The process of expanding your business inevitably gives rise to a whole array of challenges. As a growing enterprise, many difficulties can be addressed with the addition of an integrated business software solution, but this also raises the issue of selecting the right one for your business.

 

In many cases, businesses look to software to solve a short-term challenge instead of one which will address the challenges of the wider company. This leaves many companies running with incongruent systems across departments, such as Payroll, CRM, reporting, supply chain and cash flow management.

 

It is easy to get stuck in old patterns of working, which are largely ineffective because the thought of making a large change is overwhelming. This article will break down how the use of Opera 3 SE SQL can better integrate departments and make a business operate more effectively as one entity.

 

 

Greater productivity

Regardless of how motivated your employees may be, if they spend a large proportion of their time using multiple systems and out-of-date processes, then relatively short tasks can end up being a massive drain on time.

 

Working with a fully integrated solution like Opera 3 SE SQL can hugely increase the efficiency of a business, with every employee across each department working on the same platform. For example, financial data can be pulled across spreadsheets electronically and in real-time, saving both time and risk of error in project accounting.

 

Better visibility

When information is stored across disparate systems, finding and extracting data can become time-consuming and laborious, which can lead to errors in translation or delays in decision-making. Ill spent time hinders any company from excelling and developing, which is why it is so important to have up to date and accurate information.

 

A unified solution promises to keep your foot on the ball with access to real-time data from all corners of the business instantaneously. The bill of materials module, for example, features automatic works order generation from sales orders or re-order levels. This can help employees to make timely decisions and progress the business in a more efficient manner.

 

Fuel for growth

A common knot that organisations with stand-alone systems get twisted into is the inability to grow as their systems do not interact and update with each other.

 

For a business to expand, it is essential that the business uses a system that works with the business and not against it. The business intelligence module’s dynamic dashboard allows you to easily access the information held in Opera 3 SQL SE to analyse, manipulate and report on your own data. Any reports created can be saved for future use and will be updated with the latest information with a simple click of a button. This system can give you the insights needed to propel your business forward.

 

Flexible working

Pegasus Opera 3 SQL SE is an integrated solution compatible with cloud technologies, which grants you and your employees the flexibility and freedom to manage the business from anywhere on the globe, at any time. It is a truly revolutionary way to operate your business.

 

Scalability

A rapidly growing enterprise needs a solution which can match the pace of their growth. Opera 3 SE SQL enables your business to add applications and users as and when required, making a perfectly tailored solution.

 

As well as growing alongside your business, Opera 3 SQL SE can help to accelerate your ability to scale by keeping track of job costs and revenues against budgets. The project accounting module groups jobs costs under headings or phases, helping to stay in control of the total project budget. This saves admin time and streamlines processes by transferring timesheets for work on jobs directly into Payroll on employee records.

 

Summary

The use of disparate systems across departments often creates more work than it saves, holding many organisations back from progressing. Opera 3 SE SQL offers a solution that is easy to implement and unifies all business functions. Take a look to see how Opera 3 SE SQL can work for you.

 

 

Opera 3 SQL SE from Pegasus Software is a business solution designed to help small to medium-sized businesses manage their day to day processes more simply and efficiently. Opera 3 SQL SE has a suite of business management modules to help you do more with less; all of the modules are simple to deploy and are designed to be easy to use.

 

So, why do we think you should consider Opera 3 SQL SE, and who may benefit from it?

 

In this ever-changing world, we know that every business strives to satisfy distinct challenges and, in doing so, encounters its own. With that being said, unique problems demand tailored solutions. Opera 3 SQL SE is perfect for just that, managing and adapting to any business to ensure your requirements are met.

 

Regardless of how your business functions, Opera 3 gives you the freedom to have systems in place to run your business exactly how you need it to be run. Not only that, but it’s designed to develop with you as you grow as a business – so you don’t need to worry about looking for specialist software to handle your demanding needs. Opera 3 SQL SE has all the capability.

