Sage 100

We know Sage had two outages for their payroll tax services recently. The first was an Azure issue, and the second that happened today, 7/24/19 has not been fully investigated but seemed only to affect customers on Payroll version 2.18.x.

Sage contacted us.  We talked over some of the issues, and one point they made needs more illumination from us - please comment:

Payroll went to a separate version.  One of the reasons for this change was to allow payroll upgrades separate from the rest of the Sage 100 programs and to be able to complete the upgrade in place rather than parallel.   If your Payroll customers completed the upgrade to Sage 100 v. 2018 and they are not on the latest release of Payroll, (2.19.3), what is preventing or delaying the upgrade? 

#Urgent #payroll #PR #tax

​​​​​

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Moira Goggin
Executive Director
90 Minds, Inc.
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I don't know what the benefits are for upgrading from 2.18.x to 2.19.x and if the customer is willing to pay for the upgrade.  I suppose it is my job to keep up to date on all of the features of every release of every module but unless Sage pushes it out via email it is likely to be at the bottom of the priority list, particularly if everything is working well with the current version.  As long as taxes get calculated correctly, employees get paid on time, and taxes get filed timely and accurately there isn't an incentive to spend time and money on an upgrade.

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Doug Higgs
Assistant Technical Support / Building Maintenance Specialist
Midwest Commerce Solutions, Inc
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The old adage - don't fix what isn't broken.

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Moira Goggin
Executive Director
90 Minds, Inc.
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-24-2019 20:05
From: Doug Higgs
Subject: Sage feedback on Payroll why aren't customers upgrading to 2.19.3?

I don't know what the benefits are for upgrading from 2.18.x to 2.19.x and if the customer is willing to pay for the upgrade.  I suppose it is my job to keep up to date on all of the features of every release of every module but unless Sage pushes it out via email it is likely to be at the bottom of the priority list, particularly if everything is working well with the current version.  As long as taxes get calculated correctly, employees get paid on time, and taxes get filed timely and accurately there isn't an incentive to spend time and money on an upgrade.

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Doug Higgs
Assistant Technical Support / Building Maintenance Specialist
Midwest Commerce Solutions, Inc
------------------------------

Since I have just started doing payroll upgrades, I have been skipping over v2018.  Let someone else be the pioneer be shot with arrows.  Clients are WAY less forgiving when you screw up their paychecks than when you screw up their order entry for a day or so.  But now is the time to jump in, the water is great.  I have upgraded several clients to v2019 in the past month (at the low end of employee counts).  Main impediments have been understanding the tax codes (still limited help text on what each one does) and rewriting any custom reports (still getting a feel for how the PII table fits in) and where exactly, the data is stored.  Once tables are set up, I import the last PR from v2017.  If the details and totals match, then I have a good feeling.

Non of my upgrades involve Job Costs, Time Card (or whatever it is called), just plain vanilla payroll.

Other pioneers have been quite helpful with sharing their lessons of hard knocks for which I am very grateful.  I plan on doing at least two upgrades each month for the foreseeable future.

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Jeff Schwenk
FORMER 90M Board Member
Bottomline Software, Inc.
Waynesboro VA
540-221-4444
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-24-2019 20:16
From: Moira Goggin
Subject: Sage feedback on Payroll why aren't customers upgrading to 2.19.3?

The old adage - don't fix what isn't broken.

------------------------------
Moira Goggin
Executive Director
90 Minds, Inc.
------------------------------


Original Message:
Sent: 07-24-2019 20:05
From: Doug Higgs
Subject: Sage feedback on Payroll why aren't customers upgrading to 2.19.3?

I don't know what the benefits are for upgrading from 2.18.x to 2.19.x and if the customer is willing to pay for the upgrade.  I suppose it is my job to keep up to date on all of the features of every release of every module but unless Sage pushes it out via email it is likely to be at the bottom of the priority list, particularly if everything is working well with the current version.  As long as taxes get calculated correctly, employees get paid on time, and taxes get filed timely and accurately there isn't an incentive to spend time and money on an upgrade.

------------------------------
Doug Higgs
Assistant Technical Support / Building Maintenance Specialist
Midwest Commerce Solutions, Inc

I think Sage have lost sight of who their typical Sage 100 customer is.

OUT: one and two person doctors offices, insurance agents, retail, landscapers, etc. Basically anyone not a distribution company first (light mfg second).

IN: 20+ person distribution, multiple warehouses, operations sometimes run very early to very late, sometimes people are in Sage on the weekends, sometimes require testing prior to installing upgrades/updates/patches

Most companies don’t want to take a few hours to kick everyone out during the day for us to install an update which they have to take on faith isn’t going to break something else.

Some of these updates require prerequisites (hello surprise reboot - 1994 called and wants their 3.5” floppy back) which in turn will prompt or sporadically reboot.

