Rebate feature in AX2012

Let’s discuss about the Rebate Agreements in AX 2012 R3. Rebates are nothing but an amount paid by way of reduction, return, or refund on what has already been paid or contributed. It is a type of sales promotion that marketers use primarily as incentives or supplements to product sales. Rebates can be of two types- Vendor Rebates and Customer Rebates. In this post we would eagle-eye on how to use rebates for vendors.

Scenario:

Whenever a purchase order is created for vendor 1002 using item B0006, he gets a rebate of 5 %.

But the rebate is applicable only if the minimum quantity is 2 and maximum quantity is 10.

To achieve this follow the below process:

Set up Vendor Rebate Parameters

Navigate to Procurement and sourcing -> Setup -> Procurement and sourcing parameters -    -> Rebate program.

Specify the ledger accounts and Journal name.

Create a Rebate Agreement:

Rebate agreements is the place where we define which items are in the offer or which vendors offer rebate.

Navigate to Procurement and sourcing -> Rebates -> Rebate agreement -> New

Select the rebate program id -> select a Vendor /Item code. There are three types of Vendor / Item Code-

1. Table > Applicable For only one specific Vendor or Item
2. Group > Applicable For only Vendor / Item Rebate Group. Means all the vendors /items  that come under this particular Rebate group are applicable
3. All > Applicable for all the vendors / items.

Specify the minimum quantity.

As per our scenario we will specify vendor as 1002 and item as B0006 and minimum quantity as 2.

Click on Lines tab -> Add lines -> Specify from value and to value -> Specify the value.

In the from value give 2 and in the to value give 10. The value is given as 5. That means whenever a Purchase order is being created for the Vendor 1002 of item B0006 from the quantity 2 to 10, a rebate of 5 per unit will be given.

Now we need to validate the rebate.

Click on Validation -> Ok

After clicking OK, the Rebate status changes to Approved.

Create a Purchase order.

Create a purchase order with vendor 1002, item B0006 with quantity 3, Post the Purchase order observe the Infolog.

Process Rebate Claims

Navigate to Procurement and sourcing -> Rebates -> Rebate -> Select the record with your invoice number ->Click Approve -> Select the vendor account -> Ok .

Process the Rebate

Navigate to Procurement and sourcing -> Rebates -> Rebate -> Select the record with your invoice number ->Click Process ->  Select the vendor account -> Ok .

After the rebate voucher gets posted, click on the Rebate Transactions to see the vouchers

The same functionality is applicable for the Customer Rebate also. But the navigation path is- Sales & Marketing -> Common -> Rebates -> Rebate Agreements.

How to Send Email Notification Of Workflow

How to Send Email Notification Of Workflow

Let’s enlarge some more features of AX Workflow. Dynamics Ax2012 facilitates the powerful Email  mechanism which can be used commonly across the modules for new implementations. Especially to fulfill the users wish on getting notification through emails and helping them in their daily activities.

Scenario:
Edward is an accounting manager and who is not involved in PR approvals as he is occupied by other responsibilities but still he wants to be notified whenever a purchase requisition is approved.

To achieve this follow the below process:

Setup an email address for a user who wishes to receive email.
Navigate to System Administration -> Common -> Users->Select the desired user ->Click on Options.
Enter users email id.

Click ‘Notifications’ and then check the box next to ‘Send notifications in email

Set up AX E-mail Parameters to use the SMTP server

Navigate to System Administration -> Setup -> System -> E-mail Parameters ->Enter details about mail server.

Create an email template navigate to Organization Administration -> Setup -> E-mail Templates ->

Check the checkbox "Show system emails".

Assign your email template to the specific workflow, Navigate to the desired workflow click on basic settings and select the created email template under “email template for workflow notification”

Select the desired notifications on the specific task.

Setup the batch job to distribute the email messages, System Administration -> Periodic -> E-mail Processing -> Batch

Thus by doing this configuration whenever a PR is approved Edward will receive an email notification.

