Full Sail Partners Blog | Support (2)

Are you ready? Year-end is upon us. As part of a yearly tradition, we are providing you with resources and reminders to assist your firm with year-end processing. Check out the information below, and let us know if you have any questions.

Don't Forget Your Deltek Vision Year-End Processes

As we come into the holiday season many of us in accounting face the coming season, not only with the joy of family and friends coming together, but with a sense of impending dread – YEAR-END and TAX SEASON are looming – ugh - have another drink.

W-2s - 1099s - journal entries - checking and double checking each number!  Auditors - shareholder meetings - endless explanations’ of what the results mean (even though you have been saying for the past 6 months) - Oh the joy of the season!

As we go through the year-end process there are mistakes we (and others) make that are easy to recover from like entering the 15 page depreciation journal entry “backwards” at midnight sitting in your semi dark office chugging your 15th pot of coffee.  Some are more difficult – like removing all the lower levels of your work break-down structure (did that once – glad our backups worked). So outside of deleting the database, what are some of the items in Vision year end processing that are hard to recover from?

>> Learn more

Is Your Deltek Vision System Year-End Process Stress Free?

Year-end is always a stressful time of year, but it doesn’t have to be.  As with everything else in the world of Accounting, planning and preparation is the key to a successful and stress-free year end. Check out this article talk provides a few tips to make your year-end close just a little easier.

>> Prepare more

Webinar: Stress Free Year-End Process - Yes You Can!

Join our on-demand webinar to see how you can make your year-end stress free.  Our panel will provide insight into best practices, tips to close your books with ease, and focus on those “gotchas” on year-end processes. See what our panel says about the following year-end items:

1. How to make your process efficient
2. Avoid disruption to production
3. Communication topics to provide your staff and management
4. Saving money by evading closing obstacles

>> View more

Deltek’s Year End Resources

Deltek Customer Care is working to assist you with year-end activities. You can now take advantage of year-end resources:

• Year-End Forums
• Phone Menu Guidance
• Year-End Info Center
• Quick Chat Guidance
• Year-End Guides & Videos

>> Know more

We hope these resources serve as good reminder. Best wishes from the Full Sail Partners' staff! Wishing you a prosperous 2014.

It’s Time to Upgrade! Regulatory and Year-end Updates Available ONLY on Vision 7.2 or 7.3

Working in the most recent release of your Deltek solution ensures your firm is benefiting from all the features and enhancements engineered into the latest versions of Vision. Your support and maintenance plan entitles your firm to download the latest version of your product here if you're not up-to-date!

Important Note Regarding Year-End Regulatory Updates in 2014

Year-end updates in 2014 will be supported only on Vision 7.2 and Vision 7.3. Regulatory updates for releases prior to Vision 7.2 will not be delivered.

Check out the Deltek Support Assurance Product Lifecycle on the Deltek Customer Care Connect website for the latest information on your product's status and definitions of the support delivered in the Active, Maintenance, and Sustaining phases.

Is Your Firm Prepared for Deltek Vision 7.3?

Because of Microsoft’s de-support of Windows XP in April 2014, Deltek can no longer support the Windows XP client operating system beginning with Vision 7.3 and extending to future releases. 

The following client operating systems will be supported for Vision 7.3:

• Windows 8 or 8.1
• Windows 7
• Windows Vista

Additionally, to use this new version you must ensure that .NET Framework 4.5 or 4.5.1 is installed. For more information on the .NET Framework and to determine how best to deploy the 4.5 or 4.5.1 release within your organization, please refer to the Microsoft web site at http://www.microsoft.com/net.

Are you ready? Year-end is upon us. We thought we would highlight some resources to assist firms with year-end processing.

Don't Forget Your Deltek Vision Year End Processes

As we come into the holiday season many of us in accounting face the coming season, not only with the joy of family and friends coming together, but with a sense of impending dread – YEAR-END and TAX SEASON are looming – ugh - have another drink.

