Accidently deleted a record that you were trying to save?   Moving the mouse to the save icon we click a split second too early and hit the delete because the Delete icon was next to the Save icon.  

Yes, we have all done it.   Yes, you were saved if you left the “Confirm Delete On Delete Button” dialog box on.  But many of us have turned the dialog box off.

This is over starting with Epicor 10.   The Delete icon can now be moved.

There is a new global settings that avoids the frustration of accidentally clicking the delete button which was put next to the save button. 

In any data entry screen. 

Tools à Options

Global Options à Toolbar

Notice the delete icon is next to the save icon.

Down arrow on the Delete Tool Location drop down list and select “After NavControl”

Notice the delete icon is now behind the NavControl icon.

Click OK and when the original data entry screen appears the Delete Icon is after the NavControl icon.

You now longer have to worry about deleting a record for this reason.

The post Prevent accidental deletions in Epicor ERP appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Right-Click > Open With

Most master table maintenance screens are available by doing a “Right-Click > Open With” inside the field. This feature allows to you to enter missing master file data without leaving the screen you are in. Security is enforced for this feature so you can only add master files that you have security. The Example below shows Sale Order Entry and doing a Right-Click > Open With Ship Via field so you may create a new Ship Via or search on existing ones..

The post Epicor – How to drill to related documents appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

To speed Epicor up each user can “Cache” several of their most used screens. The first time each screen is loaded during a session will still take the same amount of time. But the screen will be saved in cache memory after that point. The load will be much faster after the first load. To set the Memory Caching you must be in the desired entry screen. Then choose Tools > Options

Then click on the Memory Cache checkbox.

This option should be used sparingly. If too many screens are “Cached” the screen load will become slower.  This is because each cached screen stays in RAM.  If your machine starts running low on RAM, it will swap Epicor and other open applications out to your hard drive which will slow down the overall computer.  If you have a lot of ram (such as 2 gigs or more), this issue because less apparent.

The post Epicor Memory Caching appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Excel integration is built into Epicor 9. Grids are enabled to copy and paste data in and out. Copy Epicor data into Excel by right clicking on the grid and selecting “Copy to Excel”.

Copy Excel data into Epicor 9. The Epicor 9 grid will allow the excel data to be update the grid.  Do this by right clicking on the grid after copying your data to the clipboard and selecting “Paste Update”.  Paste Update finds matching records and updates them.  In this case, if an order was in the system and you pasted in a revision to the order, the system will find the appropriate line and update it from your copied from Excel Data

The Epicor 9 grid will allow the excel data to be inserted into the grid.  Paste Insert, Inserts NEW data into the system.  So if you wanted to add lines into the order from an excel spreadsheet, you would use this function.

The post Epicor – Excel Integration appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Add New Line with a “Hot” key

Hot keys can be programmed to quickly add line to Quotes, Sales Orders, Purchase Orders and so on.

To set a Hot Key you must be in the desired entry screen. Then choose Tools > Options

Hot Keys tab. Choose a Command and the Short Cut key.

The screen above will create a new Sales Order line when the Insert key is hit.

The post Epicor – Hot Keys appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

One of the most important steps of the Epicor Signature Implementation Project plan is to get the Epicor software installed and tested. The install process is complex and needs to be verified before the Epicor install consultant leaves. Once the Epicor install consultant leaves it could be weeks before rescheduling.

Before the Epicor consultant is scheduled to arrive and install the software verify the following:

• Verify Epicor has sent registration key codes to all Epicor modules purchased. If you are missing registration key codes, contact your Epicor Salesman immediately to get all of the codes. When you receive the fixed registration key codes, verify them again.
• Verify Epicor has sent the correct DVD’s to all Epicor modules purchased. . If you are missing DVD’s, contact your Epicor Salesman immediately to get all of the DVD’s. When you receive the replacement DVD’s, verify them again.
• Once you have all of the hardware, software and registration codes have arrived you can schedule the Epicor Install consultant.

