PCMARS 2.1 FEATURES

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INDEX

New Special Features 2 Recurring Transactions 4 Reuse (Linking to Past Year) 6 Reconciliation (Linking to Past Year) 7 PcMars 2.1 Period Changes/Overview 8 Using Direct Control of Period & Reconcile 9 Printing the Check Register 10 Editing Past Years Data 12 Revolving Credit 14 Last Backup Location 15 Carry Over Cashflow 16 New Report Options 17 New Report Printing Feature 20

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PCMARS 2.1 FEATURES

NEW SPECIAL FEATURES There are several new features in the 2.1 version that are worth listing so you will be aware of these changes.

1. When you click on “File”⇒ “Open Set of Books”, the Open Set of Books screen can now be “resized” so you see all the books listed. You can resize a screen by getting the double arrow cursor ↔ with your mouse and dragging the screen to the size you wish. This is really an advantage if you are using “Advance File Management”. 2. When you are in “Setup”⇒ “Business Information”⇒ the “Additional” tab, the Operator,

Spouse, Children listing changes to Operator and Members if the type of entity is anything other than a “Sole Proprietorship”.

3. If a set of books is opened using a program that is “Older” than the program that was

used to backup the books, the following warning and screen will appear.

In this example the “Sample.07” set of books was saved or backed up using a PcMars version 2.1.2.0. The program I used to open the set of books was only 2.1.1.0. The easy solution is to download the current “patch” to this version of PcMars. A hyperlink is available right on this screen to access the current “patches” FREE on the Internet.

4. Another new feature in the 2.1 version of PcMars is the “Globe” icon on the tool bar.

Clicking on the “Globe” will being up the following screen:

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This will tell you the exact version number of your PcMars and two hyperlinks to access the Internet to the PcMars web site and also the web site for SoftShell Computer Service. You can also access this screen by clicking on “Help” above the icon bar.

5. Added an option to either print or not print the chart of account codes in all the report headings. This option is selected under “Options⇒Miscellaneous Options”. With this option selected you can tell what type of account codes a client is using for their PcMars.

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RECURRING TRANSACTIONS Recurring transactions are any transaction that repeats weekly, monthly, etc. to the same vendor, but not necessarily the same “amount”. It can be anything from an automatic withdrawal to a paycheck deposit.

When you have entered under “Setup⇒”Recurring Transactions” the type of “recurring” transaction (i.e. check, deposit, credit), PcMars will remind you to make “recurring” transactions on the prescribed day. These transactions can be selected by month or week. In this example “month” and the 28th day have been chosen for three recurring transactions.

When the 28th day of each month comes along, this screen will pop up and prompt you to “add” the transactions that are scheduled for the 28th. You have the choice at that time to click “Yes”, “No” or “Quit asking”.

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If you choose “Yes”, the recurring transaction screen pertaining to that transaction will be displayed for you to enter more data such as amount if it is not a specific amount every month.

If you choose “No”, the program will prompt you again in one hour (or the next time you open this set of books). If you choose “Quit asking”, the program will not prompt you to enter this transaction again

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REUSE (Linking to Past Year) The “reuse” button is a time saver to “reuse” information entered in a previous transaction. This button is not new to PcMars; however, we have added a new feature to this function to allow you to “reuse” information in a transaction from a “previous year”. So the reuse screen has a new option noted below.

When you check “previous year” option, the following screen will appear to allow you to check the previous set of books to view the specific transaction information you wish to “reuse”.

NOTE: If you already set up these “prior years” under “Setup⇒Business Information⇒Advance (tab)”, you WILL NOT be prompted for the prior year set of books. If you “select previous year set of books”, the program automatically saves this to the “Setup⇒Business Information⇒Advance (tab)”.

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RECONCILIATION (Linking to Past Year) In order to make the reconciliation process easier when reconciling “previous years transaction”, we have added a new feature to the reconcile screen. You can reconcile transactions from the previous year set of books by checking this box. If a link has not been setup to the previous year set of books under “Setup⇒Business Information⇒Advanced (Tab), you will be prompted for the previous year set of books. Then you can reconcile transactions from the previous year, defaulting to the last statement period of the previous year (i.e. “post-December” or “13”).

When you are done in the previous year, uncheck the box, and you will go back to the current year, with the correct bank balances automatically carried over to the current year.

