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Infor LX Tips, Infor LN Tips, BPCS Tips, Baan Tips, Infor M3 Tips & Infor ERP News

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Infor ERP Tips & News from the Experts

Infor LX | Infor LN | BPCS | Baan | Infor M3

Infor LN & Baan: Customizing Shipping Labels for All Customers

Kathy Barthelt 0 19536 Article rating: 5.0

Are you striving to create shipping labels that cater to all your customers' needs? Do you require specific details on your shipping labels for particular items or product lines?

According to recent research, the global barcode label printer market was valued at $2.6 billion in 2022 and is estimated to reach $4.3 billion by 2032, exhibiting a CAGR of 5.2% from 2023 to 2032.

Crossroads RMC's RMClabel software automates the printing of customer-specific and item-specific labels...

​Infor LN & Baan Tip: Determining What Data to Archive or Delete

Kathy Barthelt 0 31838 Article rating: 5.0

Ensuring access to historical logistical and financial transaction information for your employees is crucial. However, before proceeding with archiving or deletion, it's essential to evaluate the necessity of retaining this data. Baan and Infor LN (ERP LN) offer standard archiving sessions within major modules that typically handle a significant volume of historical transactions. These sessions are designed to transfer historical data to an archive company before deleting it from the operational company.

When it comes to archiving sessions, you have three primary options:

Infor LX & BPCS Tip: MPS Planned vs. MRP Planned

George Moroses 0 17527 Article rating: 5.0

Determining whether to use Master Production Schedule (MPS) planning or Material Requirements Planning (MRP) planning for items in Infor LX and BPCS involves understanding the nature of the items and their demand characteristics.

Master Scheduled Items typically encompass finished goods or service items. These items receive their requirements either from Independent demand, Dependent demand, or a combination of both...

Unlocking the Full Potential of Your LX/BPCS Investment - Embrace the Cloud for Enhanced Connectivity

George Moroses 0 13390 Article rating: 5.0

At Crossroads RMC, we understand that our clients are fiercely loyal to Infor LX/BPCS because of its breadth of capabilities, reliability, and efficiency. Simply put, it stands as an indispensable tool for your business operations.

Thanks to our new partnership with Aleran Software, we’ve made it easy and affordable to extend your LX/BPCS investment with a suite of modern, cloud-based sales tools, including:

  • Aleran Software Mini DemoCustomer/Dealer Portal Capabilities: Empower your customers and dealers with intuitive portal access.
  • Streamlined CPQ (Configure, Price, Quote): Simplify complex configurations and pricing processes.
  • Efficient Sales Order Management: Centralize all cart activities, quoting, and sales orders for seamless operations.
  • Sales-Focused PIM (Product Information Management): Store vital sales-driving information for enhanced decision-making.
  • Flexible Buying Sites: Offer unlimited buying sites tailored to customer or dealer preferences, complete with customizable price points.
  • Integrated Catalog and Tech Manual Buying: Facilitate integrated buying directly from existing catalogs and technical manuals.
     

With a modern, cloud-based deployment, Crossroads RMC can help you remove the risk and eliminate the headaches that come from traditional cost-prohibitive builds and months-long integrations. We can help you put your customers at the center of a multi-channel sales strategy with curated sales experiences, personalized promotions, and out-of-the-box fully configurable tools and features.  

Contact us today at 800.762.2077 to jumpstart your path to enhanced connectivity and sales efficiency.

We're excited to unveil our revamped BPCS/LX Technical Staff Augmentation Services

George Moroses 0 13777 Article rating: 5.0

We're excited to share some updates about our BPCS/LX Technical Staff Augmentation Services. At Crossroads, we're refining our staff augmentation structures to better cater to specific job descriptions. This enhanced offering is designed to provide our clients with the opportunity to seamlessly maintain product-level support (BPCS/LX – RPG) and development assistance. What sets this program apart is its ability to offer significant cost savings compared to traditional time and material arrangements. We aim to make staff augmentation more accessible and customizable to meet varying budgetary needs.

As part of this agreement, Crossroads will allocate a dedicated BPCS/LX technical resource for a set number of hours per week. The exact hours will be mutually agreed upon during the sourcing requirements discussions, ensuring that the support arrangement aligns perfectly with your needs.

Key Features of the Technical Staff Augmentation Service:

  • Flexible Hours: Tailored to your specific needs, we'll collaborate with you to determine a fixed number of hours per week that best aligns with your requirements.

  • Duration Options: Choose from flexible prepaid agreement durations of 3, 6, 9, or 12 months.

  • Remote Accessibility: Our technical services are primarily remote, but onsite assistance can also be discussed and arranged during the project kickoff phase, ensuring comprehensive support regardless of location.

