**Coming Soon** Sage BusinessVision 2010 (7.4)
Significant improvements in new version to be released before summer 2010
We had the opportunity to attend a Sage BusinessVision partner conference in Toronto in December 2009, hosted by some of the key
Sage people responsible for BusinessVision.
Among many other interesting topics covered that day, they demonstrated some of the features that are expected to be released
in the next version of Sage BusinessVision. Similar to version 2009 (aka, "7.3") released in 2009, they're calling this
new version "Sage BusinessVision 2010", though many will refer to it as 7.4. In addition, they discussed a number
of other features to be added in 2010, but after the initial release of version 2010 (expected by June 2010).
While the number of new features and improvements in version 2010 won't be quite as dramatic as in version 2009,
the new version will be noteworthy.
A pre-emptive note, however: any and all features listed may or may not actually get into the final release,
as what we saw was definitely a pre-release version. Given Sage's history, the released version will probably
have most or all of the features seen, but there is certainly no guarantee of that, or that they will still be
designed to function in the same way by the time the final release happens.
Most Notable New Features - Version 2010
The features that got the most appreciation from the BusinessVision partners in attendance were these:
Most Notable New Features
- Bank Reconciliation - this module is getting an overhaul that will make bank recs much simpler;
many of the columns are sortable, allowing easy searching for cheque numbers, GL memos, dates, etc.;
new "select all" button; bank rec report now clearly indicates whether an account has been
fully reconciled or not
- Accounts Payable - a new prompt after printing a cheque - "was the cheque printed properly";
if not, it will allow you to reprint using either the same cheque number OR the next one; works
as well in the instant cheque and batch payables modes
- New "Report Groups" - will be able to set up a list of commonly used reports for each
user; example: a group called "Month-end reports" might include every report that the
accounting staff need to run at each month end; simplifies finding and remembering to run
specific groups of reports, and reduces the number of reports people have to sort through
to find what they need
- New report - Inventory Historical Value - basically, works backwards from today's inventory
levels back to a specific date, allowing for both inventory receipts and sales history, to arrive
at inventory levels that existed at some point in the past
- Browse customization - Ability to add even more fields to your customized browses;
for example, in browsing Customers, you can see all their contact info, addresses, etc.
- Find Module - now allows you to quickly Find customer-specific pricing (CSP) and
vendor-specific pricing (VSP) information
- Notes tabs - the title on the Notes tab in each module will now indicate the number of
notes that exist, which is an easy way for a user to know whether there are notes they need
to be sure to review before contacting a customer, vendor, etc.
- Workbook setup - when using Date fields in the Workbook (part of the Custom Pack module),
can now allow a new entry to use a blank date, or default to it; if you need this feature,
you probably already know it
- Payroll - employees have a new checkbox indicating CPP exemption, rather than just relying
on the employee's birth date to trigger the exemption
- Purchase Orders / Sales Orders - line item Required Date field has been added, which allows
you to indicate for each line item when it is required; allows for scheduled deliveries of
product over a period of time, without having to resort to using Workbook fields on each line item
- Fully compliant to work with Windows 7 - This won't happen until the full release of version 2010,
due to delays from Pervasive in updating and certifying their database engine for Windows 7;
as of today, version 2009 works under Windows 7, but there are a number of fairly minor
functions that are known to not function (a workaround is to run it in "XP Mode")
- Data Validation - essentially an integrity checking utility for your BusinessVision data
to ensure any problems can be identified as soon as possible
- General Ledger - this version reinstates an older feature that was left out of other 7.x versions,
namely that as you enter a GL Journal Entry, the system will present you with amounts to balance
all previous lines in the entry. This simplifies entry of Journal Entries, particularly short ones
- And many more - of course, there were many other small changes that will be included
that will continue to make using BusinessVision that much better....
Features to be added after release of Version 2010
At some point fairly quickly after the initial release of version 2010, there will be a number of
additional, incremental changes that will be added. The main ones follow.
Features To Come After Initial 2010 Release
- Credit card processing - new regulations come into effect in July 2010 regarding
credit card processing, relating the encryption, privacy and security; the current
credit card add-ons for BusinessVision will not be fully compliant with these new
regulations, so BusinessVision will now integrate with Sage Payment Solutions; the result
will be better integration with BusinessVision as well as proper compliance with the new regs.
If you accept credit cards either in Point Of Sale or in AR, you will want to
be ready for the this change, which will greatly simplify a lot of things, and keep you
in line with the new regs; there will be support for credit and debit cards, PIN pads, etc.,
and we're told it will work properly in a Terminal Services environment
- New look for the BusinessVision desktop - they showed a preliminary mockup of the
look they're going for on the new user interface, and it will look very clean still, but much more
updated and modern - more along the lines of an Outlook main screen or similar
- Compatibility with Microsoft Office 2010 - Office 2010 will be released somewhere
around July 1, 2010, and once it's out, BusinessVision will quickly be compatible with it
- Software Assurance / Payroll Update Plan - there will be new options available to give
you more flexibility and choices in adding support to your basic Software Assurance plan
- And more - but we'll leave the rest of the proposed new features and updates to be a surprise,
since any others they mentioned are still pretty conceptual, rather than in the works
All in all, everyone agreed the new features all looked excellent, and Sage have done a really nice job of focusing their
development efforts on things that end users and partners have told them we need, rather than just what they think
we'd like. If you have product suggestions for Sage / BusinessVision, you can e-mail them to: enhancements.bv@sage.com.
Third-Party Software
At this same conference, a number of the certified third-party developers got time to demo their offerings as well.
Note that the third-party developers will always be a little behind Sage in releasing new versions, so it you
use any of these products, always make sure they're compatible before you upgrade your BusinessVision software.
Although there are literally dozens of third-party vertical applications that integrate with BusinessVision,
here are just some of the ones our clients have traditionally been most interested in (click here for more on third-party solutions):
Third-Party Software
- Data management - clean up your customer / vendor / inventory data including merge / purge / change codes using PowerTools
- Document management - eliminate mailing / document preparation costs and do easy direct marketing to your BV customer list
using DocuFire
- Order / inventory management - e.g., backorder management, warehouse management including OE+, BVImport, InBridge
- E-Commerce - Add your BusinessVision data to your own web store (or multiple web stores) or website(s) using ZeckoShop
Sage are doing a very good job in encouraging the development of third-party tools, utilities and applications, and the developers
of these tools are certainly producing some great work. If you need to streamline or expand your use of BusinessVision or the
management of your BusinessVision data, please give us a call to discuss how some of these tools can
actually save you money or make you money.
All in all, this was a very useful conference, and we are looking forward to what 2010 brings to the BusinessVision world!