B/P Impressions

Is your organization in a constant scramble when someone suddenly leaves the company?

Have you ever had a key employee leave that you thought would always be there to do the job?

Do you have a plan?

A succession plan, to be more specific.

“I know I have heard of that. But what is it, and why do I need one?” you may be asking. A succession plan is defined as “a process for identifying and developing new leaders who can replace old leaders when they leave, retire or die. Succession planning increases the availability of experienced and capable employees that are prepared to assume these roles as they become available.” Succession planning is not just for large employers. It's critical for small ones, too. They benefit employees as well as employers.

The Department of Labor (DOL) has made it easier for small employers (i.e. generally 50 employees or less) to join together to buy health insurance coverage with big company benefits and potential large group savings. The DOL's recently released Association Health Plan (AHP) final rule expands access for these organizations. AHPs have been around for many years, but the rules on them have now been loosened a little with the newly adopted legislation. AHPs have a better negotiating position due to the health risks being spread over a larger pool than if the members participated individually. The final rule also bestows upon them the ability to self-insure without being required to meet all of the essential benefit mandates of a small employer.

Have you ever copied the data from a worksheet in your Excel workbook to another workbook - or even a worksheet - and then you spend time reformatting the data you copied because it didn’t copy everything? Let's look at how to make that not happen and shorten the time between original and copy.

Years ago, when software manufacturers would telephone our clients trying to sell them something they had not originally purchased, or a new item that had just been produced, we would tell clients, “Just ignore the man behind the curtain and call us if you have questions. We know how your system is configured better than anyone else, so please call us and just ignore the man behind the curtain.” (You know, The Wizard of Oz - in which the man behind the curtain was pulling all kinds of levers and pretending to be something else - someone much more knowledgable - than he actually was?)

We were recently notified that Sage Software will be directly calling our clients who have not yet converted from Sage 100 to Sage 100cloud, letting them know that Sage 100cloud is a “superior” product and has many features that Sage 100 does not.

And so again we say to you: “Just ignore the man behind the curtain.”

Do you have an Excel workbook that has a ton of worksheets? And does it take you forever to find the specific sheet you are looking for? If you answered "yes" and "yes," then there's a shortcut you should be using to see all sheets in one place.

There are a lot of questions around whether an employee is considered exempt or non-exempt. This determination is made by the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The FLSA determines minimum wage rates, overtime pay, youth employment regulations, and record-keeping requirements for nonexempt workers in the private sector as well as Federal, State, and local governments. Here are a few commonly asked questions about exempt employee status.

On June 21, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in favor of South Dakota in the South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. case. If you've been reading our blog posts related to the topic of nexus, you'll realize why some people are worrying that this 5-4 decision could put an end to “tax-free” shopping for good. Out-of-state retailers might now have a new set of obligations and challenges ahead of them, while states could potentially gain billions in revenue from taxing out-of-state sellers on their online sales. But what does it mean for your business?

Do you ever need to know the number of characters in a cell? What about changing the case of text in a cell automatically? Or even something as basic but useful as removing those pesky spaces at the beginning or end of text? Try these formulas.

Having been contacted directly by Sage Software, some of our customers have inquired about their recently released Sage Time offering. Sage Time is a web-based time and labor management (TLM) system that eases time collection and automates pay calculations in readiness for payroll processing. Sounds cool, right?

The real behind the scenes story, however, is that Sage Time is not developed by Sage Software. It's actually only one-third of Kronos's Workforce Ready product, which Sage has white-labeled in partnership with Kronos. Why does that matter? It might not. But it depends on your organization's ultimate goals with regard to time and labor management...and beyond.

Owning and operating a small business can be challenging. There are so many moving parts, and you need to make sure every department is running as smoothly as possible. Even if all the wheels are spinning in the right direction, you still have to factor in the parts you can’t control, like getting paid quickly and efficiently.

The fact is, 79% of business owners can’t pay themselves due to late payments, according to Fundbox. If small businesses got paid for all unpaid invoices at once, they’d each be able to pay themselves about $40,000!

Collecting payments from customers isn’t always a timely process. If you’re still managing your invoicing with paper, making the switch to email payments can save you time and help you get paid faster. With email payments, customers can pay you from any device with the click of a button. Here are four benefits of accepting email payments through your ERP software.