  • Expertise Spectrum: Our dedicated BPCS/LX technical resources boast a comprehensive skill set, including proficiency in RPG, thorough documentation practices, design capabilities, familiarity with IBMi system foundations, job scheduling expertise, SQL proficiency, CL development capabilities, and more.

  • Scope Clarification: While our agreement primarily focuses on technical support and development assistance, application support falls outside the defined scope and can be considered separately upon request.

This innovative approach to technical staff augmentation is designed to streamline your operations, enhance system reliability, and empower your team to maximize the full potential of your BPCS/LX environment. Let's embark on this journey together, customizing technical staff augmentation solutions that precisely align with your business objectives and budgetary constraints.

Request a phone consultation or Learn

Introducing VJES (Visual Job Execution Software)

Kathy Barthelt 0 19469 Article rating: 5.0

You would be hard-pressed to completely miss the stories in the news recently about quality issues in manufacturing. The crux of the issue has been a complete focus on production and a lack of focus on quality. Yes, it is a wonderful thing to get the goods out the door, but when you’re sacrificing quality, what good is it really?

There are specifications for production for a reason. Engineering exists for a reason. If products are not built according to exact design specifications, scrap is likely to go up, rework goes up, customer returns and/or service requests go up, and customer satisfaction and overall customer confidence in your product plummets.

Is all of that worth it to get the good out the door in the shortest amount of time possible?

Every manufacturer relies on a few core measurements to manage their operations. Measurements like efficiency, productivity, capacity, labor and equipment utilization are used by manufacturers across the globe to benchmark performance and assess the effectiveness of processes.

Quality needs to be part of that mix. Because measurements like efficiency and productivity don’t necessarily mean high quality, incorporating ways to ensure quality from the start can help to eliminate waste and rework.

Manufacturing quality is achieved through quality control using documented, repeatable, and measurable processes.

What if you could incorporate quality control in every operation, at every work center to not only ensure high-quality finished goods but also simultaneously train high-quality operators?

Introducing Crossroads’ ERP independent solution, VJES (Visual Job Execution Software)...

Infor LN & Baan Tip: Performance improvement by setting the First Free Number Cache (tcmcs0651m000)

Kathy Barthelt 0 27909 Article rating: 5.0

Many transactions in all kinds of modules use order numbers or serial numbers. These order numbers are most often automatically generated. In the Number Groups (tcmcs0151m000) session you can define groups of order numbers used for dedicated areas. A Number Group is a group of the first free number series that you can assign to a specific use. All the numbers that Infor LN generates in the number groups that are dedicated to the same purpose are unique.

All the first free numbers are stored in the table tcmcs050.

As many different processes can request a free number from the number groups, we often see delays in the performance, due to locking on the first free number records. This locking issue can have a severe impact on the performance of huge batch-type transactions, but also on the performance perceived by individual users in many areas in LN.

For example:

Infor LX & BPCS Tip: Automated Approach to Your Cash Application Process with ARP

George Moroses 0 21345 Article rating: 5.0

Advanced Remittance Processing, ARP, provides an automated approach to your cash application process. ARP works together with Accounts Receivable to save valuable time and resources by automatically applying incoming payments to open receivables during daily batch processing. You can easily and efficiently resolve unapplied remittances online.

Advanced Remittance Processing (ARP) is an automatic cash application process that allows you to perform the following functions:

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Tips:  LX | BPCS | M3

Tips: LN | Baan

Kathy Barthelt

Infor LN & Baan Tips & Tricks for EXECUTIVES

FINANCE: Currency Differences

When currency differences are posted, several parameters affect the way the entries in the General Ledger are created. This section explains the possible parameter settings:

  1. Ledger accounts by currency

  2. Writing off currency profits

  3. Fixed exchange rate

  4. Writing off currency differences for anticipated payments


1. Ledger accounts by currency
This parameter is recorded in the Finance Company Parameters (tfgld0503m000) session.

If the Ledger Accounts Currency Differences by Currency check box is selected, the (un)realized currency differences are posted to the ledger accounts defined in the Currency Difference Ledger Accounts by Currency (tfgld0119s000) session.

LN retrieves the related dimensions from these sessions:

  • General Ledger: Finance Company Parameters (tfgld0503m000)

  • Accounts Payable: Ledger Accounts by Business Partner Group (tfacp0111m000)

  • ACR: Ledger Accounts by Business Partner Group (tfacr0111m000)

If the Ledger Accounts Currency Differences by Currency check box is cleared, the currency differences are posted to:

  • General Ledger: the ledger accounts specified in the Finance Company Parameters (tfgld0503m000) session.

