In the next couple of weeks, Netsuite is going to begin rolling out its new release to all its customers. The rollout comes with a handful of useful features that you will want to know about, especially if you are interested in using them to better your business processes or finally find relief in the fact that they have addressed something that was a hindrance to your day to day operations. Here is a summarized list of some of the most important changes:
DANGER: CRMSDK Email Templates Phasing Out This Year
Let’s get this one out of the way first: NetSuite is phasing out their CRMSDK Email Templates and fully replacing them with Scriptable Email Templates later next year, at release 2015.2. Simply put, this means if you have any email template in the system and it’s not yet in the new “scriptable” format, it needs to be replaced as soon as possible, and scripts that send emails may need to be updated as well. Seriously, don’t wait on this one, as it may have a serious impact on your business!
Enhanced General Ledger Customization
Hear ye all financial accountants! The arrival of this feature allows you to define the GL impact of transactions, across single or multiple accounting books, which will be extremely useful for industries or tax jurisdictions that have their peculiar accounting practices.
Practically speaking, the financial accountant can create their own custom transaction types or modify existing ones, therefore eliminating the need for generic journal entries to generate the accounting representation of business specific events.
This implies a lot less manual accounting work. Also, reports will be more relevant; they will no longer have to be a presentation of the generic and strict mass of journal entries, but you will have a good custom defined view as to what the transaction actually is to your business.
New Request For Quote for Enhanced Procurement
This beneficial feature pertains to buyers and sourcing managers, making their competitive bidding with multiple vendors more efficient and easier to manage.
By adding the Request For Quote for enhanced procurement feature, the vendor can quickly send RFQs to multiple vendors, and then scope out the responses to identify the best terms and pricing when purchasing specific items. Then when the choice is made, a vendor is selected for the specific RFQ item, and the system creates purchase contracts using the terms and pricing provided in the RFQ.
In consequence, this online evaluation of vendors reduces time spent making phone calls, exchanging emails and data transfer from one document to another.
Enhanced Global Vendor Management
A feature designed to facilitate vendor relationships spanning across your legal entities. Time and effort will be saved by creating a single vendor record that can be used to transact in multiple subsidiaries. Vendor properties and differences, like credit limit, can be set for each subsidiary.
Personally, I have been exposed to clients expanding globally who have had to deal with the annoyances of separating their same vendor across subsidiaries, this will be a huge time saver, and will allow real time visibility into consolidated and per-subsidiary balances you owe a vendor.
Empower Your Mobile Workforce
Netsuite for Android
With this release, Netsuite has taken into consideration the imposing market share of Android phone users. Coming soon following the release of 2015.1, Netsuite for Android allows mobile users to conduct ERP related business on the go.
Here is a list of the most interesting mobile app content:
- Access KPI’s
- Approve sales orders & expense reports
- View/Edit customer, sales and other records.
- Enter time and expenses
- Manage and view calendars
- Drill Down into saved searches
- Multi-language and multi-currency support
The initial version supports only expense reports and timesheets for now, but additional features will be infused throughout the cycle. Fortunately, the beauty of this feature is that it’s free on Google Play!
Netsuite for iPhone
Though this feature has been around since 2013.2, the Netsuite for iPhone app adds functionality which allows drill down from an event into the record to take action on it directly.
Suite Flow changes can now be utilized within the iPhone app where custom workflows can be triggered such as approvals. The user also has full access to custom buttons created using SuiteFlow from your iPhone. Additional transactions are now supported such as:
- Item Fulfilments
- Customer Deposits
- Deposits
- Return Authorizations
- Requisitions
This app is also available at no cost, and these new features will be injected throughout the Release 1 upgrade cycle.
Location Based Eligibility Criteria for Promotions
Promotions can now be set to specific locations. This will come in handy when the user wants to segment and manage promotions in one location without affecting pricing in the other.
Bill Payment Holds for Vendor Bills
Long gone are the days when vendor payments where improperly applied. In the case the wrong quantity of goods was shipped from a vendor or their billing was incorrect, the vendor bill should not be paid, even though it may have been approved. The purpose of this feature is to manage with more ease the discrepancy instead of the difficult process of reclaiming lost money after it has been paid.
This feature applies in the situation, where you want to apply a payment hold to stop payments from being processed on approved vendor bills and prevent funds from leaving the company without correcting the discrepancy on the disputed bill. This results in better management of cash flow.
Advanced PDF/HTML Templates
Enhanced Template Editor
The advanced PDF/HTML templates have been completely reskinned with a cleaner, more modern interface. The result is a less cluttered toolbar that makes it much easier for you to find yourself around the editor.
It is also much easier to add on HTML based elements, such as images and tables. Once one of these elements is clicked a popup appears with easy properties that can be modified.
Separate Templates for Email and Printing
Before this release, only one PDF/HTML template could be associated to a custom transaction. Now users can easily select separate templates one for printing and one for e-mailing.
As an example, this can come in handy if you always send printed invoices to clients, and want to include details on the emailed copy, which you only use internally, such as the cost, gross profit, margin, etc. Which are things that you usually don’t want your customer to necessarily know or have at their disposal.
Enhanced Format Options for Emailing Reports
This new release of Netsuite considers a couple more formats than the priorly available inline HTML and HTML in the attachment whenever you would send Email reports and Schedule Reports.
Here are the newly available formats:
- CSV
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Word
- Link
CSV Support for Inventory Transfers
People that have regularly used CSV imports know how much of a time saver they can be for bulk data processing. Release 2015.1 has exposed more records pertaining to inventory management, therefore allowing the user to import through CSV transfers of inventory from one location to another. In one step, the inventory transfer decreases items in the “From Location” and increases them in the “To Location” field.
Matrix Assemblies
Previous to release 2015.1, NetSuite users could create Matrix Items (same item with different options) or Assembly Items (item made out of components), but not a combination of the two. This new feature will be particularly useful if you use the manufacturing features of NetSuite to build items that have small differences between each other, such as color or size. Some of the advantages of this feature would be to allow updating of all similar assembly items by updating the parent, and having only one assembly item show up on the webstore with that item having multiple options to choose from.
How Can We Help?
Whether you want assistance on converting your CRMSDK Email Templates or you’d like help on optimizing your existing processes to leverage the new features, don’t hesitate to contact us! We’ll be happy to help.