 

As a business owner, it’s crucial to have systems to deal with the core fundamentals of running any successful business. Opera 3 SQL SE isn’t shy when it comes to features. We’ve outlined all of the features below, along with the critical functions attached to them, so you know what you’re investing in when purchasing Opera 3 SQL SE for your business.

 

Financials Feature

 

Key functions:

 

• Sales Ledger
• Multi-Currency
• Purchase Ledger
• MTD VAT Online Filing
• Credit Management
• Cashbook
• Nominal Ledger

 

Benefits

 

Opera 3 SQL SE enables businesses to track both their revenue and costs continually. This provides immediate visibility of cash flow and offers in-depth financial reporting that integrates seamlessly with Microsoft Excel. It gives your business the tools it needs to make informed decisions quickly and help your business grow.

 

Payroll Feature

 

Key functions:

 

• HMRC PAYE Recognition
• Submit HMRC RTI (Real Time Information)
• Maintain weekly, fortnightly, four-weekly and monthly paid employees within one company
• Links to Opera 3 SQL SE Nominal Ledger and Cash Book modules or can be used stand-alone
• Multi-user capability with Company and Group password control for menu level access restriction

 

Benefits

 

Opera 3 Payroll has HMRC PAYE and RTI recognition capability and provides for the submission of RTI (Real Time Information) and auto-enrolment of pensions. Opera 3 Payroll also offers fully automated procedures to help take the stress out of processing payroll, all while supporting your business to comply with complex tax, pension and employment legislation.

 

Supply Chain Management

 

Key functions:

 

• Sales Order Processing
• Purchase Order Processing
• Stock Control

 

Benefits

 

By integrating your sales orders, purchasing and stock with the relevant financial information and automating the delivery of your customers’ orders, Opera 3 SQL SE can help to increase levels of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty.

 

Bill of Materials

 

Key functions:

 

• Work in Progress
• Assembly Structure Detail
• Assembly Costs Reports
• Kitting Function
• Works Orders Generation
• Serial/Batch Item Locations

 

Benefits

 

The Opera 3 SQL SE Bill of Materials modules features automatic works order generation from sales orders or re-order levels, batch works order progression, and a comprehensive enquiry facility. Assembly structures can be as straightforward or as complex as you require, including sub-assemblies and components such as raw materials, labour or description only.

 

Further flexibility is supplied by the Kitting function, which allows works orders to be raised and the finished assembly’s build quantity to be moved into stock in a single posting.

 

Business Intelligence

 

Key functions:

 

• Multiple Opera 3 SQL SE database tables can be integrated onto a single Excel worksheet
• Dynamic write-back facility for Nominal budgets, price lists and stock adjustments
• Progressive drill down from Excel to the live underlying Opera 3 transactions
• Cube Analysis for multi-dimensional reporting
• Access to data is controlled by Opera 3 SQL security settings

 

Benefits

 

Use the familiar interface of Microsoft Excel to easily access the information held within Opera 3 SQL SE, to analyse, manipulate and report on your data. Any reports that you create can be saved for future use and refresh at the click of a button to provide the most up-to-date information.

 

Credit Control

 

Key functions:

 

• Easy to understand dashboard views of the overall financial position of your company and customers
• Record and revise promised payments against individual transactions or at the account level
• Keep on top of actions with diary views
• Place accounts ‘on’ or ‘off’ Stop
• Drill down of financial information and customer accounts
• Increase or decrease credit limits
• Powerful filters to manage customers that are over their credit limit
• Dispute invoices and record appropriate reason codes
• Print statements, copy invoices and produce advanced debtor letters

 

Benefits

 

The Opera 3 SQL SE credit control module is designed to streamline your credit control processes, reduce bad debts, increase cash flow, and help improve your business’s overall financial position.