W-2s - 1099s - journal entries - checking and double checking each number!  Auditors - shareholder meetings - endless explanations’ of what the results mean (even though you have been saying for the past 6 months) - Oh the joy of the season!

As we go through the year-end process there are mistakes we (and others) make that are easy to recover from like entering the 15 page depreciation journal entry “backwards” at midnight sitting in your semi dark office chugging your 15th pot of coffee.  Some are more difficult – like removing all the lower levels of your work break-down structure (did that once – glad our backups worked). So outside of deleting the database, what are some of the items in Vision year end processing that are hard to recover from?

>> Learn more

Is Your Deltek Vision System Year End Process Stress Free?

Year-end is always a stressful time of year, but it doesn’t have to be.  As with everything else in the world of Accounting, planning and preparation is the key to a successful and stress-free year end. Check out this article talk provides a few tips to make your year-end close just a little easier.

>> Prepare more

Webinar: Stress Free Year-End Process - Yes You Can!

Join our on-demand webinar to see how you can make your year-end stress free.  Our panel will provide insight into best practices, tips to close your books with ease, and focus on those “gotchas” on year-end processes. See what our panel says about the following year-end items:

1. How to make your process efficient
2. Avoid disruption to production
3. Communication topics to provide your staff and management
4. Saving money by evading closing obstacles

>> View more

Deltek’s Year End Resources

Deltek Customer Care is working to assist you with year-end activities. You can now take advantage of year-end resources:

• Year-End Forums

• Phone Menu Guidance

• Year-End Info Center

• Quick Chat Guidance

• Year-End Guides & Videos

>> Know more

So, you are in the Cloud!  Your company has purchased Deltek Vision Essentials ERP software and you have been assigned as the SaaS Administrator.  You may find yourself wondering, “What does this mean for me?  What do I need to do first? Where do I start?”  At first the task may seem overwhelming as you receive letters, guides and instructions on “How to get started.”  We at Full Sail Partners want you to know that you are not alone, and that we have put together answers to some of the questions asked most often when a client purchases their new Cloud solution.

What do I need to do first? 

As the assigned SaaS Administrator, you will receive a welcome letter.  The most important task to perform at this time is to print out and read the SaaS Administrator Guide.  It will be a valuable resource for you during the initial set up.

What is the next step after I read the guide?

The second most important task as the SaaS Administrator is to set up your Deltek Customer Care Account.  This account will be where most communication takes place between you and Deltek.  If you are not a new client and will be migrating data from an existing Vision database or a prior Deltek product, this portal will be the first stop to transfer your files. 

Can’t I just have Full Sail Partners set up my account?

Because of the importance placed on security, only the Saas Administrator may submit service requests on behalf of their firm.  These requests are submitted solely through your account access on the Deltek Customer Care portal.  The SaaS administrator will work closely with Full Sail Partners on the implementation process.  However, only the SaaS Administrator can request things like data uploads, receive system maintenance communications, request backup restores, submit invoice graphics or request a sandbox.  

How do I keep up with announcements regarding scheduled maintenance or issues with my service? 

The SaaS Administrator must also subscribe to the Deltek Vision knowledge based article 67385.  The article can be accessed at: http://bit.ly/143PgnX.  This page is used by Deltek specifically for Vision Essentials related communications—including announcements regarding planned and unplanned maintenance.   In order to stay abreast of the most recent announcements, it is important the SaaS Administrator signs up for notification alerts from this article.  You may do so by choosing the “notify me” selection at the bottom of the screen on the Deltek Vision knowledge based article page.

A dialogue box will then appear stating your request has been successfully submitted. Click OK. You are now set up to receive any notifications about maintenance or access issues with your Vision Essentials software.   

As the primary person responsible, what if I am not available? Can a second Administrator be added?

Absolutely! Deltek encourages all clients in the Cloud to have a second administrator assigned to their account.  You, as the SaaS administrator, may request a second administrator be named through the Deltek Customer Care Portal.  The request should include the full name and email address of the administrator that is being added or changed. You may even assign Full Sail Partners as your second Administrator.  This will give us the ability to upload databases and custom files directly for you.  Your account manager with Full Sail Partners can provide you with the appropriate name and e-mail information if you decide to assign our firm as your second SaaS administrator.

