Restructure Class/Group/Rates/Tag

This option provides several separate update tools that can be used to restructure inventory or update inventory Costs and Customer Tiered Rate structures.
These tools export existing data to a spreadsheet that can be modified before re-importing back into the data base.
It is important to run the import utility outside of work hours because the product updates can cause file locking.

The prompts are:

RESTRUCTURE BY

Select one of the following independent update actions:

• Click Product Class/Group to exercise the utility that can re-assign rental and/or sales products to different existing classes and/or groups, by exporting existing product data to a spreadsheet that can be modified and re-imported.
  This process only makes changes to product records, and then recalculates the availability requirements on the updated product and Group information.
  It does not change open documents.
  When a change is made to a "Product Class" or "Group" using this import utility or any utility, a record is written to the Audit Log by date, operator, product, and class or group values.

  Click the RESTRICTIONS button at the bottom of the screen to view the rules governing this update action.

• Click Groups/Rates to update the Groups used in the customer 'Tier 1' rates defined in Multi-Tiered Customer Special Pricing, using the export/import actions to copy/merge the "old" Groups defined for 'Tier 1' rates to "new" groups, with the option to copy some of the basic Group setup to the re-organized Groups including overwriting the description, rates, kits/SSL, services and maintenance in the Group table on import.
  New Groups can be created in this process and Groups no longer in use can be deleted.

  This process changes Customer Tier 1 rates and Group information, but does not change products or documents.

  The Groups/Rates update is useful if your Product/Group categorization has been restructured, as this tool can be used to redefine the Groups assigned with special pricing in the customer 'Tier 1' rate structure, which may be required to match the changed Groups.

  Click the RESTRICTIONS button at the bottom of the screen to view the rules governing this update action.

• Click Group Cost to update the Group fields including "Useful Life in Months", "Liquidation Value", "Replacement Cost", "Alternate Language Description", and "Useful Life Hours".
  When a change is made to any of the "Useful Life in Months", "Liquidation Value", or "Replacement Cost" values in a Group record manually or using this import utility, a record is written to the Audit Log by date, operator, product, group and field value for the corresponding category.

• Click Product Cost to update the "Date In Service" field on the Make/Model and Re-Order Information for non-bulk equipment and the "Replacement Cost" in Rental Inventory for bulk and non-bulk rental products.
  When a change is made to the "Date In Service" or the "Replacement Cost" field manually or using this import utility, a record is written to the Audit Log by date, operator, product and field value.

• Click Tag Cost/Div to update the "Historic Unit Cost", "Depreciation Class", "Alternate Depreciation Class", "Owning Division" and "Warranty Expiry Date" fields on the Asset Tag for the selected bulk and non-bulk rental products.
  When a change is made to a "Historic Unit Cost" field manually or using this import utility, a record is written to the Audit Log by date, operator, product, tag and field value.

ACTION

Select one of the following actions:

• Click Export to output the selected data to a spreadsheet to be reviewed and modified.
  • The Class/Group restructuring spreadsheet includes the product#, class, group, group description, product model number, and provides the column to redefine a different existing class and different existing group (defaults to current) to each product.
    • If the "old" Class or "old" Group do not match the product file at the time the data is imported, an exception is generated.
    • A column is also provided to flag whether the product description should be updated. For non-bulk rentals the "New Product Description" defaults to the Group Description, but for Sales and bulk rentals the actual product description displays. This Description field can be modified and updated as required.
    • The Model Number and Group Description columns are information only and do not update the data tables.
    • Multiple Groups can be re-assigned to a Class, but more that one Class cannot be assigned to the same Group.
    • Availability requirements are recalculated on import.

  • The Groups/Rates spreadsheet includes the group#, and group description, and provides the column to enter a new or an existing group#.

    • The "Group Description" only updates the data if this is a new Group to be added to the Groups table, or if the over-ride description option is checked.
    • The "Group Class" column is not used in the data update, but is used to validate that the Group is still in that class and the data has not been changed.
    • Only the Product Group, "ALL" Or "SEL" filter applies to this restructure option.
    • On importing, a new Group record will be created if no match is found in Groups and the new Group will be a copy of the associated "old" Group.