How To Put Customer On Hold

Scenario in which customer has crossed his due limits and need to be on hold till he clears his dues .Or due to any other reason we are in need to put a customer on hold .This can be achieved in two ways in AX either manually going and putting a customer on hold or automatically restricting a customer to post any transactions:

Lets discuss how to achieve this Manually:

• Create an ageing bucket and  select it on Account Receivable parameters form under collections tab 
• Whenever the customer cross is overdue , owed  to  the collection assigned Ageing Indicator would be displayed  and the user  can manually go and put the customer on hold 
• To do this go to the customer master ,Credit and Collections fast tab,Select desired option for the select box "Invoicing and delivery on hold "
• This will put the customer on hold.

Lets discuss how to achieve this Automatically

• Navigate to Account Receivable ->Setup ->Accounts receivable parameters 
• Click on Credit Rating ->Select "Error" for the select box "Message when exceeding credit limit "
• Now the customers would automatically be restricted from making any transactions .
  

Emailing Purchase Orders

In today's post we would be discussing about how to email purchase orders to vendors :

• Navigate to Procurement and Sourcing ->Setup -> Forms -> Form setup

• Click on General ->Print Management 

• Click on Purchase Order expand the node and click on Original <Default>

• Click on Destination->Printer Setup .

• Click on Email -> Mention Email ID in the “To” field mention any email address which you want to CC in “Cc” field.

• Mention the Subject and File Format.

• Set up should look like this.

By performing above steps an email is sent on the mentioned address .By the above setup works for all vendors .However if you wish to perform this activity only for the specific vendors then navigate to the below mention path and perform the same activity .

Procurement and sourcing -> Common -> Vendors -> All vendors -> General -> Print management.

Electronic Payment files for Vendors

Electronic Payment files for Vendors:

• Navigate to Accounts payable ->Journals->Payments ->Payment journal                     
• New ->Select  Name -> click on lines -> Enter vendor account 
• Click on Functions ->Generate payments 
• Select the Export format option, and then, in the Export format field, select a format for the export file

OR

• Select the Payment method option, and then, in the Method of payment field, select a method of payment that uses the appropriate format for export files.

OR

After Entering Vendor account on the Click on Payment tab and select Method of Payment as Electronic .

In this way you can make electronic payments for vendors.

Automatic Creation of Purchase Orders

Hi ,

In today's post we would be discussing about how to Automatically create purchase orders  upon purchase requisition approval.

For achieving  this navigate to :

• Procurement and Sourcing ->Setup ->Policies ->purchasing policies
• Create New policy ->Specify Name under general tab->Select Company under policy organizations.
• Select Purchase order creation and demand consolidation
• Create a policy rule.

• Click on Manual purchase order creation tab.
• Click the ‘Automatically create purchase orders’ radio button to select it

Relationship in Account Structure

                   

Account Structure and Relationship:

Scenario:

Let’s say we have a requirement which says Business Unit should have control .For this we have to create organizational hierarchy first.

Now we need to go to Configure Account Structure form and select  the activated account structure.

Click on Relationship

On the Relationship column look for the organisation hierarchy name which you have created, select the row which has Business Unit as Party A and Cost centre as Party B

Click on Ok and Activate the Account structure.

Go to General Ledger and post a transaction.

The user will  be able to see only the cost centers which were allowed in organisation hierarchy

ACCOUNT STRUCTURES

Account Structure

Account Structure is used to define valid combinations of Main Accounts and financial dimensions.

To Ceeate Account Structure navigate to

• General ledger -> Setup-> Chart of accounts->Configure account structures

• Specify the Values which are allowed.

• Click on Add Segment to Add Financial Dimension

• Specify the values 

Click on Validate then Activate

Navigate to ledger form and select the created Account structure

Now ,If we go to General ledger and try to post a transaction we can see our Account Structure is working as designed.

General Ledger Introduction

General ledger:
General ledger are used to manage legal entities financial records.Its an register which contains all debit and credit entries through which we can identify financial growth of the company.You can define your Accounts,financial dimensions,Account structures,Financial calender's,Currencies on generel ledger.

Ledger Form on General ledger : Common configuration mistake
A common configuration mistake is not using the "Organisation hierarchy" effectively while creating account structures. Account structures can be radically simplified by creating a relationship between the account structure and organisation hierarchy. Look for my future blog on how to build relationship between account structures and financial dimensions.