How do I add graphics to my firms invoices?

My firm has experienced a serious event that has created the need for a backup and restore of our data.  May I request the data from a specific point in time?

Yes.  Deltek back-ups client data no less than once every 24 hours.  There is also a backup performed once every 7 days.  The daily backups are kept for 1 week and the weekly backups are kept for 4 weeks.  If you require a restore from a specific point in time, you may send the request through Deltek Customer Care indicating the past time frame you need for the restore.  You must also include the time that you would like for the restore to take place as your system will be unavailable while the restore is performed.   Vision Essentials clients are allowed 4 Backup and restores per year.

Is there other information I should review?

Being the SaaS Administrator is a very important assignment.  Keep in mind, you are the keystone for communication between your firm and Deltek.  Being informed by familiarizing yourself with the SaaS Administrator Guide and subscribing to the Deltek Knowledge Based Article 67385 which will notify you of the availability and functionality of your Vision system is essential to your success as the SaaS Administrator for your firm.

Ready to take the next step?  Empower your employees through training!
According to a study by the American Society for Training and Development, companies that invested the most in training had a shareholder return that was 46% percent higher than the market average.

Welcome to our first Deltek Vision How-To Video Series. Today we will learn about Deltek’s Vision Info Center Help section. This video will answer some common questions asked by clients are:

1. Do you have a complete list of the fields in Vision?
2. Do you have a help guide so I can learn about the fields available?

Check out additional how-to videos by clicking here. 

In my day-to-day conversations with companies I am often discussing IT support issues surrounding their firms’ backup plan for their firms’ key financial and marketing data. As I speak to these firms I inquire about steps they are taking to protect this critical data.  I often pose this simple question “How long could your firm survive without access to this critical data?” Most firms indicate that they could not afford to be without access to this data for more than a day or two. Yet most have not taken precautions to have a 1-2 day restoration plan/ disaster recovery plan. In many cases these IT support issues seem to be a direct correlation to the firms’ reduction in IT support staff (internal & external) over the last several years. In many of these discussions it is often discovered that there is no backup plan for the firm’s critical data, no testing of backups to verify the integrity of the backups and no off-site backup storage.  Two fairly typical conversations have occurred over the last couple months (names omitted to protect the guilty).

The first required assistance to move their financial database from a crippled failing server to a new server. In the process Full Sail Partners’ Consultant requested to have the firms IT support to provide a backup of the Live Date. Upon restoring the backup provided it was discovered that the firm had been backing up a sample database for over a year and had never backed up their “Live” database. Thankfully disaster was avoided when Full Sail Partners’ Consultant was able to successfully make a backup up of their “Live” database on the dying server and restore it onto the new server (before failure happened), prepare accurate backup plan and validate the backup to verify that it was actually the “Live” database. Not sure they know how lucky they were to still be in business.

The second conversation was not quite as fortunate. This conversation started after they had their production server crash in a fluke lightning storm. Full Sail Partners Consultant was able to get the firm back up and running in less than 3 hours. However, after several attempts to recover their database, it was determined that the most recent valid database backup was over 3 months old due to not having regular off-site backups.

Often times firms hear these stories and ask how can they help their firm from becoming another story. I typically tell them that they need to make sure that their IT support either internal or external need to be verifying the integrity of the their database backups and also need to be storing these backups off-site. For those firms that may not have the desired level of IT support, Full Sail Partners now has both Hosted Solutions as well as On-Premise solutions for Deltek Vision to protect your firm’s critical data.

View our past webinar to learn more about what your firm can do to protect your data and ensure you have a back-up checklist.

