receiving services in Navision

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Hello,

I am working as a business process consultant for a company that uses Dynamics NAV. I am not an expert on the software, but by outlining their business processes I encounter some problems. The company is using Purchase Orders for inventory which works reasonably well and also for services like consultancy work,preventive and corrective maintenance contracts, training. Some of the services are received in parts (eg consultancy work # hours / tariff invoiced per monh) and services are sometimes unpredictable in costs like corrective maintenance. The main problem is that in both these cases the "receipt" step is mostly forgotten (consultancy case) or not possible at the time when te service is carried out because of unknown costs (eg maintenance case when parts are needed for example). When the requestor (who is responsible for "receiving") finally gets an e-mail notification from the finance department, usually when the actual invoice is already receive, he has to "receive" the right amount in navision and then later on also needs to approve the invoice because it mostly deviates from the amount on the purchase order.

Our goal is to achieve a smooth and clear working process with the least administrative burden. The requestors prefer to do only on time a check (either on quantity received or on invoice) and the finance departments wants to minimize the amount of times they have to ask the requestors to do their work.

I have been looking around to see what can be a solution for this. Is it for example possible to skip the receive step for these kinds of PO's, and use 2 way matching for these cases (so without check on goods received), while retaining 3 way matching for other (inventory) like invoices? Or maybe there is a completely different setup that we are missing?

Looking forward to your replies!

Renier

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ManishS 86 on at

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You need to do receiving part for only materials.

You can skip the consulting & maintenance by using the type G/L Account when creating the invoice.

1. Create a PO with type as G/L Account approve it and let the account department post the PO (Receive & Invoice).

2. Create a purchase invoice directly with type as G/L Account approve it and post.

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RobertasR 5,004 on at

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Hi Renier

mostly it depends on 3 things - internal processes in your company, system settings and specific modifications you might have.

Theoretically all services invoices are created as 'GL Account' orders (Account Type on the line is 'GL Account'), and that means when posting the invoice, you can do it directly from the PO and post 'Receive & Invoice' in one go (as opposed to creating a purchase invoice and using 'Get Receipt Line' which works nicely with stock items). This can be prevented by modifications that don't allow receive&invoice, limited permissions or your internal processes that 'receiver' has to mark services received before the invoice can be posted.

But generally, 2 way matching for service orders, and 3 way matching for item orders is possible in standard Dynamics NAV.

Robertas

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Community Member on at

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Hello Robertas,

Thanks for your reply. I would like to make it a bit more specific.

Suppose we have the following scenario: My company issues a PO (on GL account) for a maintenance contract for corrective maintenance estimated at 10000 euro for one year. When a corrective maintenace action is carried out the supplier will have a work slip containing the hours (at an predetermined tariff) and parts (of which the prices is not known) and have it signed by the requestor. The supplier sends in the invoice including the signed workslip. Suppose it is an invoice for 1000 euro's. In our current situation the requestor first needs to receive the 1000 euro's after which the invoice can be posted by finance. Then after this, the invoice will enter the invoice approval loop (because it doesn't match the 10000 on the PO) and will end up on the requestors plate again. If I understand you correctly we could set the system up as such that the finance department will receive & invoice at once, is that correct? And after this, the requestor would still have the possibility to approve the invoice as it deviates from the total amount. This is what he wants so that would be perfect. Can you confirm this reasoning? I have two more questions regarding this:

1. Suppose we setup the system like this how could we make it crystal clear for our administrative worker when to treat an order with 2 way mathcing (receive and invoice at once) and when to follow the normal procedure of 3 way matching (where the requestor has to receive the items first). Is there a way to tag those orders as being service orders or something?

2. In the above mentioned case the invoice is going through the approval loop because it deviates. Suppose we would like to always get this approval step, but only for service orders that are not actually received by the requestor. So we would also like to get approval on an invoice that exactly matches the PO (eg for a training or something). Would it be possible to set different approval business rules for these types of orders?

Thanks a lot for your help!!

Renier

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RobertasR 5,004 on at

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Hi Renier,

following your example and the process you'd like to implement, there isn't much standard NAV can offer. In the past I have created matching engines in NAV that help streamline the process to almost exact requirements that you have. As standard NAV goes, there is no difference in Item and Service POs (theoretically one PO can be a mix of both) so different processes have to be taught rather than set up. The only option I see is:

- Have your location set to require Warehouse Receipts in a way that it can't be received directly via PO.

- With the permission sets or using Warehouse Employees, make sure finance people can't receive goods. That would enforce goods to be received by 'receiver', but only Items. GL lines can be received/invoiced directly from PO as it doesn't need Warehouse Receipts

However, if the approvals are switched on, system will require to re-open and re-approve the PO if the value is different BEFORE the invoice can be posted for service. The only possible workaround (approving after invoice is posted) is to set deviated invoices 'On Hold' to be reviewed. Though it's not very robust or user friendly.

As for the second question - there isn't a way to set that up in NAV.

All in all, I don't think your requirement can be set in NAV without additional development. Some companies tend to develop (the question of importance of the requirement and your budget), others create workaround off the system, that is, invoice is input in the system AFTER it's matched and approved outside of NAV.

Hope that clarifies the possibilities to take it forwards.

Robertas

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