Release Notes for ServiceCEO Version 6.1

Updated 5/22/07

New Functionality and Enhancements

The ServiceCEO Installer
     Installing ServiceCEO 6.1 for the First Time
     Upgrading ServiceCEO 6.1
     The Database Management Tools
          The Database Setup Wizard
               Installing and Running the Database Setup Wizard
          Database Backup and Restore Utility
               Backing Up a Database
               Restoring a Database
                    Scheduling Automatic Backups
The Database Validator
     Running the Database Validator
Database Connect
Price Levels
     Creating Price Levels
     Using Price Levels
     Selecting/Editing Price Levels for Charges
     How is the Cost Calculated?
     Discontinuing Price Levels
Tasks
     Task Alarms
          Configuring Task Alarms
          Creating Task Alarms
     Assigning Tasks
Find Options
Enhanced Notes
     Rich Text Format Notes
     Enabling Rich Text Format Notes
     Entering RTF Notes
Transaction Search
QuickSale
Billing Center
Inventory
     Stock Locations
          Default Stock Location
          Teams as Stock Locations
     Serialized Inventory
     Purchase Orders
Reports
     New Reports
     Searching by Customer ID
     Adding Reports to a Job/Estimate record
Compatibility with Microsoft Vista
MobileTech
API
Miscellaneous
     QuickBooks & XML Integration
     Custom Fields
     Removing Sales Reps from Commission Splits
     Third Party Bill Payers and Service Contracts
     Billing History Filter
     Job Details on the Dispatch Board
     Self Healing
     Description Field Limit
Database Documentation
Known Issues

The ServiceCEO Client Installer

ServiceCEO 6.1 has a new installer, designed to make installing and upgrading ServiceCEO much easier.

As always, we highly recommend you backup your database before installing and/or upgrading any installation of ServiceCEO.

If you are going to use one computer for both ServiceCEO and your database server, please install and run the Database Setup Wizard before you run the ServiceCEO client installer. For more on the Server/Client split, see the Network Configuration Overview section of the ServiceCEO Help System.

The biggest change in ServiceCEO 6.1 is the database engine is migrating from the Microsoft® Desktop Engine (MSDE) to SQL Server 2005 Express. This upgrade will occur when you run the Database Setup Wizard. This change was made for a number of reasons, including these factors:

For a complete listing of all of the features of SQL Server 2005, please point your browser to http://www.microsoft.com/sql/prodinfo/overview/whats-new-in-sqlserver2005.mspx.

Installing ServiceCEO 6.1 for the First Time

If you are installing ServiceCEO 6.1 for the first time, follow these steps:

  1. Double-click the client installer file to start the installation. The welcome page appears.

If you have a previous version of ServiceCEO installed, this previous version has to be uninstalled before ServiceCEO 6.1 can be installed. If this is the case, in the Welcome page, the "The setup has detected an old version of ServiceCEO" message. This is a normal process and will NOT affect your database in any way.

  1. Click Next. If If the old version of ServiceCEO needs to be uninstalled, it will be uninstalled now. This may take a few minutes.
    If you have no older version of ServiceCEO to uninstall, the License Agreement page appears.

  1. Click the I accept the terms in the license agreement option button.
  2. Click Next. The Destination Folder appears.

  1. ServiceCEO's default installation location varies depending on if you have installed ServiceCEO in the past.
    If you want to change the installation location, click Change.... The Choose Folder dialog box will appear. Navigate to and select the folder on your computer where you want to install ServiceCEO. Click OK to change the location. The new location will appear on the Choose Destination Location page.
Note:
If, for whatever reason, you need to run the ServiceCEO installer again or upgrade the program at any point, be sure you select the same directory that you selected on the Choose Destination Location page. If another directory is selected, you will install ServiceCEO into two separate directories, and the program may not run as expected.
  1. Click Next. The Setup Type dialog box appears.

  1. Select the option you want to install. Your options are:
Note:
If you are not using QuickBooks as your General Ledger, you will still be able to integrate with your accounting application. You can use ServiceCEO's XML Integration to integrate with your GL application.
  1. Click Next. If you selected the Custom option, the Custom Setup dialog box appears. If you selected the Complete option, skip to step 10.

  1. Select the components you want to install by clicking on the appropriate down arrow. Your options are:

  2. Select the install option for both ServiceCEO and QuickBooks Integration.
  3. Click Next. The Ready to Install the Program dialog box appears.

  1. Click Install. The program will start to install. Please be patient while files are run. When the installation is completed, a Finish screen appears.

  1. Click Finish. The Installation is complete!

Upgrading ServiceCEO 6.1

There is no longer a full and upgrade install file; they have been combined.

Note that you should run the Database Setup Wizard on your server computer before you upgrade your ServiceCEO clients.

To upgrade the ServiceCEO client:

  1. Double-click the installer file to start the upgrade. The welcome page appears.

  1. Click Next. ServiceCEO will recognize that you already have ServiceCEO installed and will start to upgrade your files. When the upgrade is completed, a Finish screen appears.
  2. Click Finish. ServiceCEO has been upgraded!

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The Database Management Tools

The Database Management Tools consist of two things:

What Should I Install on My Computer?

If you are going to use one computer to run both ServiceCEO and the database server (SQL Server), you should run both the Database Setup Wizard and the ServiceCEO client installer. Run the Database Setup Wizard before you run the ServiceCEO client installer.