Before the Epicor software installation is checked off as complete. Be sure to verify the following:

• Verify database software is installed and tested. Download and install any outstanding patches.
• Verify Epicor modules purchased are installed on server. Third party modules will probably be installed later. Download and install any outstanding patches.
• Verify Epicor help is installed and working.
• If embedded education was purchased, make sure the icon exists and verify education is installed and working.
• Verify the client software is installed on several client computers and is working.
• Verify someone at your site is trained on installing the Epicor client software.
• Verify Crystal Reports developer is installed and document which computer it is installed on.
• Perform prints and print previews on Crystal Reports and Progress reports from a client.
• Verify Backups routines are created, tested and scheduled to run nightly.
• Reboot the Epicor servers and make sure Epicor restarts automatically.
• Get all Epicor Software media together and store somewhere safe and where it can be found.

Following the above list will help insure a successful software installation. As people go through the training process, all of the software will work with the training guides. It is very aggravating when the training guide wants to print something and printing is not working.

The post Epicor 9 Software Installation & Upgrade Checklist appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Sorting Epicor Master File Descriptions the way it makes best sense for your company (instead of Alphabetic)

Annoyed when setting up menu security and the security groups are mixed with the employees on the list.

Go into the Security Groups Maintenance and add two leading spaces to the security group descriptions.

Next time in menu maintenance all of the security groups will appear at the top of the list and the employees will be at the bottom of the list.

This makes security maintenance easier than trying to pick the groups out of the middle of employees. This works on other descriptions also if you do not want them in alphabetical order. If the database has ten product groups but the ninth group is 60 percent of the orders. In Product group Maintenance, add two spaces in front of the description. This product group will now be first in the drop down box.

This technique is not needed on master file that have the system default flag like terms and ship via.

The post Epicor Master File Descriptions appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Epicor Standardize Master File Descriptions explained in detail below.

In Epicor when you do a down arrow on a master file field it is the description that is displayed, not the short key name. So by standardizing the descriptions it makes finding the correct record easier. In the next example, I have put a department in front of the Security group descriptions. All finance security groups will be together.

It is less important when there are less records to choose from and more important if there are thousands to choose from. In this example let take a look at the part master. When looking for a part there is also a description field to do a search on. So standards are critical for looking up parts.

In this real world example, one I have personally seen way to many times. One engineer uses “Stainless Steel”, another uses “SS” and another uses “SSteel” in part descriptions. When searching for an existing part, an engineer would need to look for all three abbreviations. In reality without standards we all know there could be more abbreviations for “Stainless Steel” that nobody knows about. When the part cannot be found, a new part will be created, purchased, and possibly stocked. This issue can snowball that you run out of one part and so you expedite it in. In reality, you already have the part number in stock under one or more internal part numbers. Worse case that I have personally seen was the same part number was stocked under seven internal part numbers. This decreases cash flow, increases inventory taxes, and can eventually increase obsolete part cost.
It is not just abbreviations that are important to the standardized; it is the order of the words in the description. Do not re-invent the wheel; take a look at your suppliers’ web-site. They have already done the work. For instance, if you are creating the standards for hardware part take a look at your suppliers’ website. The supplier has put some thought into the ease for a customer to find what they are looking for. The descriptions are normally most import identifier to the least import identifier. For example, we are trying to determine Screw descriptions you want something like:

Screw, Type, Head Type, Material, Length, etc
Screw, Wood, Round, Aluminum, .75 in…..
Screw, Machine, Hex, Stainless Steel, 1.25 in…
Screw, Sheet Metal, Steel, 3/4 in…

Part of your standard is to determine how to signify length. Are you going to use .75 in or 3/4 in?
Your company could decide length is more important than material, if that is the case flip the two around. The identifier order is less important than having a standard and enforcing it.

In Epicor, my opinion, the part number description is much more important that the part number itself.
Part descriptions can be changed at any time, even years after the implementation.

The post Epicor Standardize Master File Descriptions appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

IIS Reset Tip for Epicor ERP 10 and 10.1.  No need to kick everyone out of the system.

This training and demonstration video shows an alternative way to reset IIS in Epicor  ERP10 and ERP 10.1

Epicor uses Internet Information Server (IIS) as it’s application server tier.  IIS is a base component of all Windows Server Operating systems that Epicor ERP 10 and higher support.  Once in a while, something may occur that makes IIS unresponsive or slow.  A typical cause might be a bug that causes a memory leak.  This means the system will slowly start to use more and more memory causing it to slow down and resetting IIS clears out all allocated memory.