Specify the Chart of Accounts .

• The Account Structures (Defined under GL->Setup->Chart of Accounts->Configure Account structure->It should be Activated)
• Specify the Fiscal Calendar(Defined under GL->Setup->Fiscal Calenders)
• Accounting Currency,Reporting Currency.(Any ISO standard defined currency code that suits your business needs)
• Specify the Main Accounts that would be used during processes which include currency revaluation.

Tax Setup: 
I feel the tax setups should be standardised and these should be available using data import just like postal codes setups. Do leave a comment on the blog with your email address if you want to receive recomended "Australia GST setup" as a DAT/DEF file" including BAS statement setups. 

Creating Legal Entity in AX and factors to think about!!!

Scenario: An implementation requires us to install and configure AX for a group of companies which contains multiple legal entities. The question we need to answer is to setup these legal entities as Business units or different legal entity in AX.

We need to ask the following questions befor making a decision on legal entity.

• Management and sponsorship team goals: Sometime customers might want to bring organisational changes to consolidate different legal entity in conjunction with ERP implementation. 
• Sharing of data across legal entity: If the customer master, item master, catalog, vendors etc needs to be shared across legal entity, then there might be enough commonality between the organisation to create one legal entity and reduce data maintenance. 
• Data security: If one company in the group is directly competing with another entity in the group, then it might be difficult to keep sensitve information away from each other. 
• Integrations with third party systems: Will the integrations with external parties be simplified or become more complicated in a consolidated legal entity environment. 
• Different business processes which cannot be reconciled: Is the sponsor team want to drive single process for all legal entity going forward?
• Will there be any difficulty in configuring automatic defaults for financial dimensions on transaction. Sometimes ensuring that the expenses and income are allocated to correct business units automatically(based on transaction inputs) might be a critical deciding factor. Using management reporter reporting based on different business units will allow users to create statuatory reports. 
• Sometime it might come down to trade off between maintenance of multiple companies vs single company in AX. In most cases creating business units instead of legal entities would win. 

How To Create Legal Entity in AX:

• Click Organization administration -> Setup -> Organization -> Legal entities
• Click New ->Give company Name ->Country/Region ->Ok
• Specify Language under General tab
• Specify Addresses  ,Contact information ,tax registration number .

Company Setup :

• Click Organization administration/setup /Addresses/Address setup
• Define an Address Format 
• Define Country/Region, State/Province, County, City, District, Street, Group Postal Codes. 

Once this set up are done it could be used in Addresses fast tab on Legal entities form.

Please add any other variables that you think is critical for decision on legal entities in the comments.

Organization Hierarchy -Introduction

What is an Organization ?

An organization is a group of people who are working together to carry out a business process or achieve a goal.
Organizational hierarchies represent the relationships between the organizations that make up your business.

Why is Organizational hierarchy required ?

Hierarchies can be used for Policies ,Organization charts , Data access , Budget planning ,Project management .

*To view and report on your business from different perspectives
*To create a purchasing hierarchy to control purchasing policies, rules, and business processes.
*Each hierarchy is assigned a purpose in Microsoft Dynamics AX.
*The purpose of a hierarchy determines the types of organizations that can be included in the hierarchy.
*The purpose also determines which application scenarios a hierarchy can be used in.
*An organization can inherit or override the parameters of its parent organization. However, shared master data, such as products and address books, applies to the whole organization and cannot be overridden for individual organizations.

How to create Organizational hierarchy in AX?

CEU->Organization administration->Common->Organizations->Organizational hierarchies.
Click on New Define Name->Organizational hierarchy->Insert->Legal Entity
Click on Legal Entity->Insert->select departments as per organization structure .

Scenario
We want to restrict an user based on his department .User belonging to Dept. Administrator should be able to access the cost centers till range 1 to 100 and user belonging to Dept. Marketing

Should be accessing Cost centers from 101 to 200.

We designed our organization hierarchy accordingly and publish it.

Now we need to go to the Account structure click edit.

Relationships ->Select the created hierarchy.

