Dynamics GP Case Studies and Success Stories

Jul 5
07:34

2012

Andrew Karasev

Andrew Karasev

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Microsoft Dynamics GP is very popular ERP application with wide selection of modules and third party add-ons. When you are in new accounting software selection process one of the good ideas is reading success stories about past implementations and trying to match them to your requirements and industry niche.

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Let’s review in brief several case studies.  We will try not to be too technical so this publication should be recommended to IT managers and company owners:

1. Membership services.  In this case client was offering membership outsourcing to association with members such as annual dues billing and collection,Dynamics GP Case Studies and Success Stories Articles phone answering, etc.  There was custom business management system hosted in MS SQL Server with client web interface programmed in Visual Studio VB.Net.  However the challenge was in the fact that invoices needed to be transferred to Great Plains and printed with membership logo.  On the first phase invoices were imported to Great Plains via Integration Manager.  In Report Writer SOP Invoice form was modified for each association and exported as ‘package’.  When invoices were due to be printed appropriate Invoice form was reloaded from the package.  On the second phase Invoices and Credit Card payments were integrated in real time by calling eConnect methods directly from VB web application

2. Multinational Corporation in beverage industry.  Company had several requirements.  First one was beverage production accounting.  The second was handling production facility in Brazil.  Bill of Materials module was perfect fit for beverage production.  Facility in Amazonia was a challenge as GP is not localized in Brazil.  Management team had to do hard homework and then decision making.  Final solution was SAP Business One with weekly GL transaction export in the form of text file and import to GP via Integration Manager.  Consolidated Financial reporting was handled initially by FRx and later on by Microsoft Management Reporting

3. Nationwide nurse placement.  The challenge here was large volume of timesheets and expense reports with following processing and collection from hospitals.  Custom front end application was created to enable web based timecards and expenses entry.  Then SQL stored procedures were moving time and expenses into Great Plains Project Accounting module.  Reporting by each hospital and nurse needed to be industry niche specific.  But due to the fact that all the information was residing in GP PA and core modules it was simple job to design them in Crystal

4. Commodity Futures Trading.  The complexity was in the worldwide presence as company had access to the markets in USA, UK, Japan, Argentina and others.  Trading company doesn’t do retail or warehouse type of operations and this is why ‘ERP localization’ was not an issue.  Real concern was about multicurrency and ability to produce consolidation P&L and Balance Sheet.  All companies are hosted on the same MS SQL Server cluster located in Chicago headquarters.  GP supports multicurrency in all modules.  Consolidated reporting was handled by FRx reporting trees.  FRx supports exchange rates entered in Great Plains

5. Lift forks manufacturing.  Production was covered in Manufacturing Suite.  The problem was in the fact that company used several fictitious names by product line.  Invoice form was complex and Report Writer was too restricted.  SOP Invoice was printed in Crystal with nice graphic

6. IT Services including software, hardware selling and integration.  Large portion of customer order was over the internet.  Ecommerce portal with shopping cart was handled in custom PHP application hosted in MySQL and Linux server.  Decision was made to realize quasi real time (every five minutes) shopping cart import via Integration Manager called through command line by scheduled job in Windows.  Another challenge was dozens of items with serial numbers.  RW invoice form is not perfect in handling serial numbers when there are ten or more.  Solution was to generate PDF invoice directly from PHP code by connection via ODBC to GP tables

7. For additional information, please feel free to call us 1-866-528-0577 or 1-630-961-5918 (this number works for international customers) or email us help@albaspectrum.com We serve you USA/Canada nationwide via remote support (web sessions and phone/Skype conferences). Local service is available in Western Michigan, Chicagoland, Southern California (LA, Orange County and San Diego) and Houston area of the state of Texas