Sage 100

interesting note from the Sale Advisor team. I asked them to enter a quote for 100c. **Unfortunately, we are not able to enter 100c quotes in the system. It appears your form has the correct pricing** Sign of the times....

Scary. A sales team that can't provide quotes. What's next!?

A sales manager that doesn't know what tier credits you do or don't get??

At Summit, let's all take Ubers to Lawrenceville and stage a protest. It seems to be the thing to do lately.

Can we wear red hats?

I'm now back to the situation where the sales manager is ignoring me. I must have unknowingly threatened him again and he's cowering under his desk.

No quote, no expiration date....hmm....a loop hole?

Has anyone else noticed that Sage 100 is not listed in the portal???

I asked for a quote. Used poor wording. The order was placed. They can tell me the total priced charged the client but not the dollars nor can the invoice be shared with me as they are on 100c and billed directly now. Oh, I am also told the price matching for 100 vs 100c will be going away April 1. I guess the 15% renewal increase for 100 should be enough incentive.

And I have heard the sales team is short staffed again. Not too surprising if you see the make-up of the sales team. Hire a bunch on minimum wage workers, have your seasoned sales team spend days/weeks educating them, and then fire your seasoned sales team to improve the bottom line.

The 15% increase is going to kill any future upgrades to 100c. Not very smart when your objective is to get all users on subscription, but this wouldn't be the first time sage has not been smart.

I was told yesterday I can't run April renewals through this month with the match. I have to spend 30 minutes discussing with each client to get them to understand and consider. I believe the transition at even cost makes sense. Not so much at 15% or full price.

@LarryBradford For two of my April clients, Sage sent me 100c quotes/order forms with the perpetual price match (which is what I asked them for). One has been processed through already too. We also did that last time they said the promotion was going to end.

Thank you for the heads up. Looks like I have another week of unproductive time fixing Sage's relationship to eventually work me out of a margin.

Well, mine just gave up and quit. Got this email early in this morning Hi Sage Partners I wanted to be the first to inform you that I will be leaving the Sage 100 ERP Team in less than 30 days. I have decided to look for other opportunities that provide a better balance, allowing me to focus on both career and family. The shortage of staff and the additional territory coverage I am responsible for has made this month extremely overwhelming but thank you for continued patience. It has been a pleasure working with each of you. Should any of wish to stay in touch, please for free to connect with me on LinkedIn.

Well, it is year end for Sage UK so I would expect there to be more shuffling in the people department. Maybe voluntary, maybe not. The only consistency that Sage seems to have is in the reseller department. Why do we love our career so much?

@Kenny Daniel, your rep must be really unhappy to quit without first having another job. At least I take ""look for other opportunities"" to mean they don't have another job yet.

The sales group in general is in disarray and unhappy.

@JaneCavanaugh, some jobs are just not worth it. I guess working at Sage is one of those. Hell, if I were a few years younger, I'd be looking for another job also :) .

LOL. I understand that. There are some days where I really feel I picked the wrong profession.

The right profession . . . https://youtu.be/zYqqla3HTyY

Be aware, had a client switch to 100c, and upon doing so Sage lopped off their J/C module.

Many mistakes are being made. NOT the time to eliminate the reseller from the loop!

I know it's the end of the quarter, but I am getting ZERO response from anyone in Atlanta. They don't even acknowledge my e-mails! {Expletives deleted}

I put in a REAL order yesterday. Client faxed it in with ACH authorization. I sent a PDF copy to the SA team as well to my ""handler"" as a heads up. My handler sent a note to the SA team about an hour ago inquiring on the status. Too funny!

It is SO funny, I can only cry. The order has been faxed in THREE times. From my handler, _I hate to ask you to do this but I am bypassing normal procedure and having you ask customer to fax again directly to the manager of SA team. The good news is within about 4 week we will have automated doc-u-sign electronically for payments._ And prior to that message, this one - _Jessica, since the payment fax line is a fiasco. Can we call the customer for payment? Jeff, do you have a phone contact for them to give to Jessica? Jeff, we will be moving to electronic signature this process in the near future. In the meantime it's a mess_ Then shortly after that, I received confirmation that third time was the charm. I simply don't understand how ANYTHING is getting processed!!!! TG, the new client gave me copies of everything so I didn't have to embarrass myself (and risk the order being cancelled) by asking them to fax it in repeatedly. If I am having trouble with ONE little order, how in the heck are ANY orders being entered?

I requested a quotation for add-on modules. Got it around a week later. After getting approval and signature from customer...place the order... Someone different from SAGE emailed me that the quotation was done wrong..guess what, it is $2,000 more...How do I go back to customer and say...yeah...I screwed up!!!!!

@LourdesSobrino you go back to the customer and say SAGE screwed up!!

Once again, if Sage is going to insist on being the front person, then **THEY** need to honor that quote!!!!!!!