If you are going to have at least two separate computers:

  1. A server computer that will host the ServiceCEO database
  2. A computer running only the ServiceCEO client, connecting to the database on the server computer

then you only need to run the Database Setup Wizard on the Server computer.

The Database Setup Wizard

The Database Setup Wizard configures your ServiceCEO database. If you are a new ServiceCEO user, it will install SQL Server 2005 Express SP2, ServiceCEO's database server. It will also configure your database so that ServiceCEO clients can connect to the ServiceCEO database.

The Database Setup Wizard and the Full Version of SQL Server

If you are already using the full version of SQL Server (the Workgroup or Standard editions of SQL Server), running the Database Setup Wizard is optional, depending on two factors:

  1. If you have run ServiceCEO before. If you have already run ServiceCEO before, your database is already configured on your server computer. If you have never used ServiceCEO, you need to run the Database Setup Wizard.
  2. If you want to use ServiceCEO's Database Backup and Restore Utility. If you want to use the Database Backup and Restore Utility rather then SQL commands, run the Database Setup Wizard. If you use regular SQL commands to backup and restore your databases, you do not need to run the Database Setup Wizard.

The Database Setup Wizard and Other Versions of SQL Server

Other database servers you may have been using to run ServiceCEO include:

If you are currently using one of these database servers, running the Database Setup Wizard will force you to upgrade to the newer SQL Server 2005 Express SP2.

Installing and Running the Database Setup Wizard

To install and run the Database Setup Wizard, follow these steps:

  1. Download the Database Management Tools installer.
  2. Double-click the CEO-[version number]--Database_Management_Tools.exe file. The Database Management Tools Installer will appear.
Note:
If you do not have .NET 2.0 installed, the Database Management Tools installer will install it before continuing.

  1. Click Next. The License Agreement page appears.

  1. Read through the license agreement.
  2. Select the I accept the terms in the license agreement option button.
  3. Click Next. The Destination Folder screen appears.

  1. The default location of the Database Setup Wizard depends if you have installed ServiceCEO before. If you want to change the installation location, click Change.... The Choose Folder dialog box will appear. Navigate to and select the folder on your computer where you want to install ServiceCEO. Click OK to change the location. The new location will appear on the Choose Destination Location page.
  2. Click Next. The Setup Type dialog box appears.

  1. Select the option you want to install. Your options are:
  1. Click Next. If you selected the Custom option, the Custom Setup dialog box appears. If you selected the Complete option, skip to step 11.

  1. Select the components you want to install by clicking on the appropriate down arrow. Your options are:

  2. Click Next. The Ready to Install the ServiceCEO Database Management Tools screen appears.

  1. Click Next. The Database Management Tools will be installed. This may take a few minutes. After the installation is complete, the finish page appears.

  1. Click Finish. The Database Setup Wizard will automatically run, displaying the Welcome page.

  1. Click Next. The Wizard will scan your system to see if you have a previous version of SQL Server installed. Depending on what it finds, the Database Setup Wizard will perform different steps:
Caution:
Before you install Microsoft SQL Server Express 2005, you should be aware that it has specific operating system requirements, and also needs at least 600 MB of free space. For a complete listing of the system requirements for Microsoft SQL Server Express 2005, see Microsoft's Installation Requirements for SQL Server Express SP2 page.
  1. If you choose to upgrade the ServiceCEO MSDE to Microsoft SQL Server Express 2005, the Database Setup Wizard will prompt you before you install it:

Note:
If the Database Setup Wizard installs Microsoft SQL Server Express 2005, it will be installed as a named instance.
Note:

If you already have at least one instance of SQL Server 2005 installed, you will be prompted to select the version you want to use. Select the instance and click Next. The Install Database page appears; skip to step 15.
  1. Click Next. A warning dialog box appears:

  1. Click Yes. Microsoft SQL Server Express 2005 will start to install. The installation will take a few minutes; please be patient. You may see a series of prompts; see the Using SQL Server 2005 Overview section of the ServiceCEO Help System for details. When completed, the Install Database page appears.

  1. Select the name of the database you want to install. Your options are:

Tip:
A wide range of demo, starter, and industry-specific databases can be downloaded from the Insight Direct member center. Click on the Training Databases link from the Member Center's home page to see what's available.
If you want to use one of the databases from the Member Center, select the Blank Database option in the Database Setup Wizard and finish running through the Wizard. When complete, you can restore one of Member Center's database in the usual manner. See the Restoring a Database section of the ServiceCEO Help System.
  1. Click Next. If you selected Blank or Demo in step 16, you will be warned about overwriting the database. If you selected Use Existing, skip to step 19.


    Click Yes to override the existing database (if any).
  2. When the database restore is finished, a complete message appears:

  3. Click OK. A Finish screen appears.

This screen records where the database was restored for future reference. To print these settings, click Print Settings.

  1. Click Finish. Your database is configured!

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Database Backup and Restore Utility

The Database Backup and Restore Utility is new and improved in 6.1!

  1. Select Start > Programs > ServiceCEO > Database Backup and Restore.

  1. Click Next.

Depending on the option you select, the path will be different:

Backing Up a Database

  1. Select the Backup ServiceCEO database to a file option button.
  2. Click Next. The third page of the Database Backup and Restore utility appears.