• Communication – It is vital to communicate to the rest of the firm that year end is approaching and the important dates that they should be aware of: final timesheet due date, final expense report due date, etc.
• Create a calendar – Your calendar should contain all of your year-end deadlines: final AP check run, final timesheet due, final bank rec are all dates you may want to add to your year-end calendar.
• Create a year-end manual – Given that year-end procedures change very little from year to year, create a manual.  With a manual to refer to, you no longer have to rely on your memory or cryptic notes you may have taken in years past.
• Reconcile on a monthly basis - Stay on top of your monthly reconciliations.  Nothing adds to the stress of year end more than performing several months of reconciliations that could be done monthly.
• Recurring transaction files – If there are yearly JE’s or other transactions that you only post once a year, consider creating a recurring transaction file.  Each year those files will already be in place so you don’t have to re-create them from year to year.
• Order year end forms well in advance - Why wait until the last minute to order your 1099 and W-2 forms?  By ordering your forms in advance you know they are on hand when you are ready to process.

In addition to the tips above, Deltek publishes the Year End Bulletin each year.  This is an excellent resource for year end preparation of your Deltek Vision System.

Just remember to stay focused and keep organized and along with the tips outlined above, you will be surprised at how easy and stress free year end will be!

Hurricane Sandy spreads her reach to 13 states wide and the evaluation of the damage and impact begin to be accessed. After the superstorm subsides, the ability to communicate to family, co-workers, and clients becomes vital. This is then followed by returning to a sense of normalcy. Events like this provide a new perspective that we sometimes overlook, the ability to access our data. You don't have to wait until you lose your data or don't have a quick restore to address this issue.

For nearly five years, Full Sail Partners has been responsible for our hosted Deltek Vision clients a guarantee of 99.5%.  To meet that uptime guarantee, a way to monitor, maintain, and protect our clients was mission critical.  Three services are now available to all Deltek Vision clients who maintain their own on-site server with our best of breed tools and techniques.

Bulletproof

On a monthly basis Full Sail Partners will conduct an eyes-on, comprehensive inspection based on a checklist of over 30 parameters, deploy the latest Full Sail Partners scripts and tricks to maximize uptime, install the latest hotfixes, and perform a soup-to-nuts database restore to test your backup plan to ensure your backups are something you can count on.  We’ll also set up that restored database as a hidden test database so you have the ability to try/test/play without disturbing your production data.

Overwatch

Chances are good there’s more information in your database today than yesterday, and the database isn’t getting smaller or using less resources.  Most companies only discover these conditions when it is too late and Vision is already ‘down’.  That would be unacceptable for our hosting clients, so we developed ‘Overwatch’, a real time monitoring system tailored to all of the Vision critical metrics and services.  Overwatch allows us (and now you too!) to check the health of your Vision servers via a webpage and see up to date information 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.  Additionally, even when you’re not looking, Overwatch is.  Warning and escalating emails will be sent to your staff whenever something like memory usage thresholds are reached.  This allows IT to be aware of issues in time to react before they become showstoppers.

Catastrophe Protection

Even though Full Sail Partners utilizes multiple hosting locations and redundancy, we wanted the additional protection of an independent, standalone backup solution for our client’s database archives, logos, and custom work.  We felt so strongly about this strategy that we decided to make our solution available to our on-site clients.  If there is absolutely nothing else you do to protect your Vision data, a dependable, tested, offsite backup solution is critical.  In addition to providing anytime access to your encrypted database backups, we also include 30 days of free hosting and will have your database online and available within 24 hours of your loss of server casualty.

To learn more about implementing these solutions in your disaster prevention, protection, and recover plans view our Comprehensive IT Services to Plan, Protect, and Prevent.

Good customer service is a rare commodity in this day and age of virtual customer support agents.   Business is done in an ultra-competitive arena where your direct competition is only a Google search away.  As a result, firms are developing customer relations management plans to help better serve their client base.  Has your firm ignored developing a plan to manage your customers?

A good customer relations management plan will act as a guideline for your firm when dealing with clients.  However, it is important to remember that there is no end-all-be-all remedy for customer support.  Some battles cannot be won, no matter how diligent and worthy your efforts.  This is why I compare having a strong plan, to a game of poker!