However, if you use the traditional command line IIS reset function, it resets all your IIS sites.  If you have multiple app servers such as multiple separate company databases, a pilot instance, a live instance etc, this function resets all of them which will knock all users of all those sessions out of Epicor.

This Video show’s how to just reset one instance.  This can be especially useful if only one testing instance is causing a problem, why inconvenience all of your users?

In this demonstration we’ll show:

• Describe the problem and traditional reset process
• Show the alternate method to reset IIS

Click the Chat Button below if you need more assistance.

The post IIS Reset Tip for Epicor ERP 10 and 10.1 appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Use only Security Groups, never use Employee ID

In Epicor 9 there are hundreds of individual menu items. Setup Security Groups and assign these security groups to each employee. An employee can have multiple security groups assigned. The bigger the company more security groups might be needed.
I recommend starting out with something like the following but terminology depends on the company:

The non-managers (Planner, Buyer) have access to particular menu items in the General Operations menus and reports. The managers generally have access to the menu items in the Setup menus also. A company may want a buyer to be able to create suppliers and part, so the above generalities are not written in granite.

Your company may have employees for each of these security groups or you may only have one person in accounting. If you have only one person in accounting then you would need to give that person the CFO, AP, AP, GL and PR security groups. As you company grows and you hire a new accounting person to take over AP and AR, you give that person AP and AR and remove it from the existing person. There no need to go look at hundreds of menus to determine security.

If you hire a new buyer you give that person the Material Buyer group and you are finished. Again there is no need to look at hundreds of menus to determine the security of the existing buyer. There is usually the case where there are multiple people is a position and one of them has a couple added menu items. It is very tempting to give them a standard security group and then add the employee ID to the extra menus. I recommend in that case, create a lead security group and handle it that way.

Each new release you need to research whether any menu items have been added and setup the correct security groups.

The post Epicor 9 Security Groups appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Epicor Apply Security Groups to all levels of the menus

One common shortcut when applying security is to apply the security at the higher levels of the menu security only.

For instance, on the Financial Management Menu only give the financial groups access. For everyone else, the Financial Management menu and all menu items below disappear.

From the prior menu snapshot you can see all of the Financial menus are missing.

I am a salesman that goes into Customer tracker for Dalton and go to the Financial > Billing > Detail tab and notice Currency field. I right click on Currency and open with Currency Entry

I am now in Currency Master Maintenance and this is because this menu option security allows it.

Make sure you set security on every menu item. Each new release you need to research whether any menu items have been added and setup the correct security groups.

The post Epicor – Apply Security Groups to all levels of the menus appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Use Security Groups to minimize confusion and new software trauma

Epicor has hundreds of menu options to choose from and is overwhelming for the standard user. Each user will only see the menu options that their security group allows them to see. This should dramatically reduce the menu options for the standard user and be much less overwhelming.

When you do not give the user Financial Management access, the Finance menus will disappear as seen in the next screen shot.

The post Use Security Groups to minimize confusion and new software trauma appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Excel integration is built into Epicor 9. Grids are enabled to copy and paste data in and out. Copy Epicor data into Excel by right clicking on the grid and selecting “Copy to Excel”.

Copy Excel data into Epicor 9. The Epicor 9 grid will allow the excel data to be update the grid.  Do this by right clicking on the grid after copying your data to the clipboard and selecting “Paste Update”.  Paste Update finds matching records and updates them.  In this case, if an order was in the system and you pasted in a revision to the order, the system will find the appropriate line and update it from your copied from Excel Data

The Epicor 9 grid will allow the excel data to be inserted into the grid.  Paste Insert, Inserts NEW data into the system.  So if you wanted to add lines into the order from an excel spreadsheet, you would use this function.

The post Epicor – Excel Integration appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Add New Line with a “Hot” key

Hot keys can be programmed to quickly add line to Quotes, Sales Orders, Purchase Orders and so on.