  1. Select the server on which the database you want to backup is located from the Server drop-down list.
  2. Select the name of the database that you want to backup from the Database drop-down list.
  3. Click Browse. A dialog box appears.
  4. Browse to the location that you want to save the backup file.
  5. Click OK. The file you selected will appear in the last field of the third page of the Database Backup and Restore utility.
  6. Click Next. The database backup will start. It may take a few moments to complete the restore; please be patient.

  1. Click Finish. The backup is complete!

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Restoring a Database

  1. Select the Restore ServiceCEO database from a file option button.
  2. Click Next. The third page of the Database Backup and Restore utility appears.

  1. Click Browse. The Select Database Backup to Restore dialog box appears.
  2. Browse to and select the database file you want to restore. You can restore either a .scb or .bak file.
  3. Click OK. The file you selected will appear in the first field of the third page of the Database Backup and Restore utility.
  4. Verify that the information in the Server and Database drop-down lists are accurate.
  5. Click Next. A warning dialog box appears:

  1. Click Yes. The database restore will start. It may take a few moments to complete the restore; please be patient.
  2. When complete, a success message appears:

  1. Click Finish. The database is restored.

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Scheduling Automatic Backups

You can schedule automated backups of your ServiceCEO database using command-line options. Before you begin, please read the Backing Up a Database section.

Caution:
Please note that the new Backup and Restore utility in 6.1 will break any previously configured automatic backups scheduled using the old utility. You will need to reconfigure your automatic backups using the steps below.

Note that the instructions below were written for Windows XP. They may vary slightly depending on the Operating System you are running. For additional assistance using the Windows Task Scheduler, see your Windows documentation.

To schedule an automated backup:

  1. On the server computer, Select Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Scheduled Tasks. The Scheduled Tasks dialog box appears.
  2. Double-click Add Scheduled Task. The Scheduled Task Wizard appears.
  3. Click Next. The second page of the Scheduled Task Wizard appears.
  4. Scroll down and select ServiceCEO Backup and Restore.
  5. Click Next. The third page of the Scheduled Task Wizard appears.
  6. Select the option button corresponding to the frequency in which you want to back up your ServiceCEO database.
  7. Click Next. The fourth page of the Scheduled Task Wizard appears.
  8. Define the time, frequency, and any other options for the automatic backup.
  9. Click Next. The fifth page of the Scheduled Task Wizard appears.
  10. Type the user name and password of the user that you want to run the backup. It is a good idea to use a user with administrative privileges here.
  11. Click Next. The sixth page of the Scheduled Task Wizard appears.
  12. Select the Open advanced properties for this task when I click Finish check box.
  13. Click Finish. The Task tab of the Backup and Restore Database dialog box appears.
  14. In the Run field, type the following text, including the quotation marks: "C:\Program Files\Insight Direct\ServiceCEO\Database Management Tools\BackupAndRestore.exe" -backuppath [backuppath] -servername [servername] -databasename [databasename]
    replacing the values in [] with your actual data. All replaced values should be in quotes.
  15. Click OK to save the parameters. The Scheduled Tasks dialog box appears, displaying the automatic backup you just created.

Note these conditions of the automatic backup:

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The Database Validator

The Database Validator -- a tool that runs a number of tests on your database before it is upgraded to ensure that there is no data corruption -- has been updated with several new tests that check for potential new issues that may affect the new features in ServiceCEO 6.1.

In addition, the 6.1 Database Validator will automatically fix some known issues that we have determined can be safely fixed, removing the need to contact Technical Support for these minor problems. If the problem can be fixed, the Database Validator will automatically make the necessary changes to your database and then rerun the Database Validator to ensure that the changes were implemented correctly.

When the Database Validator has finished running, a Results screen will appear if any issues were found and/or fixed. This results screen will display the the following information:

  1. A list of Critical, Major and Minor errors that have not been fixed.
  2. A list of errors that have been fixed.

Running the Database Validator

Tip:
You can double-click any error or fixed error to display the database records that were affected by this issue.
In addition, you can click Help to display the Database Validator help, where you can read an explanation of the Database Validator tests and what they mean to your data.

The Database Validator can be run in two different ways:

  1. As a standalone program at any time. Simply make sure that nobody is logged into ServiceCEO and select Start > All Programs > ServiceCEO > Database Validator.
  2. Before upgrading a database. After you run a ServiceCEO upgrade, the Database Validator will run before you upgrade your database to the new version of ServiceCEO.

Note that if the Database Validator does not find or fix any issues when run before an upgrade, no results screen will appear. The upgrade will simply start immediately after the Database Validator is finished running.

For more on the database validator, please see the Database Validator section of the ServiceCEO Help System.

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Database Connect

ServiceCEO 6.1 makes is much easier to connect client computers to the server computer. The Database Connect tool enables any user to easily connect to a ServiceCEO database on their network.

For details, see the Connecting the Client to a Local Database section of the ServiceCEO Help System.

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Price Levels

Caution:
Price levels are different from Zone Pricing. Zone Pricing used to be called "Price Groups" in previous (pre-6.1) versions of ServiceCEO. For more on Zone Pricing, please see the Using Price Groups section of the ServiceCEO Help System.

Price Levels enable you to tailor charges for particular customer locations or jobs by raising or lowering product and service prices by a percentage that you define. For example, if you could provide a preferred customer a 5% markdown on all of their products and services.

In addition, you can mark up or mark down products based on the cost or price. In other words, you can use price levels to generate the product's sell price based on two things:

  1. Standard Price. Price-based price levels generate a new sell price by adjusting the product's standard price as defined in the Product Detail dialog box.
  2. Cost Based. The sell price will be derived by taking the product's cost (as defined in the Product Detail dialog box) and multiplying it by the price level.