I was recently offered the ""assistance"" of Scott Ehmen or Connie Certusi to help close deals. (Yes, I still laugh when I think about it.) If they want to be helpful, perhaps they should take turns in the quote and order group.

hey guys..remember the incorrect quotation I got from SAGE...after getting the second one approved by the customer...now SAGE tells me that they are over the 90 days renewal timeframe...so the price just doubled!!!! UNACCEPTABLE !!! and the sales advisor supervisor started laughing when I called...I AM SO UPSET that I will start swearing in Spanish...COO !!!!!!!

The sales advisor supervisor laughed??? That is SO unprofessional. I recommend you complain to whoever you can - your RSM, Jeff Scott, Rob Larsh, Dianna Lane, Connie Certusi, Nancy Harris, Stephen Kelly . . .

WOW! John, do you have those names somewhere where you can copy and paste in when needed or do you keep a Velcro board on your wall where you can replace the names as necessary?

They're in my brain, but they should be an Outlook group.

were is it that I sign to be a quicken basic reseller?????

@LourdesSobrino I'm adding your word to my repertoire!

@LourdesSobino - I have been in that hell. My sympathies.

Take it up the complaint ladder. I am guessing Jeff Scott is your guy based on your location. Copy Dianna Lane as she is the newest member of the team and probably the only one with an ounce of empathy. Jeff Scott is a straight guy and I liked him when I worked for him, no I mean he worked for me, no, that isn't right, I mean when we are on the same team together...

@JeffSchwenk At least Jeff pretends he likes you.

Perhaps that is because he lives in the DC metro area.

Email already sent out....not a good week. They have been contacting my customers directly to offer Sage Payroll Services....even tough it does not support Puerto Rico Tax tables....talk about confusing the customers !!!

@JeffSchwenk what did you ultimately find was the procedure that Sage wants you to follow? I'm puzzled as to whether for a migration from 100 to 100c should I just complete an order form and hope Sage knows it's an existing user? I'm more than a little concerned that each new Sage rep seems to follow a pattern of burnout where they are less and less responsive until they are gone and the cycle seems to repeat. Almost at the the point where I feel I'll need to just give the user Sage's phone number and resign myself to the fact that future revenues are 100% consulting. What a grind.

The process that Sage wants us to follow??? There is one? What I found out is that you truly have to bird dog the order. Since they DON'T do quotes, you have to complete the Excel form, hope that you filled it out correctly and send it in ahead of time for ""quote"" verification. Then you have to have prospect sign/date form and also highlight the area about sales taxes because you don't know IF Sage will be charging that. You also have to explain the payment authorization form to them, recommend the credit card option (do you really trust Sage to charge your bank account correctly). I give the prospect of faxing the forms directly to Sage. In any case, I also get copies of ALL forms as a CYA. I then go back to the office, email the order to the advisors, copy my Sage handler. Wait for the phone call that the fax for the payment authorization has not been received. Fax the form a second time, wait again. Fax it the third time to the sales supervisors fax machine. Pray. Wait a day or two for the commission credit. When it comes in, try to figure out how they arrived at the credit amount. Start receiving emails from the now client about the mysterious emails from Sage regarding the unlocking code, where to download the software, etc. IMHO, going direct to the end user just highlights the total confusion of Sage. Not a pretty initial experience to the new Sage user.

As @ThereseLogeais and I have found, you have to ""bird dog"" Sage on every aspect from quote to order to tier posting and margin. I keep telling my RSM and Rob Larsh that because Sage is so dysfunctional, this takes time away from pursuing new sales. For the majority of members of 90 Minds, we are not large enough to have dedicated administrative or order staff to spend time on this. I know the process and the game, so it is more expedient for me to do it. One of our areas of consulting, specifically related to JobOps, is to help decrease the time it takes for customers to get quotes out to their customers. Perhaps we need to be consulting with Sage on this. As for sending the Excel form, signed summary order form and payment authorization form, we do everything now using Citrix ShareFIle. This is secure, so the customer send all forms, including the payment authorization to us using the ShareFile link I send them, and we send all the forms to Sage via ShareFile. There is much less confusion on the part of the customer, and it makes Sage actually download the documents, rather than depend on a fax. By the way, we cannot directly e-mail the Excel form, since it has macros, and our enhanced security no longer allows that. ShareFile takes care of that. Sage is supposedly going to implement DocuSign, but it would be a better idea IMO to standardize on ShareFile.

Quick update... Jeff Scott and Dianna Lane were both prompt in their responses.... and it didn't require any swearing in Spanish

Prompt in their response does not mean they were prompt with a resolution. Please keep us posted.

Dianna is very good at responding. She comes from ""real"" companies - Xerox and HP - where they learn how to respond.

At least they responded my email by phone within 12 hours and directed me in the appropriate direction. Have to look at the glass half full......everyone from Sage is going to recognize me when they read my name tag at Summit...and run the other way!!!!!