Workstation sync. Great concept. Customer (or consultant) is forced to contact 20+ users to explain to them what this sync means or we get calls. Worse - UAC or other Windows feature interferes and requires significant debugging - also worse if the sync requires local admin rights in a secure network (psst Sage - most savvy IT departments don’t want users to have full admin control even on local machines - Google “ransomware” for a fuller understanding why)


Data conversions after upgrades. Sometimes conversion is required. Sometimes not. Always annoying when the customer calls asking why they are prompted for a data conversion.

Update must be done on server (see also: surprise reboot ) where Sage might not be the only application running.

I think if Sage communicated clearly the key reasons for the version update (give us a set of bullet points of important reasons not marketing fluff) then it would be easier to convince/recommend to customers.

Sage is very out of touch with who their customer is and who their target customer will be over the next 3-5 years and with best practices for update/patch management (please take your prerequisites and only add them with full version upgrade), never require a data conversion without clear advance warning.





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Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
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------Original Message------

I think Sage have lost sight of who their typical Sage 100 customer is.

OUT: one and two person doctors offices, insurance agents, retail, landscapers, etc. Basically anyone not a distribution company first (light mfg second).

IN: 20+ person distribution, multiple warehouses, operations sometimes run very early to very late, sometimes people are in Sage on the weekends, sometimes require testing prior to installing upgrades/updates/patches

Most companies don’t want to take a few hours to kick everyone out during the day for us to install an update which they have to take on faith isn’t going to break something else.

Some of these updates require prerequisites (hello surprise reboot - 1994 called and wants their 3.5” floppy back) which in turn will prompt or sporadically reboot.

Workstation sync. Great concept. Customer (or consultant) is forced to contact 20+ users to explain to them what this sync means or we get calls. Worse - UAC or other Windows feature interferes and requires significant debugging - also worse if the sync requires local admin rights in a secure network (psst Sage - most savvy IT departments don’t want users to have full admin control even on local machines - Google “ransomware” for a fuller understanding why)


Data conversions after upgrades. Sometimes conversion is required. Sometimes not. Always annoying when the customer calls asking why they are prompted for a data conversion.

Update must be done on server (see also: surprise reboot ) where Sage might not be the only application running.

I think if Sage communicated clearly the key reasons for the version update (give us a set of bullet points of important reasons not marketing fluff) then it would be easier to convince/recommend to customers.

Sage is very out of touch with who their customer is and who their target customer will be over the next 3-5 years and with best practices for update/patch management (please take your prerequisites and only add them with full version upgrade), never require a data conversion without clear advance warning.





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Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
---------------------------------

Generally speaking, updates / upgrades cost time, money and all change comes with risk.  There needs to be a business case with added value as justification.

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Kevin Moyes
Technical Systems Analyst
Munjal White Consulting Co.
Toronto ON
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 07-24-2019 23:22
From: Lloyd Smith
Subject: Sage feedback on Payroll why aren't customers upgrading to 2.19.3?

I don't think anyone could say that better. 

Regards,

Lloyd

Sent from my iPhone

Original Message------

I think Sage have lost sight of who their typical Sage 100 customer is.

OUT: one and two person doctors offices, insurance agents, retail, landscapers, etc. Basically anyone not a distribution company first (light mfg second).

IN: 20+ person distribution, multiple warehouses, operations sometimes run very early to very late, sometimes people are in Sage on the weekends, sometimes require testing prior to installing upgrades/updates/patches

Most companies don't want to take a few hours to kick everyone out during the day for us to install an update which they have to take on faith isn't going to break something else.

Some of these updates require prerequisites (hello surprise reboot - 1994 called and wants their 3.5" floppy back) which in turn will prompt or sporadically reboot.

Workstation sync. Great concept. Customer (or consultant) is forced to contact 20+ users to explain to them what this sync means or we get calls. Worse - UAC or other Windows feature interferes and requires significant debugging - also worse if the sync requires local admin rights in a secure network (psst Sage - most savvy IT departments don't want users to have full admin control even on local machines - Google "ransomware" for a fuller understanding why)


Data conversions after upgrades. Sometimes conversion is required. Sometimes not. Always annoying when the customer calls asking why they are prompted for a data conversion.

Update must be done on server (see also: surprise reboot ) where Sage might not be the only application running.

I think if Sage communicated clearly the key reasons for the version update (give us a set of bullet points of important reasons not marketing fluff) then it would be easier to convince/recommend to customers.

Sage is very out of touch with who their customer is and who their target customer will be over the next 3-5 years and with best practices for update/patch management (please take your prerequisites and only add them with full version upgrade), never require a data conversion without clear advance warning.





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Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
---------------------------------

All of the above reasons. 

Just when we had a sufficient comfort level from small sites to start rolling out for larger installations, we have the tax service outages. 

I have a customer with <> 1,500 checks processed every 2 weeks. How is a tax service outage going to go over with them? 