    Note:
    Depending on how the inventory product is being costed (i.e., serialized, LIFO, FIFO, Average On Hand, Last Purchase Price, etc.), the original cost of items may vary; for details on how inventory items are costed, see the How is the Cost Calculated for Inventory Items? section, below.

Creating Price Levels

Before you can use Price Levels, you first need to create them. To do so, select Tools > Lists > Price Levels. The Customer Price Levels dialog box appears.

From here, you define the percentage by which the price level will increase or decrease cost or sell prices.

  1. Click Add to add a new price level to the list.
  2. The Active check box is selected by default. Deselect it if you do not want this price level to appear when assigning products and services to jobs.
Tip:
Once a price level has been created, it cannot be deleted. If you are no longer using a price group, simply deselect the Active check box and the price group will no longer be able to be used in ServiceCEO. See the Discontinuing Price Levels section for details.
  1. Type a name for the price level in the Name field.
  2. In the Services field, type the percentage amount by which you want to change the sell price of services using this price group. This value can be positive or negative.
  3. Type the percentage amount by which you want to change products using this price group in the first Products field. This value can be positive or negative.
  4. If you typed a value in the Products field, select what about the product you want to change from the Products drop-down list. Your options are:
  5. Repeat steps 1-6 to create additional price levels.
  6. Click OK to save your changes and close the Customer Price Levels dialog box.

Top of Price Levels Section

Using Price Levels

Once you've created your price levels, you can define a price level for a customer location or for specific jobs and/or schedules.

A price level is defined for a job on the Products/Services tab of a Job record.

To define a price level for a customer location, select the price level you want to assign from the Price Level drop-down list in one of these two locations:

  1. Customer Record - The General tab of a Customer record. The price list you select will be linked to the customer location that appears in the drop-down list (located above the address box).
  2. Customer Location - The Address tab of the Address Information dialog box.

When you define a price level for a customer location, the Price Level Update dialog box appears, where you will define how the price levels will be affect the jobs/estimates for this customer location:

Your three options are:

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Selecting/Editing Price Levels for Charges

You can control a job's price level via the Price Level drop-down list on the Services/Products tab. By default, the drop-down list will display the price level as selected in the customer's address information dialog box.

Note:
The job/estimate will continue to use the location's default price level even if all or a portion of the job or charge is being paid by a Third Party Bill Payer.

When you add a product or service to a job that already has a defined price level, the price level markup or markdown is automatically applied to the product or service.

You can always select a new price level from the drop-down list. However, doing so does not automatically apply the price level to any of the job's charges; it will merely bold the price of any products or services that could potentially be affected if you apply the price level change. Potentially effected charges will also be marked with the Information icon: . For example, in the following screenshot, the price level change marked the marked both the "Discovery ACD Lite..." product as well as the "Service Call" service as having a potential change:

To apply the price level change, select the charge and click Reprice.

Tip:
You can select multiple items to reprice by pressing the SHIFT or CTRL keys when you select the products or services. Clicking Reprice will recalculate the price of all selected product and services.

If you reprice a product or service from a master schedule, charges on active occurrences of the schedule will be repriced.

Note:
You can also reprice charges in the Charges page of the Completion Wizard.
Caution:
At this time, the MobileTech feature does not integrate with Price Level pricing. All costs and prices default to the Master Product/Services values in MobileTech.

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How is the Cost Calculated for Inventory Items?

Every product has a cost associated with it. This cost is used to help determine the cost of a job, which is displayed on the Job Costing report.

Costing is potentially calculated at three different points:

  1. When opening a job.
  2. When adding a product to a job record.
  3. When completing the job.

For non-inventoried products, the cost of the product is pulled from the the Our Cost field in the Master Product record.

However, for products that have inventory associated with them, the costing is a bit more complicated. The sections below detail how costing is calculated in these instances.

Serialized

If a specific inventory item as been assigned to the product, then the actual purchase cost of the item is used. Otherwise, the cost is pulled from the Master Product record.

Last Purchase Price

If the item(s) have been received on their Purchase Order (PO), then the cost from the most recent PO for which a bill has been logged will be used. Otherwise, the item's cost will be pulled from the Our Cost field in the Master Product record.

Exact (LIFO/FIFO)

If a specific inventory item has been assigned to the product, then the cost of the assigned item(s) will be used:

If there are no inventory assignments, then the value if any unassigned stock (either available or on order) from the default stock location will be used:

If there is not enough stock to fill the charge from the most/least recent transaction in the default stock location, then the next most/least recent transaction will be used.

If there is no unassigned stock in the default stock location, then the item's cost will be pulled from the Our Cost field in the Master Product record.

Average On Hand

If a specific inventory item has been assigned to the product, then divide the total value of the items currently in the default stock location by the number of units in stock for the average cost, which will be used as the cost for the items.

If no inventory items are assigned, then the average cost is calculated by dividing the total value of the item at the default stock location by the number of units in stock.

If no items are in stock, then the item's cost will be pulled from the Our Cost field in the Master Product record.

