Sage software users V11

[PJ ENG]

Hi there we have used QuickBooks for around the last 15 years and to be honest out grew it a long time ago, the main gripe is we hit the 14500 customer limit years ago so keep having to go over old customers.

Anyway i have looked at Sage 50 before even brought a copy but sent it back as i did not think it was step forward, more focused on business to business.

But again i am looking at it mainly for the link between seller deck and Sage.

So my questions are

How do you get around the A/C system? It looks like you cannot just add a customer’s name but need to give them an account number which is a pain if you are never going to deal with them again.

How good is the link like between seller deck and Sage and again how does it handle the A/C number thing

[Mike Hughes]

I could easily be wrong on this but I think with sage link all the orders go through under a single generic 'online customer' account.

Mike

[Fairyglass]

Hi, we use Sage Accounts Pro with Actinic Link. We've 5 retail sites and two wholesale sites. The retail customers pass through Actinic Link into generic "internet customer" accounts so there's no account per customer requirement. The wholesale customers are currently set up the same way (to a generic "wholesale customer" account in Sage) but we're about to switch to single accounts as we also input orders directly into Sage.
It was a bit of a pain to set up, as the instructions on Actinic Link (and Sage) weren't that clear, but once we'd got it going it all seems to work fine. We continue to use Actinic to do all the order processing, and just pass invoices over to Sage from which we do the reconciliations and company accounts. Issues I've found tricky:
1. Stock control- if you control stock in Sage, and input orders from Actinic, the Sage invoices may not update properly if there's not enough stock.
2. Nominal codes disappearing- we've had two instances of Actinic Link dropping shipping nominal codes when transferring invoices, which has been a headache. I check settings before every use now, and run backups before and after transfers.
3. Initial set-up- if, like us, you purchase Sage and try to set that up at the same time as Actinic Link, it's a right pain as you're unfamiliar with two software packages. We ended up enlisting the help of a couple of experts to check we'd done it right- well worth the £100 or so to ensure a smooth transition.
Sage is fantastic- the level of detail available has made a huge difference to our business, especially as we can see each site separately in terms of management accounts. I know it's not for everyone, but I'd certainly recommend it- we used QB before and I'm glad we made the change.
I hope this helps- sorry for the essay!
Ben

[saucysal]

We have accounts per customer in Sage

We transfer all orders straight from Actinic into Sage 50 using Actinic Link, have done so since 2004, and have them go to individual customer accounts. The system automatically finds the customer in Sage by looking at their name, postcode and email address and matches up where possible. Occasionally matches to wrong person in same street if it is a new customer, but not enough to be a problem. New customers have accounts created in Sage automatically. We don't pay much if any attention to customer account numbers.

We like to have individual accounts as we often refer to their histories, and keep notes regarding previous problems and things we need to know about the particular case, details of complaints, delivery problems, etc.

We find using Sage invaluable, if not essential, for keeping proper stock control. The accounts/book-keeping is also automatically done.

We update the stock from Sage to Actinic at least once a day (this clears up incorrect stock online due to multiple failed payment attempts), and also after imputting a delivery of stock into Sage.

Sarah

[PJ ENG]

Thanks for all of your replies,

We transfer all orders straight from Actinic into Sage 50 using Actinic Link, have done so since 2004, and have them go to individual customer accounts. The system automatically finds the customer in Sage by looking at their name, postcode and email address and matches up where possible. Occasionally matches to wrong person in same street if it is a new customer, but not enough to be a problem. New customers have accounts created in Sage automatically.

Sarah i did look at sage again and spent some time on the phone to their support team, they seem to contradict what you say, but as a user i believe you!

They say i need to add an account called “internet shopper” and bring all the order into this account. From what they say they would all have different names and address but would all be in one account?

Also a deal breaker for me was how it handled the stock, is it true you cannot have a different purchase description (the one your suppliers needs) to the selling description what’s on the customer invoice.

Again sage said the item does not give the option to have 2 different descriptions, is this correct?

I see it as a basic requirement when dealing with stock and suppliers; you don’t need the supplier’s part numbers and relevant info to be shown on the sales invoice

[chris ashdown]

I agree with Sarah thats how we do it but without stock control

The newer line 50 software is a massive improvement on the older versions and the link whilst strange to set up only takes a short while once you understand it

[saucysal]

It handles customers and stock fine

As before, we have no problem with Sage 50 with orders/customers importing from Sellerdeck via Actinic Link into individual customer accounts in Sage. We have been doing this since 2004, many hundreds of thousands of customers overall (we delete customers annually, who have not ordered for several years to speed up searches).

As regards stock, this works very well for us in Sage 50. We can put supplier's information in the product details in Sage and this does not appear on the sales invoices (though it could if you wanted it to). There is one product title/description, which is neutral to both sales and purchases, and does not have to be the same at all as the title/brief description in Sellerdeck.

Sarah

[LHorton]

We also use Sage 50 with SellerDeck. The link works fine, creating new account in sage for new customers and linking downloaded orders with existing customers in Sage where appropriate. Occasionally a new account is created in Sage when the customer already exists, but the orders is easily linked to the correct account and the newly created account can then be deleted.

Regarding the different purchase description in the Sage stock record. We get around this by using the Bar-code field. you will need to modify the Purchase Order Report to list the Suppliers Part Number and the Bar-code field (now containing the purchase description) - works fine for us. No good if you want to use the bar-code for a bar-code though.

Lee