To set a Hot Key you must be in the desired entry screen. Then choose Tools > Options

Hot Keys tab. Choose a Command and the Short Cut key.

The screen above will create a new Sales Order line when the Insert key is hit.

The post Epicor – Hot Keys appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

One of the most important steps of the Epicor Signature Implementation Project plan is to get the Epicor software installed and tested. The install process is complex and needs to be verified before the Epicor install consultant leaves. Once the Epicor install consultant leaves it could be weeks before rescheduling.

Before the Epicor consultant is scheduled to arrive and install the software verify the following:

• Verify Epicor has sent registration key codes to all Epicor modules purchased. If you are missing registration key codes, contact your Epicor Salesman immediately to get all of the codes. When you receive the fixed registration key codes, verify them again.
• Verify Epicor has sent the correct DVD’s to all Epicor modules purchased. . If you are missing DVD’s, contact your Epicor Salesman immediately to get all of the DVD’s. When you receive the replacement DVD’s, verify them again.
• Once you have all of the hardware, software and registration codes have arrived you can schedule the Epicor Install consultant.

Before the Epicor software installation is checked off as complete. Be sure to verify the following:

• Verify database software is installed and tested. Download and install any outstanding patches.
• Verify Epicor modules purchased are installed on server. Third party modules will probably be installed later. Download and install any outstanding patches.
• Verify Epicor help is installed and working.
• If embedded education was purchased, make sure the icon exists and verify education is installed and working.
• Verify the client software is installed on several client computers and is working.
• Verify someone at your site is trained on installing the Epicor client software.
• Verify Crystal Reports developer is installed and document which computer it is installed on.
• Perform prints and print previews on Crystal Reports and Progress reports from a client.
• Verify Backups routines are created, tested and scheduled to run nightly.
• Reboot the Epicor servers and make sure Epicor restarts automatically.
• Get all Epicor Software media together and store somewhere safe and where it can be found.

Following the above list will help insure a successful software installation. As people go through the training process, all of the software will work with the training guides. It is very aggravating when the training guide wants to print something and printing is not working.

The post Epicor 9 Software Installation & Upgrade Checklist appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Sorting Epicor Master File Descriptions the way it makes best sense for your company (instead of Alphabetic)

Annoyed when setting up menu security and the security groups are mixed with the employees on the list.

Go into the Security Groups Maintenance and add two leading spaces to the security group descriptions.

Next time in menu maintenance all of the security groups will appear at the top of the list and the employees will be at the bottom of the list.

This makes security maintenance easier than trying to pick the groups out of the middle of employees. This works on other descriptions also if you do not want them in alphabetical order. If the database has ten product groups but the ninth group is 60 percent of the orders. In Product group Maintenance, add two spaces in front of the description. This product group will now be first in the drop down box.

This technique is not needed on master file that have the system default flag like terms and ship via.

The post Epicor Master File Descriptions appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Epicor Standardize Master File Descriptions explained in detail below.

In Epicor when you do a down arrow on a master file field it is the description that is displayed, not the short key name. So by standardizing the descriptions it makes finding the correct record easier. In the next example, I have put a department in front of the Security group descriptions. All finance security groups will be together.

It is less important when there are less records to choose from and more important if there are thousands to choose from. In this example let take a look at the part master. When looking for a part there is also a description field to do a search on. So standards are critical for looking up parts.

In this real world example, one I have personally seen way to many times. One engineer uses “Stainless Steel”, another uses “SS” and another uses “SSteel” in part descriptions. When searching for an existing part, an engineer would need to look for all three abbreviations. In reality without standards we all know there could be more abbreviations for “Stainless Steel” that nobody knows about. When the part cannot be found, a new part will be created, purchased, and possibly stocked. This issue can snowball that you run out of one part and so you expedite it in. In reality, you already have the part number in stock under one or more internal part numbers. Worse case that I have personally seen was the same part number was stocked under seven internal part numbers. This decreases cash flow, increases inventory taxes, and can eventually increase obsolete part cost.
It is not just abbreviations that are important to the standardized; it is the order of the words in the description. Do not re-invent the wheel; take a look at your suppliers’ web-site. They have already done the work. For instance, if you are creating the standards for hardware part take a look at your suppliers’ website. The supplier has put some thought into the ease for a customer to find what they are looking for. The descriptions are normally most import identifier to the least import identifier. For example, we are trying to determine Screw descriptions you want something like:

