November 2014

 

 

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Our FlyBy this month is devoted to a single subject: QuickBooks. Specifically, the newly added link to QuickBooks in version 14.1 of Morning Flight Gold and Pixelblitz.

As easy as the popular QuickBooks accounting program is to use, uploading transactions into it has always been a challenge. It didn't come as a complete surprise to us then that developing a utility to import Morning Flight invoices into QuickBooks took longer than we had hoped it would. Deciding in midstream that "wouldn't it be cool if new users could also transfer into Morning Flight all their QuickBooks customers?" wasn't helping any.

Felt good to get it all working, though, making the long hours worthwhile. Both functions come with the new Gold and Pixelblitz editions now at the Printfire Store. As we promised in our last FlyBy, current users can upgrade to V14.1 at no charge. If you've misplaced your original download link, please email me and I'll see that you get it.

January of next year will bring a fifty dollar adjustment for both the Gold and Pixelblitz. Prices of the rest of the line stay as is. If you're currently using one of the lower editions and have been thinking about upgrading, now would be a good time, ahead of the price increase. Remember, you only pay the difference between editions. And you're never charged an annual maintenance fee.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Hal Heindel
Unitac International Inc.

 


 

QBExportInvoices

 

Loading your Invoices into QuickBooks

 

Morning Flight Gold and Pixelblitz generate invoices but can't accept payments or track receivables. For that you need an accounting system. In much of the world that's likely to be QuickBooks. So here you are. Two separate programs and the nuisance of having to key in a stack of invoices into QuickBooks every night. If only you could get the two to talk to each other. Starting with version 14.1 of Morning Flight you can. Here is what you'll need:

1. Version 14.1 of the Gold or Pixelblitz edition. Why only those two? None of the others generate invoices. Version 14.1 includes an expanded Flight Engineer that produces CSV (Comma Separated Values) files of your Morning Flight invoices, mapped for QuickBooks. If you own a Gold or Pixelblitz version of any age, we invite you to download the upgrade with our compliments - free of charge.

2. The Transaction Pro 5 Importer from Baystate. Importing transactions into QuickBooks with the old "Intuit Interchange Format" files used to be a messy process, often yielding unpredictable results. Fortunately, a number of third party vendors have found a way around the barricades. Foremost among them is Baystate Consulting. Their Transaction Pro 5 Importer now lets us use the same reliable CSV files for exporting transactions that even Intuit has used for exporting lists.

The Transaction Pro 5 Importer is available directly from Baystate and sells for 199.95 U.S with a perpetual use license. A trial version can be downloaded from the Baystate website. We don't sell the Pro 5 or get a commission from Baystate. When we developed the new QuickBooks link for Morning Flight, we tested a number of utilities from different vendors. Theirs just happened to come out on top.
 

More . . .

 


 

QBCustomerImport

 

Importing Customers into Morning Flight

 

Exporting lists out of QuickBooks has always been easier and more reliable than transactions, mainly because the exchange of lists is riding on tried-and-true CSV files. With version 14.1, we've automated the second step, importing and merging your QuickBooks customers with those already stored in your Morning Flight file.

What about the reverse, transferring your Morning Flight customer list into QuickBooks? After all, the Pro 5 Importer works for both lists and transactions, so you might be tempted to bulk-import all your customers into QuickBooks and be done with it. Not a good idea. For openers, it's unnecessary. The Pro 5 program will piggy-back customer and other relevant data whenever you import a Morning Flight invoice into QuickBooks, so there's no need to set up the customer in advance.

Second, if you've built up a customer list in Morning Flight for a while, that list will include folks who asked for quotes but never bought anything. Your list could probably stand a little pruning anyway, so why drag all that baggage into QuickBooks?
 

More . . .

 


 

CousinMel
 

 

The Things we do for Cousin Mel

 

Version V14.1 includes a number of improvements to all editions, not just the Gold and Pixelblitz. Some we thought up ourselves, others were added because a user asked for them:

1.When an invoice is voided, the job is now released so it can be re-invoiced later.

2.Once an order has been invoiced, the job sheet can no longer be edited. That's always been the case, but now you can still add notes. Makes sense when you think about it. Say a customer threw a hissy fit after the job was delivered. You may want to record that in case of a reorder.

3.If no suitable paper is found in in-Stock, the program will now automatically show you what you have in Buy-it-Now.

4.One-Price has become the new default for pricing paper. Because the number of sheets per carton is irrelevant when a vendor ignores brackets, that entry field now vanishes so as not to confuse Cousin Mel.