BQE
Software eLetter
January 2004
In This Issue
1. Resource
Allocator - People, People, People
2. NEW BillQuick Palm and BillQuick CE
3. BillQuick Certified Training
4. January Support Tip
5. January Special Promotion!
Resource Allocator
– It's Here!
The afterglow of pleasant, lazy days fade under the Arctic wind of a new
year. We strive toward resolutions despite already heightened stress.
Will productivity rise to meet 2004
goals? Will profits?
Will it be another year and another
10 pounds?
We can’t help with the 10 pounds of holiday cheer, but productivity
and profits are firmly in our sights! Resource
Allocator is here!
People, People, People
Resource
Allocator, the latest and smartest member of
the BillQuick family, helps you manage projects with confidence, accuracy and smarts.
The key to a successful project is people – the right people.
Short of cloning your most valuable talent resources, it falls to project
managers to assign the right people to jobs. Often you must jump a person from one project
to another as priorities (financial, client clamoring, etc.) change. Part of effective
decision-making is knowing the impact of such action. How far will it push Project A out
in time if Darlene spends four days working up the specs for Project D? If John does the
specs and takes six days, how will that impact other resources you want to assign who are
currently working on other projects? What if Darlene, John and Nigel worked on the Project
A’s specs? How would that impact Project B with Nigel switched over to project A for
three days?
You could spend hours, even days, trying to figure out the ramifications of
adjustments to resource assignments. But not with Resource
Allocator. Powerful functions track schedules and tasks of individual resources
(people, equipment – anything). You can see when a resource is available and what the
impact will be if you shift a resource from one project to another for a few hours or a
few days.
Resource Allocator employs advanced fuzzy logic algorithms to determine
conflicts. It uses standard work hours, overtime hours, holidays, recurring events like
company or department meetings, and other information to determine the impact of an
assignment. For example, let’s say you’re setting up a new project. You can
choose resources by skill set or by name. When you select a resource for a project, Resource
Allocator immediately identifies any resource conflict. Rather than scour grids and
manually change dates and tasks, you choose whether to:
Split the conflicting and new tasks so all of them are accomplished
simultaneously,
Delay all conflicting tasks until your resources have time to work on it,
Start the new task on the next available date the resource is available, or
Start the new task on the same date and delay the conflicting tasks until
the resources have time to work on it.
After making your decision, Resource Allocator recalculates all dates. In
seconds, you know the impact of switching a resource to the new project versus delaying
the new project until the resource becomes available.
The ability to tie the schedule of one project with others makes Resource
Allocator unique. It is not simply project-centric; it focuses on the whole company, the company-wide scheduling of
resources and projects.
Can you visualize your productivity and profit resolutions rising above
the mist of the verdant glen? Can you feel cool stress flowing into oblivion? Aahhhh.
Wait,
there’s more! Click here.
NEW BillQuick Palm & BillQuick CE
Go, Go, Go
On-the-move BillQuick users have all-new
versions of the popular BillQuick
Palm and BillQuick
CE add-on software. That small organizing device you carry just became more powerful.
Listening to users, we first added sharing of
BillQuick’s project security permissions. Now, if an employee is restricted to
specific projects, the security setting downloads into BillQuick Palm or BillQuick CE
during synchronization. With this new feature, erroneous data conflicts are gone.
Next, if you liked the time entry capture
function, you’ll love the new expense log. Like time, you can select from drop-down
lists and enter data using script, a virtual keyboard, or a keyboard (depending on your
hand-held unit).
Last, you can now add memos when capturing time
and expense entries on your hand-held. No more recording memos
after transferring entries into BillQuick. You can still edit the 50-character description
field, however, the new memo pad gives you much more space. It is unlimited in length like
all memos in BillQuick.
Other BillQuick
Palm and BillQuick
CE features save you time and effort while delivering strong flexibility. For example,
the built-in Timer function keep track of time spent on a job just like its cousin in
BillQuick. It even runs while your hand-held is turned off.
Want a bigger and better deal? Click
here.
BillQuick Certified Training
New BillQuick
Certified Training is growing fast. Whether a new staff member or
administrator or a user who needs to expand his or her skills with BillQuick, our Certified
Trainers can help you excel.
The BillQuick
2003 Introduction course covers everything a new user needs in two hours. In addition
to understanding the various profiles (employee, activity, client, project and so on), the
trainer covers Time Entry, Expense Log, Billing Review, Invoice Review and Payments. While
new administrators will find this course a solid beginning, partners, executives and
project managers would also benefit from the comprehensive overview.
BillQuick
2003 Intermediate and BillQuick
2003 Advanced are in the works. The three-hour Intermediate course focuses on how
BillQuick’s different parts work together, and how to maximize control and accuracy
of data and minimize task time and effort by using such features as Budgets, Service Fee
Schedule, Project Control, Project Rules and QuickBooks integration. The Advanced course
comprises two, three-hour sessions. BillQuick Certified Trainers customize the course to
your firm, beginning with a 15 to 25 minute interview. It covers all major functions,
historical data entry, project rules, budgeting, project control, security, and much more.
Check out our Certified
Trainers and the course
descriptions.
January Support Tip
Never Enough Hours In A Day
Managing projects is critical. To nurture client relationship and manage
expectations up and down the hierarchy of your firm, you need timely, complete
information.
One way to save hours each week is to automate printing and
delivery of key reports. How, you ask? Agent
Pro 2003.
Let’s say to stay on top of the projects you’re responsible for,
you need a Budget
Comparison Report (and a cup of coffee) waiting for you each morning at 7:30 a.m.
More, say you could save a few hours each week answering questions from two managers in
your client’s company if they had the same Budget Comparison Report. With Agent
Pro, our our workflow automation tool, you can:
1. Select the Budget Comparison
Report (or any of over 300 BillQuick reports).
2. Produce the for the week,
month, quarter or year-to-date, or for last week, last month, last quarter or last year.
You can produce a report for a single project, a range of projects, or all of them. You
can also apply a wide range of date and custom filters, if desired.
3. Set the frequency of printing
– daily, weekly, biweekly, half-month, monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly or annually.
Wow!
4. Deliver the report.
This is where it really gets hot! You
can email Budget Comparison to yourself, specific managers, employees by group (e.g. all
the managers responsible for a client and its projects), clients by group, or by employee
titles (e.g. all partners). And you can define the email message too.
5. Read the report. Stop by the
printer on the way to your office or simply open your email.
Now what should you do with the hours you save each week?
January Special Promotion
BQE Software doesn’t want the pleasant halo of the holidays to fade.
Until January 31 you can order the new Resource Allocator, BillQuick Palm
or BillQuick CE at 25% off list price.
Yes, that’s right. Order the new Resource Allocator module or one of
the hand-held modules and receive 25% off.
Not enough?
Okay, okay, there’s more. Two free months of support for each add-on.
You buy Resource Allocator, you get a discount AND two free months of support. Grab
BillQuick Palm or BillQuick CE you get the bonus too.
Wow!
Just click to the BillQuick
Pricing web page to place your order. We will automatically apply your discount when
processing the order. Of course, you can call BQE Software Sales at 888-245-5669 to place
your order too.
What a deal!
Don’t wait. The special offer ends January 31. Grab a little fading
halo for yourself!
Need a new PC?
Order your BillQuick 2003 Ready PC from our authorized Hardware
affiliate Great Lakes Electronic Distributing Inc.
Thanks from the
BQE Software Marketing Team
May Success Follow You
. . . Always |
