Customer Configuration

Customer configuration options can be found in the File → Configuration Management → Customer section.

Customer Options

The customer options section includes new customer defaults, customer lookup defaults, credit evaluation options and more.

Customer Defaults

Options under this section apply to new customers created in Acctivate. These are defaults that are meant to help simplify the new customer creation, however you can override these defaults at the time of creating a new customer.

Field Field Value
Ship To Location ID The text in this field will be used as the default Location ID for new Ship To locations created.
Terms This is the default terms code for a new customer. The terms are setup and managed in QuickBooks
Branch This is the default Branch for a new customer. See the Branch section in Customer configuration
Ship To Tax Category The default Tax Category (Acctivate's singular name for QuickBooks tax items or tax groups) for a new Ship To Location is defined here.
Tax Code The default tax code for a new customer.

Synchronization

  • Copy Acctivate credit card information to QuickBooks
    When this option is enabled, Acctivate will sync a customer's saved credit card information from Acctivate to QuickBooks. This is a one way sync and will overwrite the customer's credit card information in QuickBooks with the credit card info stored in Acctivate. This option only appears if you have the "Allow this application to access personal data such as Social Security Numbers and customer credit card information." option enabled in the QuickBooks Integrated Application Certificate.
  • Only sync new customers with transactions
    When this option is enabled, Acctivate will only sync Acctivate customers to QuickBooks once they have an invoice or payment transaction.

Customer Lookup Defaults

The Customer Lookup Defaults option will apply to users the first time they use the customer lookup in Acctivate. If the user makes changes to the lookup options, Acctivate will remember those options, per user.

Credit Evaluation

  • Deny Credit if invoices overdue
    If enabled, a customer's account will be placed on an "Overdue" credit hold if any invoice has a balance past its due date.
    • Grace period _ days
      You can add an additional grace period to the credit restriction calculation beyond the standard invoice due date. For example, if the invoice is due on the 10th, but you have a grace period of 15 days, the "Overdue" credit restriction will not go into effect until the 25th if a balance still exists. (For accounting purposes, the invoice due date remains the same, just no credit hold will be placed on the customer's account until the grace period end is reached.)
  • Deny credit if over limit
    If enabled, a customer's account will be placed on an "Over limit" credit hold if their open invoice balance exceeds their credit limit. See the Approve Credit section of the Sales Orders documentation for more information on how orders whose amount will exceed the customer's credit limit are handled.
    • Zero limit indicates no pre-approved credit
      • With this option enabled, entering a zero ("0.00") in the customer's credit limit field means they have no credit available to them and any orders will be placed on a credit hold which must be overridden on a per order basis. If the credit limit field is empty, as opposed to having "0.00", then the customer has no defined credit limit.
      • If this option is not enabled, entering "0.00" or leaving the credit limit field empty means they have no credit limit.
    • Include open sales and service orders
      When this option is enabled, the "Over limit" credit evaluation also includes open sales and service order amounts, in addition to the open invoice balance.
    • Included unbilled time and materials on business activities
      When this option is enabled, the "Over limit" credit evaluation also includes unbilled time and material amounts, in addition to the open invoice balance.

Address Validation

Avalara provides an address validation service that can be utilized if you have partnered with Avalara and you have configured Acctivate to utilize the AvaTax integration. You can enable address validation based on the customer's ship to country. An example of how this table can be configured is:

Country Method
* Avalara
CA

In this example, all countries (asterisk is a wildcard that will match all country values) will use Avalara to validate their address, except for Canada since no Method is defined for Canada (CA).

Note

The Avalara Address Validation is valid for US and Canadian addresses only. Therefore it is recommended that you enter the formats of United States and Canada that you support (e.g., "US", "USA", "CA", "CAN", etc.)

Branch

In Acctivate, a Branch represents a physical location that customers may contact to place sales orders. It's not the same as a warehouse, which is the physical or virtual location the inventory is stocked in.

A Branch is how Acctivate links to Accounts Receivables accounts in QuickBooks and therefore each A/R account used for invoices must have a corresponding branch. For example, if you have a "USD-Accounts Receivable" and a "EUR-Accounts Receivable" account for invoicing you would need to setup two Branches. If you have multi-currency enabled in QuickBooks then you will need to select the currency that corresponds to the Branch and its A/R account.

A Branch must be linked to an Accounts Receivable account, but it can also optionally be mapped to income and COGS accounts and QuickBooks Classes (see Sales/COGS configuration section of Sales Order Configuration.

Field Name Definition
Branch 15 characters
Currency List. The currency list is managed in QuickBooks.
Name 50 characters
Address 1, 2 41 characters (500 for QuickBooks Online)
City 31 characters (255 for QuickBooks Online)
State 21 characters (255 for QuickBooks Online)
ZIP 13 characters (30 for QuickBooks Online)
Country 31 characters (255 for QuickBooks Online). If using AvaTax, it's recommended that you use the 3-letter ISO country code.
Phone & Fax 20 characters
Email 253 Characters (100 for QuickBooks Online). The Branch email address is used when emailing Pick Tickets, Picklists and Pack Lists from the sales order or Sales Order Manager window.

