How To Use Safe Pay in GP To Prevent Fraud

Did you know that Microsoft Dynamics GP has a built-in tool to assist in the prevention of check and ACH fraud?  It’s called Safe Pay, also referred to as Positive Pay.  It’s a process that involves creating a file of payables payments (checks and EFT’s) that you submit to your bank.

Any payments presented to your bank are compared to your company’s issued Safe Pay file. If a payment does not match the information in the file, your bank will contact you for authorization.

If you do not see this option in your GP, then it either needs to be installed and/or registered.

It requires a few setup steps.  You’ll first need to contact your bank to confirm that they offer this service and then ask them for file specifications.  This file format gets created in GP by going to Financial > Routines > Safe Pay > Configurator, where you select an Output file Type and define the types of records lines and record fields per line.

Next you go to Financial > Routines > Safe Pay > Upload Maintenance.  Select the Bank Upload ID (Bank Format) that was created in the first step.  Link it to a Bank ID and a Checkbook ID.  Select the Upload Filename and Path where you want the file to be created.  The same file name will be used every time.  (The file gets overwritten each time you create a new file.  Have no fear, though, you can always recreate a file from history.)

If you’re using EFT processing in GP, be sure to check the “Include EFT Transactions” checkbox at the bottom of the window.

Once you’re ready to create a Safe Pay file, after you’ve posted a batch of payments, go to Financial > Routines > Safe Pay >Transaction Upload.  Select the Bank Upload ID.  Enter a Last Upload Date and Upload Cutoff Date.  Click on the Load/Reload Transactions button.  The payments to be included in the file will appear.  Click on Upload to create the file.

Click on Proceed when the window below appears.

Click on OK again.

If your bank provides you with a confirmation number when the file is submitted, you can enter that in the next window.  If you don’t have a confirmation number, just enter any number then click on Successful.

You can then print a report listing all the payments that were included in the file.

To recreate a Safe Pay file, go to Financial > Routines > Safe Pay >Transactions History.  Select your Bank Upload ID.  Click on the left and right arrows to scroll through previously created uploads.  Click on the Upload button the recreate the file.

Need Help With GP Safe Pay?

Do you need guidance for GP’s Safe Pay? Just contact CSSI for help.

Too many lingering customer balances on your A/R Aging Report?

Do you need to clean up your AR Aging report?  Do you have small, lingering customer balances on your report?  If so, you can use the Write-Off’s feature to eliminate them.

You’ll first want to be sure a customer is set up to allow write-offs.  Go to the Customer Maintenance Options window and select either Unlimited or Maximum (requires a maximum amount to be entered.)

Go to Sales > Routines > Write Off Documents.  You can run this routine to process write-offs for many customers at once or for one customer at a time.  The routine will create either a Debit Memo or a Credit Memo, depending on whether the customer has a negative or positive account balance.

Choose whether you want to write off Underpayments or Overpayments.  Next, select whether you want to create one write-off (debit memo or credit memo) per customer or per document being written off.  In the Write-Off Limit field, enter the maximum outstanding balance for documents to be included.  Documents with a document date on or before the Cutoff Date will be included.

Click on Preview to view, mark, or unmark the customers to write off balances for.

Click on Process to create the write-off documents.

You can also write off amounts while entering a Cash Receipt transaction.  In the Apply Sales Documents window, if you have an Amount Remaining, you can enter that amount in the Writeoffs field.

Contact CSSI For Help

Have questions or need help with A/R write-offs? Contact CSSI for GP help.

One favorite year-end activity is inventory stock counts!  A new feature, added in GP 18.3 (October 2020 release), is the ability to export and import Stock Count data to and from Excel.

The Stock Count Schedule window has a new “Export/Import” button.  This button becomes available once the schedule has been Started.  The export action will create a file called stockcountmmddyy.xlsx in whatever file location you choose.

Once you’ve entered your counts in the spreadsheet, go to the Stock County Entry window.  Click on the Export/Import window, select Import and browse out to and select your file.  Counts can still be manually edited after the import has been run.

If you need to reimport the file, you’ll first need to click on Clear Count.

We hope this is a helpful tip for importing or exporting year-end inventory stock counts in GP. Need help? Please contact CSSI.

Year-end processing time is here again!  And the last module that gets closed is general ledger.  With the release of GP 2013, a new checkbox was added where you can mark the checkbox to “Maintain Inactive Accounts”.

 • With this option marked, it will enable additional options to maintain All Inactive Accounts or just those With Budget Amounts associated with them. Mark the option you prefer.

 • If this checkbox is not marked, then ALL inactive accounts will be deleted that meet the criteria listed below, even if they were used in a budget.

• No balance
• No activity for an open period
• No account history amounts
• Not part of an allocation account
• Not part of an unposted transaction
• No multicurrency data
• No transaction history records

We hope this is a helpful tip for handling your GP year-end close and inactive accounts! Need help? Please contact CSSI.

Do you create and post transactions in sub-modules without using a Batch ID?  If so, then you know that you must remember to post the Financial batches that get created from these transactions.

