Emailing and Posting Invoices

[Tda321]

Hello,

I have been stuck with an issue for a while whilst trying to move invoicing from posted form to being emailed to customers.

We send a decent volume of invoices (and statements although I can cope with those) each month through the post, which obviously costs and is very time consuming. Therefore, I have sent letters out to each of our customers in order to get their email addresses. This has been going well.

However, I have now come to the point where we have some customers who have sent email addresses and some who haven't. This means that I am having to post so many invoices and email the rest. This is where the problem begins.

I am able to display on the 'Customer' list whether we have an email address by simply adding it to the bar at the top of the list, this means that I can pick the ones with emails and send them their statement as this goes from the 'Customer' screen. Unfortunately, the 'Invoice/Credit Note' screen does not have an option where I can display an email address for each invoice as I guess it's not specific to an account. How can I highlight the accounts which have email addresses and the ones which don't so I am able to only email ones with and leave the rest for posting?

Is this possible? Surely there are other out there who post and email invoices depending on how the customer likes to receive them.

Thanks for any help in advance.

Tim

We are running:
Version: 21.5.9.201
OS: Windows 8

[brucedenney]

You can make 2 copies of your layout.

Add a filter to each "if the email address is blank" and "if the email is not blank" then print everything with them both one to email and the other to the printer.

[Tda321]

You can make 2 copies of your layout.

Add a filter to each "if the email address is blank" and "if the email is not blank" then print everything with them both one to email and the other to the printer.

Hi Bruce,

Thank you for the response.

Is this filter option on the invoice page? I can filter by 'Emailed Flag - Yes/No' but that's not what I'm after as you'll know because it is only filtering whether the invoice is marked as being previously emailed. Am I looking in the wrong filter section? Where do I make a copy of the invoices that are previous and are yet to be sent? Our list consists of thousands of invoices as I'm sure others will.

Thanks again.
Tim

[brucedenney]

No, this is the filter on the Invoice Layout in the Report Designer.

Right click on the layout and choose edit.
Report>Filters
In there you want the PaperPrint version to say.

Include rows where
SALES_LEDGER . E_MAIL Equals

you want the EmailPrint version to say.

Include rows where
SALES_LEDGER . E_MAIL Does not Equal

Save and close.

You can make things a bit slicker by setting the email button to use the email layout ie not to try and print those without email addresses and the QuickPrint button to only print those that do not have an email address.

In Settings>Invoice and Order Defaults
On the Email tab set the email layout for invoices
On the QuickPrint tab set the print layout for invoices.

To print invoices you select the ones to process, and hit the email button to email them all and then hit the QuickPrint button to print them all. Those with email addresses will be sent by email, those without will be printed on paper.

[Tda321]

Hi Bruce,

Many thanks for the help, I will have a go at your suggestion now.

Just to complicate matters a little more, am I right in assuming that it doesn't matter if we use a layout for posting then a different one for emailing? We have a template we print onto for posted ones so can't use the same layout (as far as I'm aware...)

Thanks
Tim

[brucedenney]

You can have different layouts sure.

[doinktheclown]

Sorry to hijack your thread, but I don't think there's any point starting a new one.

Similarly to the poster above, we are moving away from posting invoices out each month and want to email them where possible.

However, emails on Sage are not set up in any form. How does one go about setting up the emailing function in Sage 50 Accounts Professional 2013?

Thanks in advance.

[brucedenney]

You could try and follow my guide ...

http://www.makingithappen.co.uk/sage-50 ... eports.htm

[Tda321]

Hi Bruce,

All set up as you suggested, thanks again.

The print invoices are working fine as far as I can tell. However, the quick email button is returning the following message for each invoice:

'Report Designer was unable to generate the report:
No data was returned for this Report.'

Any help is really appreciated!

Thanks
Tim

[brucedenney]

Does the report run if you use it manually.

Is it that the all records selected do not have an email addresses and so there is no data for the report?

[Tda321]

Hi Bruce,

It does run manually.

It's very odd, when I select multiple invoices (some with email addresses and some not), it exports the invoices without email addresses attached to my Outlook drafts. The ones with email addresses don't export at all but Sage says that it has been successful.

I'm very confused with this one, normally I have been able to beat things Sage has thrown at me but this is on another level!

Thanks for the help
Tim

[brucedenney]

I think you have the filter wording incorrect on the email layout.

Can you paste it (go to advanced).

[Tda321]

Report not to be emailed:

SALES_LEDGER.E_MAIL <> ""

Report to be emailed:

SALES_LEDGER.E_MAIL = ""

Edit: Which is totally the opposite way around to what you have said, I will amend it Bruce and let you know how I get on!!

[Tda321]

Swapped them round, it's now coming up with this. Have you seen the error attached before?

[brucedenney]

Erm... that is Sage not the report designer, try a reboot.