Branch Accounts

  • AR GL Account
    Type: Accounts Receivable
    This account will be used for posting unpaid sales invoices. Each Branch in Acctivate must be linked to an Accounts Receivable account, though they can all be the same.

    Note

    In QuickBooks Online companies, the default A/R account for the Branch's currency will be automatically mapped.

    When multi-currency is enabled in QuickBooks Online, select the currency when creating the Branch. When you save, the default A/R account for that currency will be set. For more information about the Branch GL accounts, refer to the Accounting Guide resource.

  • Invoice Disc GL Account
    Type: Income
    The Invoice Discount GL account is used to give invoice header discounts. This is the sales discount account that will be used for discounts given on an entire sales invoice (e.g., 10% discount for entire order).

  • Sales GL Account (Optional)
    Type: Income
    If your Sales/COGS accounts are configured to map to the Branch, you will select the income account associated with this branch.

  • COGS GL Account (Optional)
    Type: Cost of Goods Sold
    If your Sales/COGS accounts are configured to map to the Branch, you will select the Cost of Goods Sold account associated with this branch.

Branch Defaults

  • Default Warehouse
    A branch can be assigned a default warehouse. This is the warehouse that will be defaulted for sales order lines (when the Branch is set on the order before adding line items).
  • Default Warehouse for Special Orders
    The Purchase Wizard module allows you to create a Special Order purchase orders. A common practice is to receive Special Order PO's into a virtual "Special Order" warehouse. The warehouse set here will be used as the warehouse for Special Order line types on a sales order.

Class Selection (Optional)
Acctivate supports QuickBooks Class tracking at the Invoice header and Invoice detail level (see Sales Order Configuration). If the QuickBooks classes are linked to Branches at either the header and/or detail level, then this field is visible and you can set a default QuickBooks Class associated with this branch.

Customer Type

Acctivate and QuickBooks share a common Customer Type list. Typically, Customer Types are used to classify customers for reporting purposes. Optionally, income and COGS accounts and QuickBooks Classes can be linked to Customer Types.

In Acctivate companies integrated with QuickBooks Desktop, new customer types can be added or edited in either program.

In Acctivate companies integrated with QuickBooks Online, Customer Types can only be created or edited in QuickBooks Online. However, if your Sales and COGS accounts and QuickBooks Classes are mapped to Customer Types, the corresponding GL accounts must be set in Acctivate.

Salesperson

Salespersons are setup and configured in QuickBooks. This is due to the salesperson usually being tied to some financial transaction (e.g. payroll, 1099, etc). Salespersons that are added/edited in QuickBooks will have their changes brought over to Acctivate after a sync.

While you cannot add to or edit a salesperson in Acctivate, you can make them active or inactive by checking the Active checkbox. Depending on the Sales / COGS configuration, you can link income, COGS, and QuickBooks Classes to a salesperson.

Field Name Description
Salesperson ID Salesperson ID as entered in QuickBooks
Name Salesperson Name as entered in QuickBooks
Sales GL Acct/Seg Optional Based on Sales/COGS Configuration. The income account associated with this Salesperson.
COGS GL Acct/Seg Optional Based on Sales/COGS Configuration. The Cost of Goods Sold account associated with this Salesperson.
Class Name Optional Based on Sales/COGS Configuration. The QuickBooks class associated with this Salesperson.

Marketing Lists

Marketing Lists are user defined lists which allow you to assign a customer to a list so that you can market to them using the Create Mailing List or Broadcast Email Messages functions. To setup a Marketing List, do the following:

  1. Navigate to File → Configuration Management → Customer → Marketing List
  2. Click Edit.
  3. Enter a Description, which is what you will see throughout Acctivate (up to 30 characters).
  4. Enter a List Code (up to 5 characters).
  5. Check the Active checkbox.
  6. Click Save.

Tax Categories

Tax Categories is an all encompassing term used to describe QuickBooks Tax Items and Tax Groups. In this configuration window you can view the Tax Categories that have been setup in QuickBooks. Any changes to the Sales Tax Categories must be made in QuickBooks, including making a tax category active or inactive. You can however check the Shipping Exempt checkbox if shipping charges are exempt from being taxed by certain Tax Categories.

Note

Sales Tax Items included in Tax Groups are not available for use in Acctivate. Please create a Sales Tax Group containing only the Tax Item in QuickBooks if you need to use a tax item that is already part of another group.

Customer Export

Acctivate includes a Customer Export function which allows you to quickly and consistently export customer data in a comma separated values (.csv) format. This section of the configuration manager allows you to select which fields you want to export, whether the exported file includes column headers, and the default export location.

Default Fields to Export
Select which fields should be included in the export file:

  1. Click Edit.
  2. In the Default Fields to Export section, click on the name of each field you want to export. A selected field will turn blue.
  3. Click Save.

Default Customer Export Destination
A default export filepath and filename can be set here. At the time of exporting the filepath and filename can be changed, if necessary.

  1. Click Edit.
  2. In the Default Customer Export Destination section use the lookup button ... to open the Save As window.
  3. Navigate to the path where you want to save the export and enter a file name in the File name: field, such as "Customer Export.csv".
  4. Click Save.

Customer Export Options
When the Include column headers checkbox is checked, the customer export file will include column headers in the first row.