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Expense Reporting for Dynamics NAV and Comparison Tool

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During discussions with customers on our Expense Reporting Solution for Dynamics NAV, the inevitable question we get asked is what versions do we support or integrate with. And the answer is really most versions of NAV are supported.

Of course our expense reporting product’s integration with NAV 2013 and NAV 2009 is more seamless and robust simply because these architectures lend themselves better and offer more flexibility. Due to this we can be more be innovative and customer specific when integrating with these systems.

Needless to say, we spent quite of a bit of time initially reviewing the various NAV versions. We recently found a resource from Microsoft Dynamics that does a comparison of all the NAV versions which we wanted to share. For all the customers, fellow ISVs and VARs out there, here is a link to the Microsoft Dynamics NAV Feature Comparison Tool.

Hope you find this to be as useful as we did! If you have any questions or want to send us your feedback, please contact us at info@gorillaexpense.com.

Automated Expense Reporting Integration with ERP & Accounting Systems

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In the last few months, we have been receiving inquiries regarding our integration with ERP & Accounting systems in relation to some of the other expense reporting solutions out there. I think the key difference can be summarized as – Full Automation

Most of the other systems out there say that they can ‘integrate’ but what they really mean is that they provide a flat-file that can then be imported into the ERP system. Nothing wrong with this and it may actually work better for some companies. But when we refer to integration, we mean full 100% automated integration, which means – the Accounting person pushes a button and the expenses are available in the ERP system as GL entries or into AP. This makes a huge difference for our customers.

Using our integration manager utility, they are able to pick and choose expense reports they want to send. After that, they click on a button to push the expense data. Simple as that! We have heard from our customers that With this approach, there is lesser chances of errors, much fewer manual steps that need to be taken and it can be performed by anyone in Accounting or AP without any expert training. Plus, the mapping of parameters can be tweaked very easily within the integration manager by the Admin without having to redesign the flat file format. Thus the Accounting folks will have lot more flexibility in how the data is pushed to the ERP or Accounting systems. We guarantee that this approach is 21st century proof! 🙂

So, come take a look at this and some of the other advancements we are making in the expense reporting space. To see a list of some of the systems we integrate with, go to the ‘Advanced Functions’ tab here. If you’d like to learn more or have any questions, as always, send us an email – info@gorillaexpense.com

Three Amigos: NAV2013, Gorilla Expense and The Cloud

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We have been receiving several inquiries over the last few months about our integration with NAV2013 in relation to what would happen if NAV is hosted on the cloud. Here is the quick scoop –

Microsoft has made significant investments towards the “hostability” of NAV2013. This helps deploying and using NAV in the cloud, thus benefiting both customers and partners. Microsoft is currently fine-tuning deployment scenarios and developing guidance for deploying NAV on Azure. Microsoft expects to make deployment of NAV on Azure broadly available in Q1, 2013. They had initially planned it closer to Nov 2012.

Our application is deployed on the cloud too (as one of the options), specifically Azure (Yes, we are heavily Microsoft oriented and we love it :). With this option, the customer has nothing to worry about in regards to hosting the data, managing the application or tackling the overhead associated with maintaining a server, support etc. Our integration with NAV is agnostic to the hosting format employed. NAV can be on a dedicated server on the cloud or we could be co-hosted with NAV too. Neither approaches affect out integration from the user’s perspective. On the back-end, there will be a few more gerbils turning wheels. But the customer will always experience a seamless and fully automated integration between our solution and NAV.

This flexible integration and hosting capabilities between our solution and NAV makes life much easier for the customer, the partner and of course for us too. Read about our integration with NAV here. If you would like to learn more or have any further questions, send us a message at – info@gorillaexpense.com.

Meanwhile, here are some more tidbits about NAV013 you may find useful

– Microsoft announced the availability of NAV 2013 in 15 markets. With significant improvements in functionality and several new capabilities, this launch was hailed as the most significant release of NAV yet
– Functionality such as Cash Flow Forecast, Cost Accounting, and Excel Integration to Query enable greater accounting efficiency for customers while offering partners the ability to develop customized solutions
– The new NAV web client allows users to access NAV from virtually any device. Improved query and charting offer compelling ways to analyze and display data for more users
– Improvements to the migration tool, partner development tools, and increased interoperability with Microsoft technologies mean less time is needed for partners to customize and deploy solutions, and they are easier for customers to learn and have impact
– Specifically useful for partners, NAV2013 enables easier deployment, configuration and installation through the RoleTailored developer experience. The new .NET Framework enhancements makes it easier to build, deploy and integrate high-performing add-ons with existing NAV solutions, and share data more easily

Adios!

GP2013 new features and integration with Gorilla Expense

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Microsoft Dynamics GP2013 which was released on Dec. 19 has several new features that are designed to help SMBs grow their businesses. These features are powerful and very easy to use. From our preliminary research, some of the key enhancements that we have seen include:

  1. A rich web client to access information when you need it and on the device of your choice
  2. Improved cloud-deployment model to streamline deploying and managing GP in the cloud
  3. Faster deployment with new “RapidStart” tools that significantly reduce time to configure GP for each customer
  4. Deeper interoperability with Office 365, other Microsoft technologies & ISV products

Microsoft has indeed made interoperability very easy for ISVs like us. We integrate fully with GP2013 and it is seamless while the implementation time for our solution is almost immediate. The mechanism is similar to GP2010, in that once expense reports are approved by the manager within our system, the data is automatically pushed as GL entries to GP2013 with the single click of a button! This definitely provides a robust value add-on for T&E expense reporting and also extends the company’s investment in GP2013. We are extremely thrilled with the advancements made by Microsoft in GP2013 and look forward to seeing more.

How Gorilla Expense Enhances Microsoft Dynamics GP

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Over the last few months, we have been interfacing with several companies that use Microsoft Dynamics GP. The inevitable question that we hear during the requirements phase is related to importing transactions from the corporate credit card. How does it work? Basically, a corporate card is provided to each employee and they are expected to enter/import expenses on the card within the reporting system. Once the expense report is approved, the data is pushed to GP. After this, the accounting department then does the reconciliation between the employee-submitted corporate card expenses and the card statement. If everything is correct, this should balance out. That’s the gist of it.

As we know, GP has an Expense Management add-on called eExpense. This provides online expense reporting and helps companies automate their expense submission process. But eExpense does not provide an interface for managing and tagging corporate credit card expenses. That’s where we come in!

Within the Gorilla Expense application, users can import transactions from their corporate card and even their personal cards. For this discussion, we will stick to the corporate card only. After the transactions are imported, our application allows the users to tag them with specifics – such as expense type, codes, projects, cost centers or account numbers. These fields are setup in the Gorilla application based on how it is setup in GP. The user can also split each card transaction into multiple cost centers. Once the compiling and tagging is done, the report is then available to the manager and finally the accounting folks to approve.

Once the approval is complete, the final ‘gatekeeper’ sends the transactions to GP using the Gorilla Integration Manager (GIM). The GIM is a very versatile & flexible tool that allows the gatekeeper to map specific parameters and fields to codes and accounts within GP. So, with the push of a button, all the transactions are available within GP and they have been tagged appropriately and immediately.

Our application combined with the GIM takes the pain out of importing and processing corporate credit card transactions. It is a “cannot live without” (actual customer quote) tool for accounting folks that cuts-down the processing time, effort involved and importantly data entry errors. So there you have it. A quick synopsis of the Gorilla Expense – Great Plains symbiosis!

If you have any questions or need assistance in implementing or customizing our application with GP, send us a message at info@gorillaexpense.com or 877.973.6737.