Topic: ‘Uncategorized’

So, there I was setting up my Sales Event Kanban in a training environment, enjoying life and learning something new! Everything was going swimmingly well until I decided to go check the results of my set up in the Kanban Scheduling Board, or for the real Lean aficionados – the Heijunka Board (Why did Microsoft change the name?).
No sign of my Kanban – oops! Then I noticed that I did not see the correct period, silly me! So I clicked on the advance arrow, and it moved forward by one day; not what I expected! Ok, let’s look at changing the period settings, because I don’t’ want to move from January 2011, to January 2012, one click at a time do I? How do you change the period? Read the rest of this entry »

The payment of commission as remuneration for services rendered or products sold is a common way to reward sales people. Payments often will be calculated on the basis of a percentage of the goods sold. This is a way for firms to solve the principle-agent problem, by attempting to realign employees’ interests with those of the firm.

A side effect of commissions is that in some cases, they can result to salespeople resorting to dishonest and fraudulent business practices in order to increase their sales ^[1].
This can be particularly apparent when the schedule is based on transactions within a given period. It can be observed large spikes at the end of a period followed by returns or very little activity in the subsequent period.

Commissions are supported in AX; the configuration is located within the Sales and Marketing module within the Setup\Commissions menu group:

Commissions are calculated and accrued to the GL against the Commission Expense and Commission Payable accounts on an invoice by invoice level during the time of invoice posting on a Sales Order. It should be noted that a Return Sales Order or negative Sales Order will result in a negative commission. The commission structure can be based on a percentage of revenue or margin upon 3 criteria, using the ALL/Group/Table.

• Customer Commission Group –Who sold to
• Sales Commission Group – Who sold by, this is a 1 or more sales rep team with % split
• Item Commission Group – What was sold

Calculated commissions are store in a commission transaction table from which reporting can be done for the purpose of paying the sales team.

Leveraging the 3 criteria ALL/Table/Group architecture does offer a flexible starting point but because of the many types of scheduled that exist, it is often enhanced to meet business requirements. Some of the frequent enhancement made include:

1. Basing the commissions on a “commissionable cost” or “warehouse cost” which accounts for overhead in the supply chain.
2. Calculating the commission, based on tier, of the total invoice to account for delivery overhead
3. Providing a fixed amount per sales unit
4. Providing a time fence from when the customer was first sold to for a new customer based reward
5. Only paying commission upon receipt of payment from the customer
6. Improving the Reporting for the employee and auditing purposes to indicate which calculation rule originated the commission (particularly when there is complex structures required)

IBIS has experience with all of these and features in commission calculations and more so feel free to contact us with Questions or for a discussion around your needs.

^[1] McConnell, Cambell R.; Brue, Stanley L. (2008). Economics (Seventeenth Edition). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. ISBN 978-0-07-329392-9.

In AX 2012, most forms have at least one “factbox” on the right side of the form.  They will most often contain information pertaining to the highlighted record.  But often times, we would like to see other or more information in one of these boxes.  I’m going to use an example to explain a fairly straight forward way to create a new factbox (or “part”) that doesn’t require too much technical knowledge. Read the rest of this entry »

To create a direct delivery, you’ll first need a fully created sales order.  This sales order should have at least one item on it that will be shipped directly from the vendor to the customer that is on the sales order.  The direct delivery function will create a purchase order that is tied to the sales order and the two will be updated simultaneously.  So when one order is updated (received or shipped), the corresponding order is also updated to match.  This way, your inventory will not have the potential to show the item(s) that are being direct delivered. Read the rest of this entry »

Budgets! Say it again budgets! Shout it from the rooftops BUDGETS! Who is not excited now? Perhaps the question should be who is excited now? There are a few out there but the very few…there are probably more Marines than budgeteers. If you are not a budgeter (a.k.a. budgeteer) then you should stop reading at this minute and go buy the product that formerly used this logo-

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Microsoft recently announced that Mark Polino has been selected as a Most Valuable Professional yet another year!  Mark truly deserves this award, as he works nonstop within the Microsoft Dynamics GP Community.  If you somehow don’t know Mark, I encourage you to visit his blog, download a webinar of his from the on-demand GP webinars, sit in on his presentation at Convergence, read his Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 Cookbook, or find him at the GPUG Summit.  We are proud to call Mark Polino a member of our I.B.I.S. family.  Congratulations, Mark!

Lately, I have been researching the W3G product for Warehouse Management offered by McLane. It’s a great product that seamlessly integrates into Dynamics AX 2009 because it is written in the same programming language. While Dynamics AX 2009 has a lot of functionality with Warehouse Management, it doesn’t offer everything which is where a full Warehouse Management system comes into play. One capability of W3G is Master Loads and Scheduled Loads for shipping products out of the warehouse.

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Customer picking control is one of the many features that McLane brings to the table.  This setup allows you to specify how orders are picked at the customer level.  This gives you the flexibility you need to accommodate customers who have unique requests for their orders.  McLane gives you the ability to input these unique terms into the system and then the system will manage all of the customer orders in the appropriate manner.  Please continue to read to find out how simple it is setup customer picking control.

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I will preach it today and I will preach it tomorrow:  you cannot get through the IT industry without a sense of humor.  There have been many times when the only thing that has saved me from taking the elevator to the roof is a kooky client or a light-hearted co-worker.  As consultants, we strive to find not only the optimism but also the humor in our victories, our mistakes, and our day-to-day activities.  A little humor goes a long way, and in a world as busy as ours, we need every bit we can take. Read the rest of this entry »

My first year at I.B.I.S., Inc. concluded not too long ago, and I think my general opinion on the last 365 days is one of growth.  As you can gather from my previous entries, I have learned much about the software, the industry, relationships, and myself.  I think one of the most important takeaways from my experience so far, though, is the fact that things are sometimes up and things are sometimes down, and that’s just how it goes.  Since the ebb and flow of a full-time career in the software industry can be ruthless if you are not careful, I will quickly journey through the past year and reveal the secrets I could not have done without. Read the rest of this entry »