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Discontinuing Price Levels

You can mark any price level as inactive by deselecting it's Active check box in the Customer Price Levels dialog box. However, if that price level is assigned to any customers, customer locations, or jobs, then a Price Level Update dialog box will appear:

This dialog box lets you control how the inactive price level is replaced, if at all, on your customers and/or jobs. Your choices are:

Caution:
If you keep the deactivated price level, it will continue to be used for those customers that have it selected (in either the General tab or the Address Information dialog box). However, it will not be used for any other customers, nor will you be able to select it from any of the price level drop-down lists in ServiceCEO.

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Tasks

Task Alarms

You can now set alarms to remind yourself, or the task's owner/assignee, when the task should be performed.

Configuring Task Alarms

To configure task alarms:

  1. Select Tools > Options. The Options dialog box appears.
  2. Scroll down and select Task Alarms. The Task Alarms dialog box appears.

  1. Type the amount of minutes that you want to pass before ServiceCEO checks to see if any tasks are due. You can enter any number between zero (which will only check for overdue tasks when you login to ServiceCEO) and 999. Note that you cannot use decimal points for fractions of minutes.
  2. Type the default amount of time before the task is due that you want the alarm to appear. The number you enter here will be the units of the value you select in step five.
  3. Select the type of units for the default reminder from the drop-down list. The default reminder can be set in Minutes, Hours, Days, or Weeks.
Tip:
The value you enter as the default reminder can always be edited when you create or edit an individual task.
  1. By default, a sound is already selected to serve as the default reminder that will chime when an alarm occurs. If you want to change this chime, click Browse... to navigate to and select the sound you want to use for the alarm. The only limitation is that sound file you select must be a .wav file (Waveform audio format).
  2. Click OK.

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Creating Task Alarms

To create a task alarm for a task:

  1. Open a new or existing task.
  2. If the On Calendar check box is not selected, you cannot set a task alarm, so select it now.
  3. Select the Reminder Alarm check box. The two fields next to it are activated, displaying the default value as defined in the Task Alarms Options dialog box.

  1. If you like, type a new value into the Reminder Alarm field and/or select a new value from the Reminder Alarm drop-down list.
  2. Complete creating or editing the task in the usual manner.
  3. Click OK.

When the reminder time arrives, a reminder dialog box appears on the screen of the task's assignee:

From here you can select the alarm on which you want to perform an action and:

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Assigning Tasks

On the Assignment tab of a Task record, ServiceCEO 6.1 contains a few new options for assigning tasks to people.

These new check boxes perform the following actions:

You can select as many or as few of these check boxes as you like before you save the task.

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Find Options

ServiceCEO 6.1 enables you to automatically open a record after searching for it, rather then displaying a list of possible results. This feature works for the following search fields:

To use the Find Options:

  1. From the Customer list, click Show Find. The find fields appear.
  2. Type a value into the Job #, Estimate #, or Invoice # field.
  3. Press Enter or click Find. A version of the Find Options dialog box appears.

  1. To open the item for which you searched, select the Job Record, Invoice Record, or Estimate Record check box.
Note:
The first check box will always enable you to open up the record for which you searched; the second check box will enable you to open the customer for whom the record you searched belongs.
  1. To open the customer record, select the Open Customer Record check box.
  2. Click OK. The records that you selected to open will appear in their own dialog boxes.

If you always want to open one particular type of record, simply make your selection and then select the Always use these selections and do not prompt me again check box. Doing so will always automatically open the record(s) corresponding to your original selections without displaying the Find Options dialog box.

Note that selecting the Always use these selections and do not prompt me again check box deselects the Use 'Find Options' dialog box check box in the View Options dialog box. If you want to display the Find Options dialog box again when searching, you need to select this check box. See below for details.

While the Find Options feature is turned on by default, you can turn off and on the Find Options dialog box at any time. To do so:

  1. Select Tools > Options.
  2. Scroll down and select Views from the Categories bar.

  1. Select the Use 'Find Options' dialog box check box to display the Find Options dialog box when searching for Job #, Estimate #, or Invoice #. Deselect it to prevent it from displaying when using the Find fields.
  2. Click OK.

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Enhanced Notes

The way you enter notes has been drastically improved in ServiceCEO 6.1!

To begin, we now offer private notes fields in several places:

In all of those locations, there will be several different tabs:

To enter notes on a tab, simply select it and type away.

The private notes are for internal ServiceCEO use only and will never be seen by a customer. The rest of the tabs behave in the same way that they did in earlier versions of ServiceCEO.

Rich Text Format Notes

If you want, you can use Rich Text Format (RTF) formatting in ServiceCEO 6.1 to provide increased features for entering notes.

Tip:
To learn more about RTF, please point your browser to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Text_Format.

When enabled, RTF formatting lets you perform the following actions on your notes:

Caution:
Be very careful when inserting images into your notes field, for they may significantly increase the size of your database. For example, a very small web .jpg file could be 100 KB. MSDE, the SQL Server engine shipped with ServiceCEO, has a maximum size of 2GB (i.e., 2,000,000 KB). Once your database is larger then 2 GB, then you will need to buy a full version of SQL Server.
Caution:
Due to a Crystal Reports limitation, any images you insert into your notes will not be displayed correctly on reports. All RTF images will appear as long strings of numbers, which will significantly increase the size of your reports.

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Enabling Rich Text Format Notes

Before you can use RTF notes, you first need to turn it on. To do so:

  1. Select Tools > Options. The Options dialog box appears.
  2. Scroll down and select Notes. The Notes Options dialog box appears.

