We already have a warehouse management for material circulation ready to go, but what about the purchase of services? If we use, for example, subsequent modification of our products at external suppliers before they are send to customers, we can issue delivery note for these suppliers based on the received orders module sorted by items (our products). These entries can be exported to the delivery note after minor adjustment in the program without any posting to general ledger. The delivery note then contains catalogue numbers, product name, weight, etc. for each item. Now our IS contains information where are our products. If you do these delivery sheets manually, you never have such a perfect overview. Over time, you can better plan when you will go with the products to the external service provider, because you will also see items in the relevant modules that have not yet been manufactured, so it is worth waiting a few days and saving logistics costs.
Order tracking, data export to Excel, and reporting
If our company is audited or we often prepare various ad-hoc analyses, we need to choose a program where we can easily export anything to Excel. IS offers various modules, but if you do not want expensive custome-made modules, e.g. for reporting or work in progress calculation, you will find that everything is much faster and clearer in Excel using PivotTables. In seconds, you can export the entire General ledger and continue to work only with the data you need.
However, in a high-quality IS there should be a built-in module to show a list of active and inactive orders with data on who is in charge, what their deadlines are, what their status is, as well as their planned/actual costs and revenues. Based on this data, it is possible to create detailed reports on how we perform according to different aspects and reveal where we have a weak spot, whether it is poorly set prices for clients or even inefficient departments within our company.
If we only keep financial accounting in the program and we follow the revenues and costs of orders separately from IS in Excel, it may happen that at the end of the year, after adding up all excel orders, the company shows 10 million in plus, and yet the accounting program shows an economic result of minus 10 million, with our bank account not exactly overflowing with money. Hint: in this case, I'd rather trust accounting. 🙂 In Excel, indirect costs may not have been well calculated and assigned to orders. The actual setting of reporting of our hypothetical company is a very individual matter, but we have the relevant data available if we think it through at the beginning. On the other hand, the PC games e-shop is sufficient only with financial accounting and a few simple reports.
Salaries and HR
For the payroll agenda, it is possible to either use a module in IS or outsource it with some payroll accountant and buy only the Personalistics module keeping just basic data about employees. Wages are now so complicated and so many laws and regulations are associated with them that companies prefer to use wage specialists. Or you can allow such an external company to process your payroll through a remotely access to the the Payroll and HR module.
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The issue is obviously very complex and we have outlined it only roughly. In any case, you need to prepare a plan of action and identify the person responsible for each agenda. The person concerned will certainly have good ideas or comments that you incorporate within the IS settings. You can also create a guide for users of the given agenda, which will certainly come in handy due to the high fluctuation of employees today. There are a thousand other things to consider – whether IS can be switched to a foreign language, whether it allows tailor-made print reports, how the supplier's help desk works, whether the supplier offers to use their expert directly with you at the beginning of the implementation, etc.
As a result, IS should be a framework that connects individuals and their agendas into a meaningful whole.
We use the information system of the aforementioned Money to keep our clients' accounts. In view of these facts, we always deal with the setting of accounting and requirements for its outputs in great detail with our customers from the very beginning in order to achieve their maximum satisfaction.
Very nice article, lots of useful information.
So it's a pleasure, Mrs. Hana.