Now that we want to control the entry of the cost centers based on selection made for the department dimension, select the record which shows Party A = Department and Party B = Cost center and click Ok button ->Activate it.

Navigate to GL > Journals > General journal ->New ->Lines

Enter the Main account -> Department; as soon as we enter department system only shows the Cost Centers we had set up in Organization hierarchy under department.

Further select the values, Amount and post.

Organization hierarchy in financial reports:

Financial reports are very essential part of business .As you create organization hierarchies in Dynamics AX, these hierarchies are dynamically created as Reporting Trees in Management Reporter.
Management reporter is a powerful tool used to create statutory and operational reports based upon your general ledger data. It empowers your managers by providing real-time insights into organizational results; they can take action and work to meet overall corporate goals.

How to use Organization hierarchy in financial Reports ?

Management Reporter is integrated with Dynamics AX ,Every time a new organisational hierarchy is created in AX a new reporting tree with the effective date gets dynamically created in MR .

When choosing an organization hierarchy in Report definition select the desired organization hierarchy and click on Generate button.

Here are some of the ways Management Reporter can help solve your financial reporting needs:

No need to create a connection to Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 General Ledger (GL) – Management Reporter is directly integrated with your GL

Build custom reports based on Microsoft Dynamics AX ledger accounts and dimensions – with the ability to slice general ledger information into Rows, Columns, or Hierarchies to get insight into actionable information. Robust formatting helps highlight key areas on a report and create boardroom quality reports. 

Organization hierarchy in purchase policies and procurement. 


What is Purchasing Policy ?

A purchasing policy is a collection of rules that control the requisition process.With the help of these policies procurement administrators can plan their strategies which aligns best with the organizations purchasing needs.

Scenario

An organization operates its business as Head office and regional office and it has Administration departments set in both the offices. The organization wants its Head office – Administration department employees to be restricted to raise the requisition for only the “Laptops category” whereas the regional office –administration department should be restricted to “Desktop computers” Category.

In the above case, let us create “Head office” and “Regional office” as Business units for the organization and “HO-Admin”, “RO-Admin” as the departments.

Make sure that after creating organization hierarchy you have assigned purpose "Procurement Internal control” In order  to make it reflected under "procurement policies"

To create new policy go to Procurement and sourcing>Setup> Policies> Purchasing policies> click new

Name->Click Parameters button->Add the desired hierarchy to the order of precedence.

By adding the hierarchy, we can set up the policies for any element(either business unit or department) in the hierarchy.

Policy organizations -> Select organization hierarchy ->Add the legal entity node, business entity and department nodes to “Selected organization nodes”.

Policy Rules->Click Create policy rule to define the rule. Focus on the desired Category -> Select button to move them to the Selected Categories ->Click OK.

Now, for “HO-Admin” department, only the laptop category is applicable. If any user from this department create a purchaser requisition then, only the items under category “Laptops” can be seen and user can request only those items.

Dynamics AX 2012 Surcharges on sales and purchase order: Can this be negative discounts on Trade agreements?

Surcharge on sales and purchase order as negative discounts 

The requirement for a Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R3 implementation were

• There is a surcharge applied if the item is ordered from customer in rural areas. The surcharge should be hidden in the price of the item and not shown as a "Charge". 
• A surcharge is also applied on purchase order if the item is ordered as "Rush" or "Emergency". 
• Margin should be calculated based on surcharged unit price. 

Surcharge supported natively on sales order(and purchase order) form: 

In AX, if the user enters the -ve discount percentage directly on discount percent or multi-line discount percent field the line discount is calculated and applied on sales order. 

Surcharge(-ve discount) set-up in trade agreements: 
AX does not let you set-up negative discount. Comes up with an error message. This error/warning message can be removed by changing the property of the discount percent field. This will allow you to set-up trade agreements with negative discounts.

Anything else?: 
After setting up the trade agreement for surcharges, there is another location where AX filters out trade agreement records which have negative discounts. Comment out the code from there and you have a new feature call surcharge(negative discounts) available for use.

Other options
- Line level "Charges" which is added to the line amount in invoice document. The margins will be off.