  • Accounts Payable/ Accounts Receivable: the ledger accounts recorded for the business partner group.


2. Writing off currency profits
This parameter is defined in one of these sessions:

  • ACP Parameters (tfacp0100m000)

  • ACR Parameters (tfacr0100s000)

If the Currency Profits check box is selected, the unrealized currency profits are posted as well as the unrealized currency losses. Unrealized currency losses are always posted when writing off currency differences.

3. Fixed exchange rates
For each invoice, the rate determiner defines:

  • Which date is used to determine the exchange rate.

  • If currency differences are calculated.

  • For which (home) currencies the currency differences are calculated.

The Rate Determiner is set in the Sales Invoices (tfacr1110s000) session or the Purchase Invoice Entry (tfacp2600m000) session.

Unrealized currency differences are written off in one of these sessions:

  • Write Off Currency Differences (tfacp2240m000)

  • Write Off Currency Differences (tfacr2250m000)

4. Writing off currency differences for anticipated payments
This parameter is defined in one of these sessions:

  • ACP Parameters (tfacp0100m000)

  • ACR Parameters (tfacr0100s000)

If the Currency Difference Anticipated Payments check box is selected, invoices with anticipated payments or anticipated receipts are considered for writing off currency differences.

OPERATIONS: Pegging Material Supply Lines for Operation and Product Subcontracting

For project pegged production orders, operations can be subcontracted. The material delivered to the subcontractor can be project pegged or anonymous. The subassemblies that are sent and retrieved are always project pegged. Costing breaks can apply to direct the costs of the subcontracted operation to a specific project cost account. If (production material) costing breaks are used, a purchase order line's peg can differ from the peg on the material supply line.

For product subcontracting, the subcontracted purchase orders can include materials that inherit the project pegs, or can include anonymous materials. The pegged materials are stored in inventory and are shipped to the subcontractor with project pegged orders.

In case of a project pegged order, a peg distribution is linked to the Purchase Order Material Supply Line in the Purchase Peg Distribution (tdpur5100m000) session. For a specific purchase order line (detail) and material sequence, the material supply line's Order and Consumption quantities are distributed across the peg distribution lines for combinations of project/budget, project element, and/or project activity. The peg information in the Purchase Peg Distribution (tdpur5100m000) session includes the line number for the peg in the distribution, the peg (project, element, activity), and the material supply line quantity by peg. The peg distribution cannot be manually created and must always be generated using the parent.

For operation subcontracting, the purchase order line, the material supply line, and the linked peg distributions are generated by Job Shop Control and can only be updated by Job Shop Control.

For product subcontracting, the purchase order line, the material supply line, and the peg distributions are generated by Procurement. A material supply line's peg distribution can be updated only from the parent, that is the purchase order line, the purchase order line peg distribution, or the material supply line. If a purchase order line's distribution line is changed, and no quantities are received or consumed yet, the pegged fields on the linked material supply lines are synchronized to the updated distribution line in the Purchase Order Material Supply Lines (tdpur4116m000) session. However, if a different quantity distribution is applicable, the quantities of the material supply lines' distribution lines are redetermined in the Purchase Peg Distribution (tdpur5100m000) session.


TECHNOLOGY: Load Audit Tables for Profile (ttaud3220s000)

Use this session to load tables for an audit profile.

Usually this session is run from the Specific menu of the Audit Tables by Profile (ttaud3120m000) session. The selected profile in that session is displayed in the first line of the current session.

The result of loading the tables depends on the selection level you use in the current session. For each element on the lowest selection level, a line is created in the Audit Tables by Profile (ttaud3120m000) session. For example, if you select a package and a number of modules, a line is created for each module. Because you did not specify the tables, the All check box is selected.

Field Information

  • Profile: The audit profile for which the tables are loaded.
    Note: If you start the current session from the appropriate menu of the Audit Tables by Profile (ttaud3120m000), the profile displayed is the profile that is selected in that session.
  • Package: The package that contains the tables you want to load.
  • Module: The module that contains the tables you want to load.
  • Table: The tables you want to load.
  • Audit Type: The audit type that must be set for the tables that are loaded.
    Note: You can either select Always, or Changed. However, it is also possible to determine the audit type per field. This is the Not Applicable option in the Audit Tables by Profile (ttaud3120m000) session. If you want to set the audit type per field, you must change the audit type to Not Applicable after the tables are downloaded, and then specify the audit type per field in the Audit Fields by Table (ttaud3125m000) session.

Previous Article Infor LN & Baan Tips & Tricks for OPERATIONS: Subcontracting Overview
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Kathy Barthelt

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