 

With a series of dashboard views, the Opera 3 SQL SE credit control module makes it a one-stop-shop for all your credit control needs. View your overall company turnover, old invoices and total invoice debt and drill down to the detail behind each transaction. The credit-control module allows businesses to pinpoint which customers owe what, which customers owe the most and analyse financial ratios such as average debtor and creditor days and promised payments.

 

Project Accounting

 

Key functions:

 

• Track job costs against revenues and budgets
• Transfer timesheets for work on jobs directly to Pegasus Payroll
• Group jobs under contract headings

 

Benefits

 

Opera 3 SQL, SE Project Accounting module, helps businesses track job costs and revenues against budgets and break down charges against categories including Labour, Contractor, Direct Expense, Stock and Interim Billing.

 

With the Project Accounting group, jobs cost under contract headings or post against optional phases, to easily control the total project budget. Save admin time and streamline your processes by transferring timesheets raised for work on jobs directly into Payroll to update employee records.

 

Summary

 

There is an abundance of software out there that promotes your business’s functioning, but Opera 3 SQL SE does it all. This impressive software is built for people serious about their business and its smooth running; with all the critical functionality packed into it, we can guarantee satisfaction.

 

If you’re stuck on what software you should choose when it comes to running your business with all the core fundamentals covered, why not get in touch with our team to see why Opera 3 SQL SE is the one you need.

An Introduction to Pegasus Opera 3 SQL SE

Pegasus Opera 3 SQL SE is a business management tool designed for small-to-medium sized businesses. It has been created to help manage day-to-day processes in a simpler and more efficient way, leaving more time to be spent on the tasks that matter most to the business.

With a library of core modules that are effortless to deploy and easy-to-use, businesses can operate with increased clarity and functionality. From financials to supply chain management, modules are customisable to fit with the needs of a business.

Core Modules

In total there are 9 core modules that can be added to the Opera 3 system, and chopped and changed based on the needs of a business. Each core module provides an additional function aimed at optimising processes to meet business and customer needs more quickly. Below are a few of the core modules explained in a bit more detail.

Financials

The Financials module provides In-depth financial reporting that seamlessly integrates with Excel, allowing users to track revenue and costs, to provide real-time visibility of cash-flow. This functionality was designed to offer full visibility of financial activity for quick and informed decision making. 

Bill of Materials

Gain fast and accurate manufacturing information through the Bill of Materials core module. Work in progress, assembly structure detail, batch and serial item location, and assembly cost reports can all be viewed within the software. The Kitting function offers further flexibility, allowing for works orders to be raised, and the build quality of the finished assembly to be moved into stock, all within a single posting.

Making Tax Digital

As part of the Making Tax Digital (MTD) government initiative, designed to make it easier for businesses and individuals to maintain their VAT records and ensure their tax is correct, Opera 3 SQL SE is fully HMRC accredited for MTD compliance. This means the software can store, maintain, and submit a business’s VAT information digitally and as specified by the regulations.

Supply Chain Management

Opera 3 SQL SE allow businesses to integrate sales orders, purchasing and stock with relevant financial information, automating delivery of customer orders. This integration of processes will not only make operations more efficient, but also improves customer satisfaction as orders can be met more quickly.

Opera 3 SQL SE Cloud

By moving Opera 3 SQL SE to the cloud, you can access this business management software online at any time, and from anywhere, making remote working a lot more accessible. With monthly subscription-based payments, businesses can keep a better eye on cash-flow and not worry about saving for larger lump sums on a yearly basis.

Benefits

Pegasus Opera 3 SQL SE has several key benefits aimed at helping businesses achieve their objectives:

• Better decisions can be made faster

With easy access to key sets of data, less time is spent searching for data, so more time can be spent acting on it.

 

• Gain total visibility and control

Multiple companies and multiple currencies can be managed through the platform, with reporting linking directly to Excel, offering a unified view of a business.

