2004 new features

[euraco]

It seems that the biggest improvement in Ver 2004 is its facility to email invoices directly. However, before I upgrade (once again) to Ver 2004 I would like to receive some comments with regards to its suitablilty. What worries me is that it has taken Peachtree an awful long time to have this email feature finally included. Is everything working kosher? Any bugs so far?
Thanx

[Diane Koers]

It works fine, but at this point it's limited to emailing the form only to the email address saved in the Maintain screen.

You must have Outlook Express, Outlook or other MAPI compliant email software on your system.

[lustbergcpa]

I have been using PT since version 8. I have upgraded to 2002, 2003, 2004. I think that the 2004 was the most significant. The bank reconciliation upgrade is excellent. It allows you to double click on a bank statement item and go back into the original journal to make changes.

Also, you can sort bank recon items by any field. This becomes important when you have 500 items, and 498 are cleared. You can sort to have uncleared items appear.

The other significant feature is being able to change Account number in the chart of accounts.

[Lazy J]

Dont forget the spell checker I think that is new this editon.

[Lazar Keitelman]

I upgraded to 2004 only because of the email function, and to make Peachtree more stable with WIN XP. It also has better exporting to Excel. Thats about the only diffrence. Of course it's loaded with add-ons to sell more of their products (imagine turning on a radio and hearing "buy records from Sony" between stations - its very lowbrow marketing.)

There is a work around to the limited emailing capability: Don't email directly from PAW, after opening the email window click on the quote and use "SAVE AS" and put it in some folder, which is great for organizing and getting quick accesses to quotes, pos or invoices without having to open PAW!). Now you have a clean PDF that you can send as an attachment, or even multip-le attachments or recipients in your own form as opposed to Peachtree's uneditable template (why they did that is beyond me).

[Lisa_p]

I agree that this is the most exciting software upgrade I've seen in a long time.

The improved bank rec alone is worth the price of admission (I HATED wading through dozens of entries, only viewing 3 lines at a time).

Also, being able to change G/L account IDS and running reports on selected items (non-contiguous ranges) is AWESOME!!

[Lady Glen]

I just purchased 2004 upgrade and was working with 2003 complete. PT now tells me I can't transfer data from one to the other. In other words, if I now use 2004, I will lose my 2 year history for financial statement comparison. Has anyone else experienced this.

[Diane Koers]

The only way that will happen is if you are going backwards from Peachtree Complete Accounting 2003 to Peachtree Accounting 2004.

If you are going from the Complete 2003 version to the Complete 2004 version you won't lose any data. Only if you step backwards with the product.

[Lazar Keitelman]

I was really upset about the inability to go "backwards" from PAW Complete to Peachtree 2004. I complained to their customer service line and was given a "secret" work around to importing your data, so it can be done dont remember the steps - hate to spill the beans Peachtree!!!!!

[Lady Glen]

Originally posted by Diane Koers
The only way that will happen is if you are going backwards from Peachtree Complete Accounting 2003 to Peachtree Accounting 2004.

If you are going from the Complete 2003 version to the Complete 2004 version you won't lose any data. Only if you step backwards with the product.

Thanks for the reply Diane. Had I known this at the time I purchased the 2004, I would have considered purchasing the proper version, although I really don't need the Complete version.

[Lady Glen]

Originally posted by Lazar Keitelman
I was really upset about the inability to go "backwards" from PAW Complete to Peachtree 2004. I complained to their customer service line and was given a "secret" work around to importing your data, so it can be done dont remember the steps - hate to spill the beans Peachtree!!!!!

Thanks Lazar, I think I will give it a try.

[AAnderson]

My 3 issues with 2004.

We are running Goldmine 4 and I can't get the email functionality to work with it. I will not install outlook or outlook express. I'll be researching a work around.

I can't believe they haven't included multiple contacts for a company. There is no way to print a historical invoice or quote register that has the correct contact if a company has more than one.

And finally, I was just told by customer support that Peachtree assumes that if your sending a packing slip you must also want to send a invoice. We can't be the only company that has a separate accounting and shipping department. We invoice after an order ships complete, how else do you get the correct shipping costs on an invoice. If we did it Peachtree's way we could have 8 invoices for one job and our customers would wonder what the heck we were doing.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Alan

[CMR-US]

What I did for this problem, Alan, was use one of the "sales orders" form and made it into a packing slip form. I just went into the form design and changed the wording/setup. Then our shipping department prints it and gives me costs and weights, etc...so I can invoice. It is an easy workaround.

Yes I couldn't beleive it didn't have a "blank" packing slip to work with either!

[AAnderson]

Thank you for the suggestion! How do you handle/track partial shipments, backorders, etc... I see there is a "Shipped" field in the sales order task window, but I can't access it.

Thanks again,

Alan

[CMR-US]

Alan,
I looked into this again, just so you know, I used the form already in PT called "Sales Order Picking List" for my Packing List.

The default set up of this form is to show the amount "Shipped Prior" and then "This shipment" We don't normally have partial shipments, so what I did was made two forms. one for our normal shipments and then another for partials. If you have an order for 50 pcs, and you ship 25, invoice and then have to ship the next 25, if you use this form it will show you the total-50, then 25 shipped prior, so you would know you still have to ship 25. Also you would see this in your Sales ORder itself, that you have already shipped 25, and on your sales order report.

Hope this helps!

Jenn

[AAnderson]

Thanks again Jenn,

I was hoping to get away from the multiple invoices.

Alan