Job Cost customers are stuck until there is a resolution to the SY_ReportManagerMaster records being cleared (2 cases pending with Sage since APRIL!) 

And, of course Work Order customers are unable to upgrade until history conversion is fixed. And IRP is released.

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Eric Lunceford
First Mate Business Solutions
Oklahoma City, OK
877-880-8960
https://www.firstmatellc.com/
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 07-24-2019 23:22
From: Lloyd Smith
Subject: Sage feedback on Payroll why aren't customers upgrading to 2.19.3?

I don't think anyone could say that better. 

Regards,

Lloyd

Sent from my iPhone

Original Message------

I think Sage have lost sight of who their typical Sage 100 customer is.

OUT: one and two person doctors offices, insurance agents, retail, landscapers, etc. Basically anyone not a distribution company first (light mfg second).

IN: 20+ person distribution, multiple warehouses, operations sometimes run very early to very late, sometimes people are in Sage on the weekends, sometimes require testing prior to installing upgrades/updates/patches

Most companies don't want to take a few hours to kick everyone out during the day for us to install an update which they have to take on faith isn't going to break something else.

Some of these updates require prerequisites (hello surprise reboot - 1994 called and wants their 3.5" floppy back) which in turn will prompt or sporadically reboot.

Workstation sync. Great concept. Customer (or consultant) is forced to contact 20+ users to explain to them what this sync means or we get calls. Worse - UAC or other Windows feature interferes and requires significant debugging - also worse if the sync requires local admin rights in a secure network (psst Sage - most savvy IT departments don't want users to have full admin control even on local machines - Google "ransomware" for a fuller understanding why)


Data conversions after upgrades. Sometimes conversion is required. Sometimes not. Always annoying when the customer calls asking why they are prompted for a data conversion.

Update must be done on server (see also: surprise reboot ) where Sage might not be the only application running.

I think if Sage communicated clearly the key reasons for the version update (give us a set of bullet points of important reasons not marketing fluff) then it would be easier to convince/recommend to customers.

Sage is very out of touch with who their customer is and who their target customer will be over the next 3-5 years and with best practices for update/patch management (please take your prerequisites and only add them with full version upgrade), never require a data conversion without clear advance warning.





---------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
---------------------------------

We've had such a Hellacious time upgrading the customers to v2018 Payoll, they really don't want to experience that pain again by doing another Payroll upgrade anytime soon. While I don't think they would have that pain again in going with a 2019 Payroll upgrade from 2018 - it's  a deep wound that they just don't want to re-open.  We've had everything from missing payrolls in the same quarter as the upgrade was done (they show on the employee records - just not in the accumulated totals on the Quarterly Reports) , to having problems with the tax engine not being as "accommodating" as the prior version.  Not having total control over what taxes would be applied, and which would not be applied is a lot of work for us - and one that our clients think they shouldn't have to pay for while we're figuring it out. Because of our location on the northern border of Oregon, we have a lot of clients who have employees living in Oregon but working in Washington.  The tax engine is not playing well with the State Withholding for Oregon, the Oregon State Transit Tax being paid, but Unemployment and Worker's Comp being paid in Washington.  We've had to send documentation to Sage from the State Agencies proving that we need it to do things the tax engine doesn't currently do. It was so much simpler when we could control the tax flags.

And of course, the online payroll tax outages are more than a little scary. We don't want to tell clients that not only do they have to do Payroll 2 days ahead of time if they have Direct Deposit, but they also need to add another day "in case" the tax engine is down.  Somehow that just doesn't fly...

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Sue Bennett
Jack of All Trades, Master of 1
Bennett/Porter & Associates, Inc.
Tigard OR
503.620.3484
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Since Sage's question was specifically why clients on v2018 or v2019 with the payroll module aren't upgrading specifically their payroll module to v2.19.3, I have been up to the v2.19.3 release encouraging my payroll clients using v2018 or v2019 to have me install the new payroll releases because there continue to be a fair number of fixes in each and there are new features in each which have generally benefited those clients.  

The big reason for the delay on installing 2.19.3 was the direct deposit stub form issue.  Since Sage has continued to be clueless that it's a problem and I've gotten the runaround several times from support, now that I know which and how to edit the formulas I have started installing v2.19.3.  The largest benefit to my clients from v2.19.3 is the additional of GL accounts for other taxes in Company Tax Group Setup since before this release there was only one GL account available to be used by several taxes in the other category which was making reconciliation very tough.

The payroll tax service outages are extremely concerning and Sage must have contingency plans in place for this.  We don't hear of to my knowledge for instance ADP clients throughout the US not being able to process payroll because of some outage.  Also, why are email notifications not going out when we are entering contact email addresses in Service Notification Maintenance?  It should be used for notification of these outages and updated information as well as planned outages.  Information is critical.

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Shari Eckersley
ICS Support
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