Provide a brief description of the Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative.
Amix was using Sage Accpac primarily for Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, and General Ledger tasks, handling its order entry and inventory tasks offline. Now they have assigned item codes and have begun tracking a perpetual inventory, that’s a major step forward in efficiency. Amix operates a recycling yard and a retail sales yard in separate locations across the Province. Through the company’s VPN (Virtual Private Network), the yard personnel access Sage Accpac to enter orders and check inventory levels. Plus Computer Solutions Ltd. configured Sage Accpac to run in the company’s retail store which sells sheet metal and other products to the public. Before this was a manual process, and you can imagine the time involved. Sales orders are now entered directly into Sage Accpac making it more efficient and accurate. Amix had the need to record and maintain additional information about various entities in the software, such as item codes. So Plus Computer Solutions implemented the Optional Field Creator component of Sage Accpac to create user defined fields to store this data. These fields are used to record unique information about the items that can be tracked from a transactional level all the way through to the General Ledger module for reporting and analysis, they plan to add the Project and Job Costing module soon which will allow Amix to track the costs associated with operating the equipment such as trucks, trailers, and machines.
Describe what makes this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative original or innovative. How is this over and above the accepted norm?
For years, Amix had been using an outdated DOS version of Accpac that did not allow each location to talk to one another. Lacking the ability to communicate, Amix was forced to process inventory, accounting, financial, and sales reports individually and by hand, then forward them to headquarters who would then re-key the data into the accounting system. Inevitably this process created duplication of duties, numerous errors and inconsistencies, which led to an inaccurate financial picture of the business. The system that had been used to manage the business was antiquated and unable to meet the rising demands of the operation and keep up with company growth. When it came time to turning over financial reports to the owners, countless hours would be spent re-creating and consolidating the data into one, concise report that was both professional and presentable. The move to Sage Accpac ERP eliminated many manual processes, where data had to be manipulated, allowing for reporting and comparison of multiple years of Financial Information. In an industry that provides a variety of services from recycling, demolishing job sites, and receiving junk cars to sorting, grading, and processing scrap metal to be sold to other industries, it was vital for Amix to organize data and gain control of reporting processes. Like any major business, Amix has to know what their inventory is at any given point of time to project sales and make sound business decisions, the difference is that their inventory doesn’t come prepackaged in boxes with barcodes and labels. Amix deals with junk metal that has to be graded for quality, appropriately sorted, bundled and weighed. A systematic approach to document each phase of this process was required.
Describe the improvement this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative made to the customer’s sales or revenues. What changed? Provide evidence of measurable improvements in sales, revenues, cost reduction, etc.
Amix was using Sage Accpac primarily for Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, and General Ledger tasks, handling its order entry and inventory tasks offline. Now they have assigned item codes and have begun tracking a perpetual inventory, that’s a major step forward in efficiency. Amix operates a recycling yard and a retail sales yard in separate locations across the Province. Through the company’s VPN (Virtual Private Network), the yard personnel access Sage Accpac to enter orders and check inventory levels. Plus Computer Solutions configured Sage Accpac to run in the company’s retail store which sells sheet metal and other products to the public. Before this was a manual process, and you can imagine the time involved. Sales orders are now entered directly into Sage Accpac making it more efficient and accurate. Amix had the need to record and maintain additional information about various entities in the software, such as item codes. So Plus Computer Solutions implemented the Optional Field Creator component of Sage Accpac to create user defined fields to store this data. These fields are used to record unique information about the items that can be tracked from a transactional level all the way through to the General Ledger module for reporting and analysis, they plan to add the Project and Job Costing module soon which will allow Amix to track the costs associated with operating the equipment such as trucks, trailers, and machines.
Describe the improvement this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative made to the customer’s efficiency. What changed? Provide evidence of how customer efficiency was increased.
Eliminating the manual time entry process for Payroll, has helped Amix save aprox 15 hours each week, that is equivalent to a part time position saved in this process alone. Huge time, efficiency and accuracy impact areas are being realized with the implementation of the inventory control module within the retail part of the business. In the past responding to customer and internal inquiries for materials in the retail side of the business consisted of manually updating spreadsheets with each transaction affecting the retail inventory stock. Should an internal or external customer call to inquire about availability of stock, staff would have to put the customer on hold or call them back while radios were used to interrupt and communicate to other staff members who would physically track down the part in question. More often than not, the customer would have moved on to an alternate supplier by the time the inquiry was able to be responded to, resulting in lost sales, wasted time and ineffective manual procedures, conservatively saves them over 10 hours at each retail location every month..
How did this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative improve the customer’s ability to serve its internal and/or external clients? Provide evidence of the improvement.
Implementing real time perpetual inventory in the retail operations means that non-technical staff can now accurately respond to inquiries immediately, with confidence decreasing lost sales and providing better service to their internal and external customers. Amix is impressed with the budgeting capabilities of Sage Accpac and its integration with Microsoft Excel a familiar and easy to use industry standard tool. They are able to create analytical reports, spreadsheets, graphs, and charts, and update their budgets automatically, as well as look at history and make informed projections for the upcoming year’s budget. Leveraging the capabilities of the Sage Accpac Extended Enterprise Suite, Amix Salvage & Sales is moving forward to make every level of the organization more productive, in fact the efficiencies gained with Sage Accpac have allowed Amix to open and acquire additional locations with no increase in staff required to run the operations. The next step in its move toward further efficiency is to implement a more sophisticated electronic time clock system that can track job data. That data will be brought into the Project and Job Costing module so Amix can track time and materials spent servicing their vehicles allowing Amix to make decisions based on hard numbers. As Amix incorporates technology in their business processes, they can see the enormous potential for additional efficiencies. Sage Accpac Extended Enterprise Suite and Plus Computer Solutions are helping them get there.
In what ways does this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative go above and beyond industry norms and expectations?
With the implementation process underway to simplify inventory and financial tracking, Plus noticed that the payroll system that Amix was using also had room for improvement. Plus had no intention of refining the payroll process upon the initial assessment of Amix’s business operations, however, Plus noticed that employees would clock-in and out on an automated time clock that would then create an informational report that needed to be manually re-entered into the payroll system to generate paycheques. This was a systemic flaw that was creating duplicate data entry. Plus was able to identify a simple solution that would retrieve the data from the time clocks and then insert it into Accpac in one step, thus streamlining the entire process. The employee who was responsible for payroll, was absolutely giddy after a few weeks under the new system, doing the happy dance in Dave’s office as a result of her newly acquired time.