Screw, Type, Head Type, Material, Length, etc
Screw, Wood, Round, Aluminum, .75 in…..
Screw, Machine, Hex, Stainless Steel, 1.25 in…
Screw, Sheet Metal, Steel, 3/4 in…

Part of your standard is to determine how to signify length. Are you going to use .75 in or 3/4 in?
Your company could decide length is more important than material, if that is the case flip the two around. The identifier order is less important than having a standard and enforcing it.

In Epicor, my opinion, the part number description is much more important that the part number itself.
Part descriptions can be changed at any time, even years after the implementation.

The post Epicor Standardize Master File Descriptions appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

IIS Reset Tip for Epicor ERP 10 and 10.1.  No need to kick everyone out of the system.

This training and demonstration video shows an alternative way to reset IIS in Epicor  ERP10 and ERP 10.1

Epicor uses Internet Information Server (IIS) as it’s application server tier.  IIS is a base component of all Windows Server Operating systems that Epicor ERP 10 and higher support.  Once in a while, something may occur that makes IIS unresponsive or slow.  A typical cause might be a bug that causes a memory leak.  This means the system will slowly start to use more and more memory causing it to slow down and resetting IIS clears out all allocated memory.

However, if you use the traditional command line IIS reset function, it resets all your IIS sites.  If you have multiple app servers such as multiple separate company databases, a pilot instance, a live instance etc, this function resets all of them which will knock all users of all those sessions out of Epicor.

This Video show’s how to just reset one instance.  This can be especially useful if only one testing instance is causing a problem, why inconvenience all of your users?

In this demonstration we’ll show:

• Describe the problem and traditional reset process
• Show the alternate method to reset IIS

Click the Chat Button below if you need more assistance.

The post IIS Reset Tip for Epicor ERP 10 and 10.1 appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Use only Security Groups, never use Employee ID

In Epicor 9 there are hundreds of individual menu items. Setup Security Groups and assign these security groups to each employee. An employee can have multiple security groups assigned. The bigger the company more security groups might be needed.
I recommend starting out with something like the following but terminology depends on the company:

The non-managers (Planner, Buyer) have access to particular menu items in the General Operations menus and reports. The managers generally have access to the menu items in the Setup menus also. A company may want a buyer to be able to create suppliers and part, so the above generalities are not written in granite.

Your company may have employees for each of these security groups or you may only have one person in accounting. If you have only one person in accounting then you would need to give that person the CFO, AP, AP, GL and PR security groups. As you company grows and you hire a new accounting person to take over AP and AR, you give that person AP and AR and remove it from the existing person. There no need to go look at hundreds of menus to determine security.

If you hire a new buyer you give that person the Material Buyer group and you are finished. Again there is no need to look at hundreds of menus to determine the security of the existing buyer. There is usually the case where there are multiple people is a position and one of them has a couple added menu items. It is very tempting to give them a standard security group and then add the employee ID to the extra menus. I recommend in that case, create a lead security group and handle it that way.

Each new release you need to research whether any menu items have been added and setup the correct security groups.

The post Epicor 9 Security Groups appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.

Epicor Apply Security Groups to all levels of the menus

One common shortcut when applying security is to apply the security at the higher levels of the menu security only.

For instance, on the Financial Management Menu only give the financial groups access. For everyone else, the Financial Management menu and all menu items below disappear.

From the prior menu snapshot you can see all of the Financial menus are missing.

I am a salesman that goes into Customer tracker for Dalton and go to the Financial > Billing > Detail tab and notice Currency field. I right click on Currency and open with Currency Entry

I am now in Currency Master Maintenance and this is because this menu option security allows it.

Make sure you set security on every menu item. Each new release you need to research whether any menu items have been added and setup the correct security groups.

The post Epicor – Apply Security Groups to all levels of the menus appeared first on Epicor Consulting Services by CFBS.