 

• Fast-track financials

Opera 3 SQL SE allows businesses to continually track revenues, along with what’s owed and when it’s due. The software also reminds businesses what they owe, who to, and when it has to be paid, providing full visibility of cash-flow.

 

• Adapt to change

Core modules can be deployed as and when needed, with scope to expand the solutions as the business grows. Further options allow businesses to tailor how the software works for them increasing flexibility even further.

 

For more information about Opera 3 SQL SE and how it could help optimise your business processes, speak to us today.

 

Applied Business Solutions (UK) are please to announce we have a new brand image and website! During lockdown we have been busy looking at ways to improve our business and how we can support our customers moving forward. We hope you like our new image and website as much as we do.

Applied Business Solutions (UK) are pleased to announce the relocation from the office in Newton Abbot to their new offices in Exeter. The relocation of the business to Exeter is a fantastic opportunity for Applied Business Solutions (UK) to move into a more modern and flexible office with excellent links to the M5, A30 and A38, to develop a base to from which to grow and better serve their customers.

The new office space will provide Applied Business Solutions (UK) with a more central location to expand the business and to service their growing customer base in the South West of England.

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Opera II has now been around for 17 years and businesses using the software may be finding that the software is struggling to cope with new operating systems or may now have functionality gaps between the software and your business needs.

If you would like more information on why you should be considering an upgrade and where to go from here you can join @Pegasussoftware on an online webinar to find out how Opera 3 could help fill these functionality gaps and improve efficiency in your business

Making Tax Digital (MTD) is a new government initiative designed to help simplyfy tax submissions. Under MTD, businesses will be required to keep records digitally and make a quarterly return of data to HMRC.

From April 2019 businesses with annual sales over the VAT threshold of £85,000 should use digital tools to keep records of income and costs. @PegasusSoftware are committed to ensuring that #Opera 3 software will be fully compliant with the new MTD requirements.

You can find out more about what Making Tax Digital will mean for your business here. #MakingTaxDigital #mtd #opera3

Useful Links: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/making-tax-digital/overview-of-making-tax-digital (Source: gov.uk)

Improve your phone practices with these five top tips for businesses from www.smallbusiness.co.uk

The vital role of the phone call for sales and marketing in most industries and sectors is self-evident; from restaurant’s bookings, to car dealership’s enquiries, to telecom’s call centres. And yet, businesses have typically been far slower in updating their phone practices for the 21st century than they have in online marketing efforts. While the online customer journey is tracked, recorded and refined, businesses are slower to take the same data-driven approach with the trusty phone line.

What businesses risk forgetting is that sales, particularly for bigger items or services, still often boil down to the telephone call. Across industries, data overwhelmingly suggests that inbound calls have higher intent and a higher value per sale than most online response mechanisms.

At the very least, neglecting their phones is leaving businesses with an incomplete picture, with a complete lack of data on customers that are phoning up. At worst, poor phone practice is putting customers off. It’s telling that recent watchdog research showed that 28 per cent of consumers find being directed to the company’s website is the most annoying phrase to hear while on hold.

Here are five top tips for businesses on how they can improve their phone practice:

Treat phone data like browsing data

It is widely accepted that web analytics is essential for any company operating online; businesses need to know how traffic comes to them, the search terms people enter to get there, what sites they visited first, and where they went afterwards. This insight is indispensable, and organisations are more than willing to pay a premium to get it.

Equal attention should be paid to phone interactions – where as much data can be collected on customer behaviours to inform business strategy. If the same level of analytics that companies invest in to understand their online channels isn’t applied to the voice channel, there will be a huge blind spot in customer information. Web analytics may reveal how customers found your information and what they looked at, but what happens to the trail when they pick up the phone and call?

Apply phone analytics to track your marketing investment

As part of a phone analytics solution, unique, trackable numbers can be assigned to marketing campaigns and media channels to provide insight into customer response rates. With this information, marketing can optimise the channel mix for the best return on investment.