  1. Select the appropriate check boxes to enable all of the notes fields in which you want to use RTF formatting. You can select as many - or as few - fields as you'd like.
Note:
If you select the Jobs/Estimates - Invoice check box, RTF notes will be enabled in the Invoice page of the Completion Wizard as well.
  1. By default, ServiceCEO uses a dictionary with about 135,000 words to identify and fix misspelled words. You can add words to this dictionary via the notes field; see the Entering RTF Notes section for details.
    If you would rather use a customized dictionary, click the button next to the Spell Checking field and navigate to the location on your computer where the dictionary file is located. ServiceCEO supports the following dictionary file formats:

    2. Defining a custom dictionary means that the custom dictionary will be used to identify and fix all misspelled words in the RTF notes.

  2. Click OK.

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Entering RTF Notes

Once RTF notes are enabled, opening the appropriate Notes tab will display the RTF controls:

These controls are very similar to the controls for Microsoft Word. You can select text and press the button to apply the formatting to it. Unusual functions include:

Note that if you use the Create New feature to create one of the following objects:

Selecting these options inserts a blank object. To open the program associated with the object you created, simply double-click this object.

Caution:
Keeping in mind that inserting images may significantly increase the size of your database, be careful where you insert images into your notes. For instance, if you insert an image into a Notes field in a schedule, the image will automatically be inserted into all jobs created by that schedule.
Caution:
Due to a Crystal Reports limitation, any images you insert into your notes will not be displayed correctly on reports. All RTF images will appear as long strings of numbers, which will significantly increase the size of your reports.

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Transaction Search

We've added the ability to search for a customer or invoice number in the Transaction dialog box.

  1. Create a new transaction. You can do this from several different places:
  2. The Add Transaction dialog box appears. The Select Customer fields appear in the upper right corner.

  3. Select the value by which you want to search from the Find by drop-down list. You can search by Invoice number or Customer ID.
  4. Type the value by which you want to search in the Find by field. Since this search is an exact match, a result will appear in the Name drop-down list only if an exact match of your search criteria is found. If NO match is found, the drop-down list will appear with a blank value.
Caution:
Even if the drop-down list appears blank (because no records matched your search), the name of the original customer may appear in the field itself. This does not mean that the original customer is a result of your search. Only customer names that appear in the drop-down list itself are part of the search results.
  1. Select the customer for whom you want to enter a transaction from the Name drop-down list.
  2. Create the transaction in the usual manner.
Note:
As in previous versions of ServiceCEO, you can search for the customer by typing in the Name field. As you type, the customer names that match your criteria will populate the Name drop-down list.

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Billing Center

Two new search fields have been added to the Find by Number tab of the Billing Center. These are:

Customer ID

To search by customer ID:

  1. Select Customer ID from the Find By drop-down list.
  2. Type the customer ID you want to see in the search field.
  3. Press Enter. The search results will appear in the Name drop-down list.

Customer Name

To search by customer name:

  1. Type the customer name you want to see in the Name drop-down list. As you type, a list of results will appear.
  2. Select the employee you want to display. The employee's invoices appear down below.

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QuickSale

In order to facilitate over-the-counter sales and a speedy workflow for assisting customers over the telephone, ServiceCEO 6.1 allows you to complete a job from the job record. You can start the completion process in two ways:

Performing either of these actions displays the Completion Wizard, where you can complete the job in the usual manner.

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Inventory

To conform to the new Price Levels feature, several changes have been made to some aspects of the inventory tracking module, including:

Stock Locations
     Default Stock Location
     Teams as Stock Locations
Serialized Inventory
Purchase Orders

Stock Locations

Default Stock Location

A Default Stock Location drop-down list will appear on the Products/Services tab of a job record. It will automatically default to the top-level stock location - the organization's stock location - unless it has been already changed at some point.

Note:
If you are running ServiceCEO Enterprise, the default stock location may be the branch or region level stock location.

You can change the default stock location for a job by selecting a new stock location from the Default Stock Location drop-down list.

ServiceCEO will automatically use inventory items from the default stock location when completing the job, unless at least one of two things occur:

You can tell if the default stock location is being used during completion by opening up the Charge Details dialog box. Here, based on the line immediately above the Information box, you can see that one item is being used from the Default Stock Location (Great Service Pest Control, Inc.).

Teams as Stock Locations

If you have teams enabled as stock locations (by selecting the Team check box in Tools > Options > Inventory > Stock Locations), all teams will be enabled as stock locations. The Stock Location check box will no longer appear in the Teams dialog box (Tools > Lists > Teams).

Serialized Inventory

The following changes have been made to serialized inventory:

Purchase Orders

You can now create a purchase order (PO) without immediately selecting a vendor. However, the following rules apply:

  1. The vendor for the first part you assign to the PO automatically sets the vendor for the PO.
  2. Once at least one item is assigned to the PO, you cannot change the PO's vendor.

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Reports

New Reports

Since the original release of 6.0, several new reports have been added to ServiceCEO, including:

In addition, a number of additional reports are available for download in the Report Library, accessible through the Member Center, including:

Searching by Customer ID

Many reports that let you search by customer name now also allow you to search by customer ID. An example of this is the Invoice report:

  1. Run the Invoice report
  2. Select the Contents tab.
  3. Deselect the All Customers check box.
  4. Type the Customer ID into the search field.

Adding Reports to a Job or Estimate record

You can add additional reports to a Job or Estimate record so that they can be run directly from the record without having to open up the reporting section.

