Setting Up Your Product List

The product records that you enter in Sage Line 50 will eventually form your product list
(product records are entered in the Record window, from within Products).
When you are planning your stock system, the product codes you enter need to be as
descriptive as possible so that you can locate the product quickly when you are entering
data or viewing a report.

For example, a clothing manufacturer could use a stock system which detailed material
type and colour.

For example:
SILK-RED
SILK-GRY
COTT-BLU
LINE-WHI

Creating Product Categories

You can group your products into 999 different categories for analysis and reporting purposes.
For example, if you are a stationery and computer retailer, you may want to separate your sales
into Paper Products, Office Supplies, Computer Accessories and so on. By placing similar
products into categories you can:
􀂄 Create reports based on categories. For example, you can print a Product Activity or
Product Management report.

􀂄 Use the Search option to carry out analysis within specific categories.

􀂄 Update the sales and purchase prices of the product within certain categories using the
Global Changes Wizard.
The categories you set up are available as a drop-down list on Sage Line 50’s Product Record
window.
To create a product category

1. From the Settings menu, choose Configuration.

2. From the Configuration Editor window, click the Products tab.
The default Products information appears.

3. Select the product category you want to change and click Edit, or double-click on the line
in the table that you want to change.
The Edit window appears.

4. In the box provided, enter the name for your product category.

5. To save your entry click OK, or to abandon your entry click Cancel.

6. To apply the changes to the company that is currently open in Line 50, click Apply.

7. To save the changes to your configuration file, click Save, or to exit without saving your
details, click Close. To exit from the Product Categories list box, click Close.

Entering Product Defaults

Each time you create a new product record, you need to enter details such as nominal code,
department, tax code, etc. If you give most of your products similar details, you can enter a set
of ‘default’ answers that will appear automatically in the new product records you create.
However, if you need to, you can change any of the details that were entered automatically for
you on each product record.

If you have Accountant Plus or Financial Controller version of Sage Line 50 you can also add
your own descriptions to each of the product discount tabs (by default called Discount A-E) so
that they are more meaningful to the way your product discounts are structured. For example,
you could call them Trade, Retail, Wholesale, 10% Discount and 20% Discount.
If you do change the names on the discount tabs, these name changes appear in the following
areas of your program:

􀂄 Product Record Discounts tab.

􀂄 Customer Record Defaults tab - 'Additional Discount' list.

􀂄 Customer Defaults Record tab - 'Type' drop-down list.

􀂄 New Customer Record wizard.

􀂄 Global Changes

􀂄 Sales Order Processing/Invoicing Edit Item Line window - Discount Breakdown window.

To enter your product defaults
1. From the Settings menu, choose Product Defaults.
The Product Defaults window appears showing the Details information.

2. Enter your default information.

3. To save your product defaults, click OK. To exit without saving, click Cancel.

To enter your discount tab names
(Accountant Plus and Financial Controller only)

1. From the Settings menu, choose Product Defaults.
Click the Descriptions tab.

2. Enter the names you want to use for each of your Discount tabs in the boxes provided.

3. To save your changes, click OK.
Your new discount names now appear in place of Discount A- E.

Entering Product Records

You can add, edit and delete product records. You can also view the sales value of your
products and the quantity you have sold, on the Activity tab.

Use the Record button in the Products window to manually enter your product details. If you
prefer, you can click New to use the wizard to guide you through the process step-by-step.
Alternatively, you can copy an existing record’s details using the Duplicate facility.

To enter your product records

1. From the main Sage Line 50 toolbar, click Products.

2. From the Products window, click Record.
The Product Record window appears.

3. Use the Details tab to enter or view your main product information.
Do not enter your opening balances until you have read the next section, Entering Your
Product Opening Balances

You can also use the pricing options to set multiple selling prices for your products. For
further information about how to use the pricing options, refer to Chapter 9, Pricing and
Discounts.

If you do not put in a nominal code of your own choice, then Sage Line 50 will automatically
assign each product with a default code.

The only form of commodity code that HM Customs & Excise accept is eight numeric
characters. If you are using Line 50 to produce Intrastat Supplementary Declarations
information, you must make sure that your commodity code is correctly entered into the
‘Intrastat Commodity Code’ box.

Note for Financial Controller users upgrading from Line 50 version 10 and earlier:
During the upgrade procedure, Line 50 transfers any commodity code data that is in the
correct format from the old ‘Com. Code’ box to the new ‘Intrastat Commodity Code’ box.
If data appears in the ‘Com. Code’ prior to the upgrade but it is not in the correct format,
Line 50 enters the data into the ‘Com. Code Description’ box. It is your responsibility to
check all your commodity codes, and enter them into the ‘Intrastat Commodity Code’ box
in the required format if necessary. In addition, the ‘Weight’ box now displays a ‘kg’ label.
You should ensure that any weights you entered prior to the upgrade are correct, as you
may have previously used this box for other weight measures, such as imperial pounds (lb).

4. The Memo tab enables you to attach electronic documents and filing system references to
your records using the Document Manager functionality. You can also use the Memo tab to
enter any additional product details.

5. Whenever a product is made up of other products you hold in stock, it is said to have a bill
of materials (or BOM). This is a list of the other products (or components) that are needed
to make up the product (or product assembly).

6. The next three tabs enable you to view information about your product sales.

􀂄 Accountant Plus and Financial Controller only: The Sales tab displays, for each
month of your financial year, the sales value and quantity sold for the product you
selected. The Sales tab also shows you the date of the last product invoice that was
raised for this product. Use the Sales tab to set budget values and to enter prior year
values for each month of your financial year, for each of your product records. You
can enter your budget values directly into the table, or you can enter the total budget
allocation for the year in the Totals box. If you enter a total budget, Line 50 divides it
by 12 and enters the resulting value into each month’s budget box. If there is a
remainder after dividing the total by 12, Line 50 enters it into the box for month 12.
The Actual figures update as you begin to enter and update invoices. Because you
can compare your budget figures against actual monthly figures for both this year and
for the year just ended, use this tab to keep track of how close you are to meeting
your budget targets. This also shows whether your product sales are performing
better than the same time last year. You can also set your cost of sales values for each
month here or alternatively they will be updated automatically as you update your
invoices.
􀂄 Accountant Plus and Financial Controller only: The Graphs tab displays the same
information as the Sales tab but in a graphical format.

􀂄 The Activity tab shows the individual transactions you have ‘posted’ for your product
records in table form. You can see adjustments, goods in and out and stock transfers,
as well as the current quantities in stock, on order and allocated.

7. Accountant Plus and Financial Controller only: Quantity discount in Sage Line 50 is
determined through product discount rate tables. Five tables are provided per product.
This means that you can give five different quantity discount rates to your customers
(Discounts A-E).
The product discounts you can set up are based on quantity levels and you can enter
quantities for up to ten levels of discount.

8. With the advances in e-commerce it has become increasingly important to advertise your
products and services on the Internet.
You can use the Web tab to enter information that can be used by Sage WebTools to help
you to create your web shop.

You can insert an image of the product (either in a BMP, JPEG or GIF format), so that your
customers can see exactly what you sell. To read how to do this, press F1 when you are
on the Web tab and read the topic 'To Set Up Your Product Web Details' that appears in
the help system.

9. To save your product record, click Save.

Posted in: book-keeping,bookeeping,line 50,sage line 50