Businesses should ask themselves whether or not they understand how people are calling their business, during what time of day customers are more likely to call, or even why they’re calling in the first place. This type of information is indispensable when it comes to allocating marketing budgets across all of the different available platforms.

Use analytics to improve call handling

Call analytics can also help organisations better distribute internal resources to maximise the value of every inbound inquiry. Using analytics to understand when the highest influx of calls will be, and what customers are most likely to be inquiring about, call handling can be improved through measures like increased staff allocation and training, and call management optimised to resolve each query through the best, and most cost-efficient channel.

This is especially important, as one of the results of the rise of digital is that the voice channel has emerged as the way to resolve more in-depth, complex queries. Phone interactions with customers, therefore, provide the opportunity for higher-quality conversations than those carried out by webchat or other digital contact methods.

Automate phone systems

On top of live analytics, technology is also readily available to automate the entire call process, ensuring no customers are missed. So far this approach has been adopted largely by the hospitality industry, for example, in the ability to make restaurant or hotel bookings using an automated phone system. However, it isn’t hard to imagine how a business in most industries – from a retail outlet to an estate agents office – could automate incoming enquiries to some extent, at least to handle calls while the office is closed.

There are multiple benefits to automating phone calls. Using hospitality as the example, restaurants can ensure that customer bookings are captured, whether there is someone available to answer the phone on the restaurant floor or not – a valuable use of resources when staff are having a busy night. Of course, this data is captured in the bookings system, but the information can also be analysed to provide insights into customers booking behaviours and needs, to help them further enhance the restaurant experience.

Take an integrated approach to customer data

The practice of integrating different data sources, for example, a restaurant’s online booking portal, its phone analytics, and it’s till system – will unlock a great fortune of actionable information for businesses. While each data set has its own intrinsic value, it is when the full customer journey can be drawn from beginning to end that businesses can really start being clever.

If an estate agent, for example, integrated its web analytics, phone analytics, and sales ledger it would be able to see how a customer found their website, which properties they viewed and which they called about, how many calls resulted in the final purchase of a property, and how much the property was bought for. By compiling the data for hundreds or thousands of customers, the estate agent would be able to pull out trends that could inform its strategy. Say it identified customers in a certain age range had been making phone enquiries from digital advertisements, and these had a high sales conversion rate. It could make a safe bet that increased digital advertising spend would result in more sales.

What’s vital to remember is the phone number is a part of a company’s integrated digital identity. With one on every desk, businesses have no excuse for allowing such an omnipresent business communications channel to become a sales analytics blind spot.

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We deal with all sizes of business and thought this is a great article from Business Matters Magazine regarding building a successful team and retaining great staff.

No successful big business owner is an island. You can keep a small business running by yourself, but if you are ready to achieve growth, then you need a team surrounding you.

Your team has to be the right for your business. Each individual needs to fit into your culture and they need to have the skills the company actually needs and that no one else on the team has.

Shweta Jhajharia of The London Coaching Group has spent 17 years coaching small businesses and has observed six elements that distinguish the truly winning teams from the failing ones.

Strong Leadership

It is important to hire team members who are better than in you the areas that they are hired for. This means as a team, you can achieve more. However, if you are unable to lead them and direct the flow of that team work towards the goals of the business, their strengths will be either unused or wasted.

A Common Goal

No matter what your skills as a leader, if you do not know what path you are leading them down, you are not taking them down the most successful route.

Everyone on your team should know, clearly and precisely, what they are aiming for individually, and how their goals contribute to the larger goal of the business. 

Rules of the Game

What you are aiming for here is a “loose-tight culture”. You should set some clear boundaries for what is acceptable and then within those boundaries, the culture should be loose and innovative. The best teams have the room to be creative, to take risks and to try new things, while keeping within limits of what is non-negotiable in order to ensure that innovation is directed towards results and not wasted energy or worse, negative outcomes. 