Note that if you add a report to a job record, it will only appear in jobs and project visits. Estimates and Schedules (Master Jobs) will not display any of the reports you show on the Job window.

Caution:
Any reports you display on the job record will need to have CEOJobID as the only required parameter.

Any reports you display on the estimate record will need to have CEOEstimateID as the only required parameter.

If the report is constructed in any other way, it will not run correctly. For more on editing reports in ServiceCEO, please see the Editing Crystal Reports section of the ServiceCEO Help System.

Adding to the Job record

To add a report to the job record report list:

  1. Click Reports from the Navigator bar. The Available Reports dialog box appears.
  2. Click Edit List. The Report List dialog box appears.
  3. Select the report you would like to add to the report list from the list of reports.
  4. Select the Show on Job Window check box.
  5. Click OK.

Once added, you can run the report from two locations in the job record:

  1. Print. Click the arrow next to the print icon or select File > Print > Report Name.
  2. Print Preview. Click the arrow next to the Print Preview icon or select File > Print Preview > Report Name. For example:

Adding to the Estimate record

To add a report to the report list on an estimate:

  1. Click Reports from the Navigator bar. The Available Reports dialog box appears.
  2. Click Edit List. The Report List dialog box appears.
  3. Select the report you would like to add to the report list from the list of reports.
  4. Select the Show on Estimate Window check box.
  5. Click OK.

Once added, you can run the report from two locations in an estimate:

  1. Print. Click the arrow next to the print icon or select File > Print > Report Name.
  2. Print Preview. Click the arrow next to the Print Preview icon or select File > Print Preview > Report Name. For example:

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Advanced Billing

It can be difficult to distinguish normal line-items from items being paid to Third Party Bill Payers (TPBP) in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center. To help prevent confusion, when you select when you select a TPBP in the Billing Setup dialog box, the name of the customer will automatically appear in the Allocation Notes field. It will appear as: For: [Customer Name]. This will occur only if the allocation row does NOT have an existing value in the Allocation Notes field.

Once the customer's name appears in the Allocation Notes field, it will also appear in the Notes field of the Billing Center, helping you figure out which line corresponds to what customer.

Caution:
This configuration will only be for new billing setups. If you are upgrading from 6.0, it will not affect existing jobs.

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Compatibility with Microsoft Vista

Microsoft has recently released their Windows Vista ® operating system. ServiceCEO 6.1 is the only version of ServiceCEO that we support on Vista.

Microsoft has discontinued support of the Microsoft SQL Server Desktop Engine (MSDE) on the Vista operating system. If you are going to use Vista at any point in the near future, we recommend that you install SQL Server 2005 Express Edition by running the Database Management Tools. You can also use one of the "full" versions of SQL Server 2005, all of which are supported by Vista.

In addition, please be aware that Intuit will not support any version of QuickBooks earlier then QuickBooks 2007 on Vista. See http://www.quickbooks.com/Helpcenter/Vista/ for more information. Also note that in order to integrate ServiceCEO and QuickBooks on Windows Vista, you will need to have User Account Control (UAC) enabled on your computer. Intuit requires that UAC is enabled in order to integrate with other programs. For more technical discussion of this, see this page in the Intuit Developer forum.

ServiceCEO's MobileTech and Customer Web Access modules will NOT work on Vista. To use either of these modules with Vista, you will need to run them from a separate server machine running either Windows 2000 Server, Windows XP Pro, or Windows 2003 Server.

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MobileTech

Caution:
Currently, MobileTech will not work on Microsoft Vista. See the Compatibility with Microsoft Vista section for details.

The MobileTech module has a new installer. Follow the steps below to install or upgrade your MobileTech files:

  1. Download the installer.
  2. Double-click the installer to start it. The Welcome page appears:

  1. Click Next. The License Agreement page appears.

  1. Click the I accept the terms in the license agreement option button.
  2. Click Next. The Ready to Install the Program page appears.

  1. Click Install. The wizard will install the MobileTech files. When all of the files have been installed, the Complete page appears.
  2. Click Close. The installation is finished.

You will still need to set up your server and database in the web.config file (as described in the Editing web.config section of the ServiceCEO Help System). The MobileTech files will continue to be installed in C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\MobileTech.

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API

With the release of ServiceCEO 6.1, we are proud to introduce an Application Programming Interface (API) for ServiceCEO. The API will allow developers to extend and integrate the functionality of ServiceCEO with other applications. The ServiceCEO API Web Service provides programmatic access to your ServiceCEO data using the language and platform of your choice.

The current version of the API provides access to most aspects of ServiceCEO’s Customers, Jobs, Estimates and Tasks.

The ServiceCEO API Web Service can be used to perform many actions, including but not limited to:

While developers will be able to access most aspects of ServiceCEO, some areas of ServiceCEO are not currently accessible, including (but not limited to):

Insight Direct plans on adding additional functionality to ServiceCEO’s API in future releases.

Detailed information about using the API is located in the Web Service Developer’s Guide (PDF document).

We highly encourage developers who are using or planning to use the API to post in the API Forum of the Insight Direct Discussion Boards.

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Miscellaneous

QuickBooks & XML Integration

We've made it much easier to select your integration package from the Company Information dialog box. There are now only three options:

Note that both QuickBooks options will use QBFC5, which is automatically installed as part of ServiceCEO 6.1.

