We are consulting with a NF prospect in the agri-business area. They buy and sell cattle, wheat, feed etc. and currently use something called a “Statistical GL Account” that supposedly holds only statistics like “tons of wheat”, “heads of cattle” etc. They use these accounts to perform month-end reconciliations, balancing sales against inventory, to check for errors. They also need the ability to perform manual reversing entries at the end of the month on these accounts. This prospect wants to continue using these types of accounts in their new package and this has become a deal-breaker issue. Supposedly, both Sage and Solomon have these so-called Statistical GL Accounts as part of their base system. Does anyone have any knowledge of these types of accounts in competitive products or how NAV FIN handles this requirement? Your response would be much appreciated! John Pitney Choice Solutions, LLC 800-486-1541 jpitney@choicesolutions.com
I did do some work in the UK using the Quantity field adding some extra flow fields to the G/L Account and having “Quantity only” posting Accounts. Then on “Gen jnl Check line” if the Account was “Quantity only” made sure no financial values were passed. Why you might ask? No of customers for one square footage another. Average Sale per Customer and Sales per Sq foot. Account schedules changed for the new fields and “Bingo” Not standard, but does require some medium modifications. David Cox MindSource (UK) Limited Navision Solutions Partner Email: david@mindsource.co.uk Web: www.mindsource.co.uk
We implement statistical GL Accounts without any modification. The main problem is protect users to slect this accounts when they post financials transactions. We create statistical accounts and assign special department code ‘STATISTICS’ to this G/L accounts. Valentin Gvozdev BMI Inc.
Valentin Quote: We create statistical accounts and assign special department code ‘STATISTICS’ to this G/L accounts. How would we then do Accounts Schedules? You cannot filter by a different “Department code” per line! If you were to use the “Department Filter” you would lose the “financial information” to do the calculations. I think you cannot avoid Modification in this Instance if this is the way forward. John Quote: statistics like “tons of wheat”, “heads of cattle” etc. They use these accounts to perform month-end reconciliations, balancing sales against inventory How are you going to sell the Wheat and Cattle as Inventory Items? 100 * Wheat bales" 20 * Cattle If so you could do a Report on the Item Inventory Movements and “Sales Amounts”. Calculating the Average Seling Price for the period etc: would be easy Then reconcile these to the G/L Income accounts “Net Change” And no Modifications are needed! The main question is: Does this need to be at G/L level? David Cox MindSource (UK) Limited Navision Solutions Partner Email: david@mindsource.co.uk Web: www.mindsource.co.uk
I have used Statistical G/L Accounts successfully with no mods to the G/L Account table or related areas. You simply have all the stat accounts be offset by a stat offset account. It simple to do, except sometimes clients will mix ratios into their stat G/L accounts. For example, my client was a hotel chain who had stat accounts like “Number of Rooms Sold” ans also “Percentage of Rooms Sold.” It is kind of risky because the user might balance a real G/L Acct. against a stat account, or they might even try to invoice a stat account. If I ever have to do this again, I will try to put some safeguards in place. Does anyone have any thoughts on appropriate safeguards? Also, what about units? The other G/L accounts are in LCY, so the G/L area has no provision for specifying a unit type. Has anyone ever tried to add unit-type specifications to the G/L? ------- Tim Horrigan
Tim Personally I would never advise the posting non Financial Values in the G/L Amount field, this could confuse the Users and lead to miss postings as you outlined. As I said the Quantity field from the General journal Line will go down to the ledgers with no problem, But there are no “Qty. Net Change” or “Qty. at Date” FlowFields in the G/L Account table. But these could be Added and Quantity added as a SumIndex field then you just need a little code to stop any Financial Values being posted. Then in the report if the G/L Account is a Quantity Account Calc the Quantity fields. But as you know most Customers who require such fields would want them on the Accounts Schedules as an Option so there lies a bit more work! If you do a mod in Navision it must be system wide. David Cox MindSource (UK) Limited Navision Solutions Partner Email: david@mindsource.co.uk Web: www.mindsource.co.uk Edited by - David Cox on 2001 Mar 03 23:13:12