree 2009 Quantum version will more than double the number of simultaneous users allowed.

Look for more postings soon!

Signed,

Dale Kunin, CPA.CITP Wegner LLP

March 18, 2008, Stress in the office?

2008-03-18T08:37:46-07:00

My apologies--I have been knee deep in tax returns as well as Peachtree client support and have neglected to update the blog. During this busy time I did have the opportunity to participate in a teleconference workshop on managing stress in the workplace sponsored by a firm in Pennsylvania whose excellent leadership development conference I attended this past fall. Though not Peachtree specific I wanted to share some of the highlights of this Gatto and Associates session with you.

Most of us have some feelings of stress caused by our workplace. Among the stressors in the workplace are certain colleagues, some managers, circumstances, and time management. One of the most insidious offenders is workload creep. Think about having a backpack on your back and every 1/4 hour we add one tablespoon of sugar to it. The first day no big deal; we may have 24 tablespoons. But after a month you would have close to 700 little scoops of sugar adding up to a very heavy pack to carry, but it creeped up on you. That is what stress can be like--a little bit each day till it is a heavy burden.

What can you do about managing stress at work? The standard solutions: get enough sleep, eat right, drink plenty of water and GET EXERCISE. Taking short walks in the middle of the day is an easy way to accomplish a break as well as exercise. Don't take on too much at once. Ask yourself if your expectations are realistic.

Are you walking out of the office at the end of each day with a sense of accomplishment or a sense of hopelessness? Some creative solutions to achieve that sense of accomplishment:

At the end of the day identify a project you want to work on tomorrow. Then when you come in the morning DON"T CHECK EMAIL OR VOICE MAIL for the first hour --do the project! Checking voice mail and email will take you in too many directions. Tell people to contact you about 8:30 or 9; come in at 7 and work for 1 1/2 hours to get that project done. BLOCK OFF PERIODS OF UNINTERRUPTED TIME.

I have found that implementing this has technique has definitely enhanced my time management skills and has decreased my stress level. Try it!

I will be checking in more often, I promise. Remember our users group meets at the end of April. I will have some Peachtree tips for you next time.

02/14/08 More on securing your Peachtree data

2008-02-14T07:45:29-08:00

Happy Valentine's day everyone! Today I will continue on the very unromantic topic of securing your data. Taking up where I left off about backing up...

It isn't good enough to have a regular back up procedure if you don't check your backups periodically. Discs and tapes can get corrupted or worn out, hardware can malfunction and best intentions can be thwarted. Imagine the horror we experienced recently when a client with a crashed hard drive went to restore his most recent backup and the backup file was empty! The client followed a diligent back up protocol, but had never checked to see that it was working!

Many of my clients do back up regularly; but rarely (or never) check the integrity of those backups. So be sure to not only follow a regular back up procedure--but also to check those backups on a regular basis!

You can check your backups by doing a test restore of the data. How easy is it for you to access the backup file you need to restore? Some clients with complete system backup tapes have no idea how to find the needed file. If you are dependent on an outside tech person to restore your data, you will be in trouble if you need something and this person is unavailable. System backups are essential, but you should also periodically perform a manual backup of just your Peachtree file onto a portable storage device (flash drives are my current favorite--they are inexpensive and reliable). Then practice restoring the backup. With a current Peachtree backup on your flash drive you can sleep better at night!

02/10/08 entry: Securing your accounting system

2008-02-10T12:07:55-08:00

Attention everyone: Lisa from our users group is looking for ideas to help her track specific events in her Peachtree software. Please take a look at the comments accessed by the navigation list at the right of the screen and post some suggestions.

Today I want to remind everyone about some essential steps you need to take to secure your accounting data. For small businesses who can't afford the number of staff to ensure adequate separation of duties, the owner/manager must take care that the accounting system has features that help mitigate the risks of having the same person performing most of your accounting functions. With Peachtree accounting you can set up processes and procedures that will help protect your data.

1. Make sure that every user of your software has a separate password-protected log in. Do not give your log in/password to any of your employees and make sure they do not share theirs. Recently a client was unable to identify the origin of a problem in their data because though we could trace the date and time an inappropriate entry was made (using the audit trail) we could not identify the user because this company had not enforced secure log ins for their staff.

2 If you do have mutliple staff performing separate accounting functions, you can limit their access to parts of Peachtree that they do not need to see. Peachtree allows you to customize each users rights at any time. The six areas of Peachtree (customers, vendors, inventory, payroll, banking and company) each have multiple tasks. You can get very specific on those access rights because for each task area the security options are No Access, Full Access, View Only, Add or Edit.

3. Make sure you back up your data every day. It never ceases to amaze me to discover how many businesses do not have a regular backup routine. I get calls every week from a client who had a hard disk crash or a data base get corrupted. My first question is always "when was your last back up?"

I will continue with these suggestions in my next post.

Should I Upgrade to Peachtree 2008?

2008-02-01T11:53:21-08:00

At the users group meeting this week I was asked why a Peachtree 2006 user should upgrade to Peachtree 2008. I would like to share a list of some of the improvements from 2006 to 2008.(If this feature was also available in 2007, I indicated that so you can see the smaller differences between 2007 and 2008).

Faster saving time when reports are open (from 10 seconds to less than one third of a second). For heavy users, this could be a BIG time saver.
Ability to attach files to Peachtree records and most transactions. For exampe you could add pictures to inventory records or timesheets to paychecks (All standard file formats supported)
Added the Business Status Screen-- (Dashboard). (Available in 2007)
More reporting options--new fields, new filters, new sorting options.
**My favorite--Additional drill-down capabilities on reports, including drill down on the General Ledger Trial Balance (I really appreciate this ability---a feature QuickBooks has always had).
Easier Report design--features built right into the preview screen so you can change form and screen layouts from one place.
Broadcast Invoices- bill multiple customers at the same time, or bill same customer multiple times over a specific period.
For Inventory management; Flexible Unit and Quantity Decimal settings up to 5 places.
Certified as "works with Vista."
Recurring transactions can carry over without end date (Available in 2007)
Budget creator (available in 2007)

This is by no means an exhaustive or detailed list, but certainly the highlights. So the question is: should you upgrade to 2008 if Peachtree 2006 is working for you now?

I do subscribe, to the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" school of thought. However, if you are using Peachtree for payroll processing and subscribe to their payroll tax update service, you will have to upgrade by the end of this year so the decision is already made for you. But if you don't have the payroll issue I do think the changes from 2006 to 2008 are remarkable enhancements--in fact the shift in the platform from the 2006 to the 2007 was a very significant change. I don't think Peachtree 2007 users need to upgrade to 2008, but I think Peachtree 2006 might consider the move now--but if not now, then certainly to 2009 which will be available in the late fall.