Action Plan

Knowing where you are headed is different from knowing how you are going to get there. You are not managing a team, you are managing their activities. This means you need to lay out a plan for the business and then, importantly, share that plan with your team. Sit down with them and run over how that cascades down to each of them. Where are their responsibilities? What are they accountable for? What do they have ownership of?

Supporting and Encouraging of Risk Taking

You have to let your team know that it is ok to try something new, take a risk, make a mistake – have fun. We want to enjoy our work and doing the same thing over and over is not going to achieve that. In fact, growth more often than not comes from your motivated employees seeing opportunities that you may have missed otherwise. 

Effective Management

The final element is understanding that management is what pushes a team forward. Leadership pulls a team together, but it is through management that you accelerate them.

The distinction between management and leadership is an important one that many business owners miss. In a nutshell, management is about making sure that the preparations are in place, that the systems are operating properly and that the proper leverage is being obtained to drive the team and the business forward.

Where your leadership is in explaining to your team WHY they are doing what they do, your management comes in when you are explaining to them HOW they are achieving the goals of the company.

There are, of course, hundreds of elements that affect how and why a team fails or succeeds. However, by keeping a focus on these 6 elements, you will build a very strong foundation for creating the kind of team that scores goals and wins results for your business.

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An article on smallbusiness.co.uk shows how UK businesses have been paying well over the odds for international payments, hampering their abilities to expand in a post-Brexit world, according to a study.

Traditional banks have a stranglehold of 95 per cent of the business payments market, according to a study by Covercy.

One company making 20 transactions of £30,000 could overpay an average of £4,400 monthly or £52,800 a year in completely unnecessary fees, the survey finds.

For a company making 20 transactions of £10,000 this equates to £2,120 a month or £25,440 a year, and for a firm conducting 20 transactions of £1,000 this will total £1,100 a month or £13,200 a year.

Meanwhile, importers have also been hit with unprecedented slides in the value of sterling due to Brexit (16 per cent year on year against the dollar; £1/$1.31 and 18 per cent year on year against the euro; £1/€1.18), while also facing these needless cross-border fees.

With more than two thirds (69 per cent) of the UK’s 53,000 SME exporters making at least 20 transactions a month, paying over the odds for these transactions can really add up, according to Covercy CEO Doron Cohen.

 

He says that Brexit has brought huge uncertainty to UK SMEs, with 96 per cent of exporters selling to the European Union. And now, with the threat of being locked out of the single market, these exporters potentially face new, costly taxes which could make them much less competitive than their EU rivals.

‘Meanwhile, SME importers have already suffered a critical 18 per cent rise in their costs in less than a year due to the fluctuation in sterling’s value.

‘This means the UK’s SME exporters and importers have to look for savings wherever they can find them. Unfortunately for years, banks have held SMEs hostage with over-the-top and unnecessary transaction fees for cross-border transactions.’

Making international payments easier with a currency broker

David Buskell, director of World Domination Music has a business which involves making royalty payments overseas, and the company also receives foreign income from its associates abroad when music is used in their territory.

 

In the beginning the company used the services of its bank to process both outgoing and incoming payments but found that the charges were high and the service not always as speedy as hoped for.

In 2011, a mutual contact within the music industry asked the company about foreign currency payments. ‘His own company has a significant range of both incoming and outgoing payments and so we were interested,’ says Buskell. ‘On speaking with him, we found that he routed all his overseas income through a currency broker thus removing the need for US dollar, Euro, Australian dollar etc bank accounts.’

The currency broker makes its money by being able to trade larger amounts on the currency market and getting better rates, Buskell says. ‘We investigated further and as a result signed up with the currency broker that our contact had recommended to us.

Sterling is transferred into our account either immediately or on our request and a full audit trail is produced. ‘The service is efficient and the rate we get for our currency is a significant improvement on what was offered by the banks,’ Buskell says.

 

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