Much like in a game of poker, the typical customer service interaction involves some 'hidden cards' that you are not always privileged to see.  These hidden cards can be anything from possible prior negative history with your company, temperament, and maybe even personal issues that the customer is dealing with in their life.  It is because of these cards that we as customer service representatives, much like a seasoned poker player, must approach every hand as though we are playing with pocket ACES.

Pocket ACES are a poker player’s best friend.  The ACES acronym also happens to be easiest to remember four step processes for dealing with every day client interactions.

ACES stands for:

As a professional, it is your responsibility to play like poker legend Phil Hellmuth and go ’all in’ for your customers with pocket ACES!

In today's world it's important to make sure your resources are effectively allocated and outsourced expenses are doing all they can to keep you ahead of the pack. No matter whether your IT support is outsourced, dedicated, or part-time, there are expectations your firm should have to ensure your Deltek database is properly managed. We invite you to take the IT challenge to see how you can improve. 

IT Challenge 1:

IT Challenge 2:

IT Challenge 3:

Did You Pass the IT Challenge?

Full Sail Partners can assist you with any of these concerns to ensure your IT staff is providing your data the security your firm needs. In addition to these services, our hosting division can offload the expense of servers, peripheral software, redundant back-ups and allocation of resources to address your Vision IT needs. Our hosting professionals only provide hosting services for Deltek Vision and coordinate with Deltek support on known issues. This specialized expertise comes with years of hands-on experience and provides your organization a high level of confidence that your data is secure. Outsourcing your IT Management of Vision with Full Sail Partners allows your firm to focus on your core business, while we ensure your IT landscape is fully prepared.

To find out more about how Full Sail Partners' application hosting can ease your worries and save your firm money, visit our website. To speak to someone about these services, contact Scott Seal at sseal@fullsailpartners.com or 888.552.5535 x118. We look forward to relieving your IT worries and helping your firm Reach Full Sail!

In a recent survey conducted by Full Sail Partners, 33% of clients did not understand the services provided by Deltek support vs. Full Sail Partners. Additionally, some clients don't understand what a Deltek Partner is and the value a partner can provide. So let's address these questions. 

What is a Deltek Partner? 
Deltek partners with a wide range of companies that act as an extension of their business. These partners include Infrastructure Technology Companies, Independent Software Vendors, Resellers, Consulting Partners, CPA Accountant Networks, and Hosting Companies. Full Sail Partners is an authorized software reseller, consulting partner, and application hosting partner.

As a Deltek Partner, what is your relationship to our firm?
Clients might be assigned to a Deltek Partner to help manage the relationship.  The management of that relationship includes administering your annual maintenance contract, providing you consulting services, and serving as your Deltek liaison regarding upgrades, expansions, maintenance questions, or Deltek announcements.  As a Deltek Partner, we also believe it is important to educate our clients through local user groups and our free webinars.  

When would I call Deltek Support vs. calling Full Sail Partners, my Deltek Partner?
Deltek Customer Care Support is included as a part of your annual maintenance contract or your subscription.  As a part of your maintenance, Deltek Customer Care provides a forum and a knowledge base to answer technical questions.  When answers can’t be found through those avenues, support can be contacted via phone at 1-877-HLP-PROJ (1-877-457-7765) or through the web at http://support.deltek.com.  For example, if you receive an error message while using the software, experience a software defect or need troubleshooting, or have a technical software questions, support can provide you answers.  

If your question is related to how to use the software, best practices, training, implementation, customization, or hosting services then Full Sail Partners can assist.  When in doubt we encourage you to reach out to your consultant or your Account Manager at Full Sail, we can help direct you to the right resource.

Who is our Account Manager at Full Sail Partners?
As an Account Manager at Full Sail Partners, our role is responsible for directing your firm to the proper channel and identify the most skilled resources to address your question or concern. I f you need to contact us please email sales@fullsailpartners.com or call us at 888.552.5535. 

Still need further clarification?  Add a comment to start the dialogue regarding your Deltek Vision Support needs.