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Custom Fields

The Pest Control custom fields have been merged with the Product custom fields. You can now find these custom fields in the Product & Services Options dialog box, accessed by selecting Tools > Options > Products & Services. For more, see the Defining Products & Services Options section of the ServiceCEO Help System.

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Removing Sales Reps from Commission Splits

A new option exists where you can add or remove your sales reps from commission splits. This option is available in the Payroll Options dialog box, accessible by selecting Tools > Options > Payroll.

If one of the last two option buttons in the Commission section are selected, the Include Sales Reps in Commission Split check box will be selected by default, meaning that your sales representatives will be included in any payroll commission splitting. To remove sales reps from this commission split, deselect the check box.

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Third Party Bill Payers and Service Contracts

In 6.1, you can use a Third Party Bill Payer (TPBP) Service Contract to cover all or a portion of the charges on the customer's job. To do this, you first need to:

Once these steps are done, perform these steps:

  1. Create a new job.
  2. Enable Advanced Billing for the job, and assign at least one allocation line to a TPBP. For example, let's say you've configured the job's Advanced Billing to be:
    1. 75%, invoicable 1 week before the job starts, with "Silvertone Bar" selected as a TPBP.
    2. Remaining Balance (25%), invoicable 1 week after the job starts
  3. On the job's Services/Products tab, double-click a charge to open the Charge Details dialog box.
  4. Click the Service Contract Coverage tab. You will see one line item for every allocation lines you've configured in the job's Advanced Billing Configuration. Any TPBPs you have selected will appear on their corresponding line. For example, in the screenshot below, the job charge has two lines, both corresponding to the Advanced Billing configuration:
    1. The Silvertone Bar line. This line corresponds to the 75% TPBP line.
    2. The Garcia, Jerome line. This line corresponds to the Remaining Balance line, and is invoicable to the customer.
  5. Select the Service Contract Line Item tab for the TPBP. You will see all applicable TPBP's Service Contracts in the drop-down list. Select the Service Contract that you would like to use to cover this charge.

The total at the bottom will update to display your new charge. Note that any Service Contract restrictions will be honored. For example, if you selected a TPBP contract that was restricted to only Product Category X for a product in Product Category Y, no portion of the charge would be covered.

  1. By default, the Full Coverage check box is selected. This means that it is covering the amount of the allocation row for this charge. To continue our example, this means that if the Full Coverage check box was selected in the screenshot, that 75% of the charge would be covered by the selected Service Contract.
    If you want to change this coverage, deselect the Full Coverage check box and type a value in either the Qty or Charge field.
Caution:
The amount you enter in the Qty or Charge fields must make sense in terms of the quantities involved. For example, if you entered 30 in the Qty field for a charge with 10 units, the amount would be changed when you clicked OK to reflect the limitations of the allocation line. In our example above, since the TPBP line is for the 75% allocation line, the Qty would by automatically changed to 7 (75% of 10 = 7) when you closed the Charge Details dialog box.
  1. Click OK to save your changes.
  2. Complete and create your invoices in the usual manner.

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Billing History Filter

In 6.1, we've added a filter to the Billing History tab so you can more easily control how many invoices appear on this tab.

Caution:
If the customer has a lot of billing data, the Show All Entries option may mean that the page will take some time to display all of the information. We recommend that you do not frequently use this option as ServiceCEO's performance may be severely degraded on larger databases.

By default, the Display Applied Payments/Adjustments check box is selected, meaning that all payments will be displayed within the date range. If you want to limit the display to only those payments that have NOT been applied to an invoice, deselect this check box. (Note that in previous versions of ServiceCEO, this option was located at View > Current View > View All.

Caution:
The filter on the Billing History tab is linked to the filter on the History tab of the Jobs tab filter. In other words, what you define as the date range on the Billing History tab will control both how the Billing History tab and the Jobs tab appear (and vice versa).

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Job Details on the Dispatch Board

You can now quickly display a job's details via the Dispatch Board:

  1. Open the Dispatch Board.
  2. Right-click any job and select Details... from the pop-up menu. A Details dialog box appears, displaying information about the job. Note that this is the same dialog box that appeared when you right-clicked the job from the calendar.

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Self Healing

When you start ServiceCEO and there are any DLL conflicts, ServiceCEO will now be able to heal itself by automatically running it's own repair utility. In previous versions of the software, you would need to run the Repair utility yourself.

If there are any issues, you will see this dialog box when you start ServiceCEO:

Please be patient while ServiceCEO repairs itself. The program will open when any conflicts are resolved.

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Description Field Limit

In previous versions of ServiceCEO, the description fields were limited to 255 characters. This limitation was lifted in 6.1 for the following fields:

Thanks for everyone's input!

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Database Documentation

Complete documentation of the ServiceCEO database fields and tables, designed to help you customize your own reports, is available for download. Click here to download the file:

The downloaded file is a compressed file. It needs to be decompressed with a tool like WinZip or WinRAR.

Once decompressed, you will see two files:

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Known Issues

For a complete listing of known issues with 6.1, please point your browser to http://support.insightdirect.com/release/6-1_releasenotes/knownissues.htm

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Feedback

Please send any feedback about this document to documentation@insightdirect.com. Please note that this email will not go to Technical Support. To receive technical support, please enter a support ticket by logging into the member center at http://www.insightdirect.com/support.html and clicking the Log a New Support Ticket link.

ServiceCEO is a registered trademark of Insight Direct, Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. Other parties' marks are the property of their respective owners and should be treated as such.