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PcMARS 2.1 PERIOD CHANGES/OVERVIEW

My first statement whenever someone asks me about the period is, “The period number corresponds to your bank statement. The transactions listed on your bank statement cleared the bank during this reconcile PERIOD.” Most people who use “Direct Control of Period” enter their transactions into PcMars directly from the bank statement. Changes in 2.1: To improve/simplify the reconcile procedure; the 2.1 version had several changes:

A. Period “0” was removed as an option. Prior to version 2.1 PcMars had 14 different period options—0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13. These 14 periods always caused confusion because of Pre-Jan (period 0) and Post-Dec (period 13). Users didn’t know how to spread 12 bank statements correctly among 14 periods.

Now in version 2.1 we have 13 periods—1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13. These are January through Post-December. This should SAVE confusion because the first bank statement is always January (assuming a calendar year) and any “floating” transactions that clear in the following year’s bank statement will be entered in the prior year’s period 13 or “Post-December”.

B. Uncleared transactions are assigned period “0” when not using “Direct Control of Period”.

As a review—here is a summary to explain how the uncleared transactions are handled now in version 2.1 versus how they were handled in the prior versions. Direct Control of the Period Turned Off: In versions prior to 2.1 PcMars took a “guess” at when the transaction would clear based on the transaction date—i.e. if an uncleared transaction was entered on 3/10/07, PcMars automatically assigned period 3 to this transaction (assuming a calendar year). In the 2.1 version of PcMars that same uncleared transaction entered on 3/10/07 would automatically be assigned period 0. Direct Control of the Period Turned On: There is no change between version 2.1 and previous versions. PcMars still assigns the period you specify to both cleared and uncleared transactions. Several Tips for Direct Control of Period Users:

A. By default the reconcile screen ONLY shows transactions matching the specified period. IF you change the period number, the transaction DISAPPEARS from your screen because it no longer matches your search criteria. IT IS NOT GONE!!

B. If you can’t find a transaction on the reconcile screen, click “Show out of range transactions”.

C. DON’T switch back and forth between turning the “Direct Control of Period” ON AND OFF.

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USING DIRECT CONTROL OF PERIOD & RECONCILE IF you are using the “Direct Control of Period” option in PcMars (whereby you enter your deposits and checks directly from a bank statement), your prior years reconcile screen would look like this—BLANK (unless you manually assigned them to period 13 when you entered them). This is because the period defaults to “13” and all uncleared transactions are assigned period “0” (starting with version 2.1). See below under “More Period Info”.

In order to see any uncleared transactions that were entered, just click on “Show out of range transactions”. This will allow you to see all the transactions regardless of the period.

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PRINTING THE CHECK REGISTER

The check register option also varies depending on whether the “Direct Control of Period” option is ON or OFF.

When not using “Direct Control of Period” The check register report option will look like this when the “Bank Statement Period” option is selected.

Note that the “Show cleared” and “Show uncleared” functions are disabled. This is because the “Bank Statement Period” option searches for transactions cleared in the appropriate period—i.e. May = period 5. Since only cleared transactions have a period assigned, there is no need to have the “Show cleared” or “Show uncleared” options.

When you select to print your check register by “Date” rather than “Bank Statement Period”, the check register report option will look like this.

In this situation PcMars searches for the actual date the transaction was entered. Since this search completely ignores the “period”, the “Show cleared” and “Show uncleared” options are enabled.

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When using “Direct Control of Period” The check register report option will look like this. You can select your check register by “Period”, “Month”, or “Date”. You have the option to “Show cleared” and/or “Show uncleared” during the period, month or date you have selected.

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EDITING PAST YEARS DATA When you need to “edit” data (more than just reconciling) in your previous years set of books, you just need to follow this procedure. An example of this would be if you needed adjust a principal payment and interest break down. In the previous versions of PcMars this “carryover balance” procedure only updated and carried over the bank account balances. Now ALL asset and liability balances are updated.

1. When you have your “current” year set of books open, click on “File” 2. Click on “Go to previous year Set of Books”

3. This will bring up the following screen with your “last years set of books” already

highlighted. Click “OK”. This will take you directly to your “previous years” set of books where you can edit, change, delete, add transactions to that set of books.

4. After you have finished making any changes/corrections in your last years set of books,

you will click on “File”. The option you have now is “Return to current year Set of Books”.

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When you choose that option, you will be asked the following:

This screen is letting you know that there may have been changes that affect those balances and whether or not you wish to carry those balances over. You will notice that you have the option to “Print a report listing the changes made”. If you choose to print a report (I strongly suggest you do), you will receive a report showing ALL the beginning balances for the assets/liabilities “before” you made any changes in the set of books and then the balances “after” you made those changes. After viewing/printing this report, you will again be back in your current year set of books. NOTE: You can also find this same “Carry over balances” screen under the “Utility” feature of PcMars.