With this new feature, also added in GP 2018 R2, you can now post through the general ledger at the transaction level.

A new checkbox, “Post Through General Ledger Files”, has been added to the Posting Setup window (Microsoft Dynamics GP > Tools > Setup > Posting > Posting).

This option is available for the following types of transactions.

Need help with this GP tip? Please contact CSSI.

This new feature, added in GP 2018 R2, allows you to assign a shared Calendar Year maximum amount for groups of benefits and/or groups of deductions.   This is especially helpful if you have employees who contribute to two different 401K plans.

Go Microsoft Dynamics GP > Tools > Setup > Payroll > Ded/Ben Shared Limit to set up the shared limit amount.  Create a Group Code and enter a Description.  Select the Type (Deduction or Benefit) and enter the Calendar Year Max amount.

When a deduction/benefit Group Code is created, the shared yearly maximum will be applied to all employees who are assigned to those deductions.  All deductions/benefits in the Selected column will be applied to the shared calendar year maximum set up in the Ded/Ben Shared Limit Setup window.

If an employee is assigned to only one or some of the deduction codes under the Selected column, they will still be subject to the shared calendar year maximum assigned in the Ded/Ben Shared Limit Setup window.

Need help with this GP tip? Contact us at CSSI.

Big news in November of 2021: Microsoft has announced the release of the 2021 year-end update for Dynamics GP.

What’s In the 2021 GP Update

This Microsoft Dynamics GP update is ALL inclusive of prior patches and includes the following changes.

1. Payables NEC, 1099-MISC, 1099-DIV form changes
2. Payables 1096 form changes
3. Fixed Assets – luxury auto depreciation changes
4. Payroll 1099-R form changes

The update has no changes to W-2 Forms or electronic filing.

Learn more about the 2021 GP update in this Microsoft Dynamics GP post: https://community.dynamics.com/gp/b/dynamicsgp/posts/microsoft-dynamics-gp-u-s-year-end-update-2021-released

Should You Update Dynamics GP?

If you plan on printing 1099 forms from within GP, then you will need this update. You will not be able to get by with the modifying the form in Report Writer. You’ll need the updated program code and the form change to print from within Microsoft Dynamics GP.

After the 2021 update is installed, if you have security access to a modified version of any of these 1099 Payables forms, make sure to print the original form versus a prior-year’s modified form, or you will not see the new changes in this update.

Getting Help With the 2021 GP Update

The 2021 GP update can be installed at any time. If you’d like Microsoft partner and GP expert CSSI Technologies to install the update for you, please contact us so that we can get you scheduled. CSSI also provides Dynamics GP support. Year-end is a very busy time and our calendar fills up fast!

Have you ever had to see if a user has access to a particular company in GP? If you have a lot of company databases you used to have to scroll through the entire list of companies to check the user’s access. You can now sort and search by company name or company ID making the task a lot faster. This feature was added in Microsoft Dynamics GP October 2019.

To use this tool, navigate to Microsoft Dynamics GP > Tools > Setup > System > User Access. Select the user you want to check and then select the drop down by Company Name and select by Company ID or by Company Name.

The example shows by Company Name. Enter the Company Name in the Find by Company Name box and only that company will be displayed. You can then click whether or not the user has access to the company.

Do you have credit limits set up for your customers in GP? If so, you can easily see if a customer is over their credit limit by enabling the display icon. This feature was added in GP 2015 R2.
To set up this feature go to Microsoft Dynamics GP > Tools > Setup > Sales > Receivables and go to the Options section and select the checkboxes for Display Over Credit Icon and Warn if Customer Over Credit.

You can also require a password to allow the credit limit to be overridden. The setup for that is at Microsoft Dynamics GP > Tools > Setup > Sales > Receivables.

The Over Credit Limit icon is displayed on the various customer related GP windows whenever a customer is over their credit limit.

By the way, there’s a built-in SmartList that lists all customers over their credit limit.

Register now for a great CSSI webinar on Nov. 11….

There is a tremendous amount of vital operational data locked away in your GP databases that traditional reporting does not and cannot analyze. Harnessing this underutilized and constantly growing data is absolutely critical to your decision-making process and means the difference between success and failure for your organization.

Webinar Registration: Learn About Power BI Report Pack For GP

Join us for a webinar on Nov 11, 2021 at 11:00 AM EST. Attendance is limited so register now to assure your seat at the Power BI table. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

What is Power BI Report Back For Dynamics GP

The Power BI – Report Pack for Dynamics GP is an affordable Data Analytics and AI reporting product containing 100+ pre-built dashboard reports. These pre-built Dashboard Reports surface all of your GP data spanning GL, AR, AP, Sales, and Revenue Analysis, Inventory, and Purchasing. The Report Pack will give you a real 360-degree view of your entire operation using data analytics and AI enabling your decision makers to make quicker and more data-driven decisions for your organization. There is no other pre-built Power BI solution on the market and CSSI Technologies has this solution.