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REVOLVING CREDIT Revolving credit transactions have been in PcMars for quite awhile, however new now is the ability to have an “income” transaction. Revolving Credit transactions are usually used to enter any type of credit transactions. The primary purpose of this is to track transactions paid through a revolving credit account, but can also be used for credit cards or other loan instruments. It is similar to a check except that the money is coming from a loan vendor rather than a bank.

Credit transactions are normally expense transactions, but now you can change this default setting and choose credit “income” transactions. In that case the screen will look more like a regular income/deposit transaction and the information will be entered that way. There will be no "Pay to the Order of" or Address. Vendors (one or multiple) are entered in the bottom part of the transaction as detailed entry information.

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LAST BACKUP LOCATION Under “Miscellaneous Options” you can select to have your last back location be the “default” location. So if you always back up to the “Compressed (zip) File” option, that will always be selected as well as the location of where you are backing up that zipped file when you go to “Backup Set of Books”. This method and location is saved for EACH SET OF BOOKS.

NOTE: Because of this option, the “right click”, “set default backup location”

option that was available in 2.0 is GONE.

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CARRY OVER CASHFLOW Previously in the PcMars you were able to carry over Budget data to a new budget. In the 2.1 version of PcMars you are now able to carry over any cash flow or budget file from the previous year. This will save you time in having to type in all new numbers when they might be the same or similar to the previous year. In the cashflow screen you will have a “Carry over” button at the bottom of the screen.

By clicking on this “Carry over” button, you will see a screen where you can choose which cashflo you wish to carry over and click on the “Change” button to change set of books and year you wish to carry over.

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NEW REPORT OPTIONS Several new reports and features have been added in the 2.1 version of PcMars. Some of these new reports and features and shown below:

Multi-year Loan Report

This report is similar to the Detailed Loan Report, except that the report will cover as many past years as the loan(s) have existed. The year and beginning balance of the first year that the loan exists will be printed. To report activity for one Enterprise and/or Profit Center (PC), fill in those fields (or leave blank to report ALL). Check the "Cycle" box if you want to view loan activity for all the loan accounts. The program essentially cycles the report (the same as if you had specified just one loan) for ALL of the loans. Check the last box if you want to print each loan on a separate page instead of right after each other. The prior years 1, 2, 3 & 4 are set up under the “Business Information”⇒ “Advanced” tab.

Bank Transfer Report The Bank Transfer Report is simply a list of the transactions that are either bank transfer type transactions or other type transactions that involve two or more bank accounts. It is in the format of the Entry Journal.

You have three different ways of viewing the transactions, shown in the "Select by" box. Select the method of viewing by clicking the radio button before "Month", "Period" (if using Direct Control of Period) or "Date". It will default to "ALL" months. In the date selection mode, leaving a date field blank tells the computer to accept all dates. For example if you set the beginning date blank, the report will show all of the transactions thru the ending date entered and vice-versa.

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Vendor Summary/1099 Report This report will summarize activity for one vendor, or all vendors, for a given period range. This is not a new report; however, you now have the capability to join fiscal years for a calendar report.

Click the radio button in front of "Month" or "Period" to show the totals by month or period respectively. The month (or period) range will default to encompass the entire year. Accept or change the beginning and ending month (or period) using the mouse to select from the drop down list. If you want to only view activity for a single vendor, type in or select from the drop down list. If you leave it blank the report will show the activity for ALL the vendors. Check "1099 vendors only" to report activity ONLY for those vendors flagged for 1099 reporting in the vendor entry window.

If your fiscal year does not coincide with the calendar year, you can optionally join the current year’s data with the previous year’s data to form a calendar year report. When you check this box, another window will appear showing all the set of books. The program will try to default it to the correct set of books. Click on the previous years set of books for this business entity and click OK. The previous years set of books will be displayed and the month range will be reset to Jan thru Dec.

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Vendor Detail Report The “Vendor Detail Report” will give you “more flexibility” and in the 2.1 version you can also combine fiscal years (as demonstrated in the “Vendor Summary/1099 Report” summary).

TIP: I prefer this report VS the “Vendor Summary Report” because:

1. 1099’s don’t have to be setup ahead of time.

2. More detailed inflow/outflow options

3. Ability to only “Show vendors with total $$ greater than ??? for dollars net”. (i.e. for machine hire 1099 simply put in $600)

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NEW REPORT PRINTING FEATURE When you choose a specific report you wish to print, you have the option to either “Preview” or “Print” this specific report. If you choose the option to first “Preview” your report and then click the “printer” located at the top of the preview screen, you can then choose to also print the “current” page you are previewing as well as specific pages or all pages.

Print a “Current page” option is only available when you choose to “Preview” your report prior to printing.