      Tier 1 Update:

      This update process helps maintain customer special rates when existing Groups have been re-organized and split into new Groups, by coping the same special customer rates to the new Groups, as follows:

      If the customer has special rates for the "old" Group setup in Multi-Tiered Customer Special Pricing, then any "new" Groups associated with the "old" Group on the spreadsheet, are added to the customer's Tier 1 rate structure with that customer's special rates copied from that "old" Group to those "new" Groups.
      If the "new" Group already exists in the customer's Tier 1 structure, only the missing rate codes are copied.
      After the import, if there are no products assigned to the "old" Group, that Group is deleted from the customer's Tier 1 pricing.
      The option is also provided to delete unused Groups from Group.
      

  • The Group Cost spreadsheet includes group#, and group description, and provides the columns to update the "Useful Life in Months", "Liquidation Value", "Replacement Cost", and "Alternate Language Description".
    

    • The Group Cost export option only uses the Group, "ALL" or "SEL" filter in the output selection.
    • New Groups lines may be added to the spreadsheet before being saved to the "tab-delimited" text file, that will update matching records in the database only if the Groups number already exists in Group table.
    • Changes to the Group number or primary description do not update the Group file.
    • Deleting Group records from the spreadsheet do not remove them from the database.

  • The Product Cost spreadsheet includes the product# and description, and provides the column to update the Date In Service field on the Make/Model and Re-Order Information for non-bulk equipment and the Replacement Cost in Rental Inventory for bulk and non-bulk rental products.
    

    • Only the Product, "ALL" or "SEL" filter applies to this export selection option.
    • Bulk rental products will show 'n/a' for the "Date In Service" value and will be ignored on the import.

  • The Tag Cost spreadsheet includes the product#, description, and tag#, and provides the columns to update the Historic Unit Cost, Depreciation Class and Alternate Depreciation Class fields on the Asset Tag for bulk and non-bulk rental products.
    

    • The Class / Group / Product, "ALL" or "SEL" filters apply to this export selection option.

• Click Import to upload the revised data that has been converted from a spreadsheet and saved as a "tab-delimited" text file using Select a File to Upload, and to import the data back into the relevant product, customer, or group files.

  Valid record are updated and a count of updated records is provided.
  Any errors or exceptions identified on the import document are re-exported to a new spreadsheet, where they can be corrected and re-imported.
  Click the RESTRICTIONS button at the bottom of the screen to view the rules governing Class/Group and Groups/Rates data imports.

  An audit record is written for updated Cost data imports to the Audit Log for the corresponding category, with the exception of the Group 'Alternate Language Description' from a Group Cost import.

REPORTING SET, "ALL" OR "SEL"

This field only applies if the Class/Group is selected to be restructured.

Leave this field blank to skip the Set selection field, in order to use one of the Product Class, or Product Group selection options instead.
To utilize the Set selection option choose one of the following:

• Type ALL to include all Sets as setup in Reporting Sets in the report.
• Enter a single specific Set code for the report, or select one from the Reporting Set Search window.
• Type SEL to select a range of Sets or to select Sets by Owner to include in the report, as outlined in Select Reporting Sets.

If a Set selection was made the Product Class, and Group selection options are skipped.

PRODUCT CLASS, "ALL" OR "SEL"

This field only applies if one of the Class/Group/Tag Cost options is selected to be restructured.

Leave this field blank to skip the Class selection field in order to use the Product Group selection option instead.
To use the Product Class selection option choose one of the following:

• Type ALL to include all classes as setup in Product Classes.
• Enter a single specific Product Class code for the report, or select one from the Product Class Search window.
• Type SEL to make a selection of classes to include in the report, as outlined in Select Product Classes.

If a product Class selection was made the Group option is skipped.

PRODUCT GROUP, "ALL" OR "SEL"

To use the Group selection option choose one of the following:

• Type ALL or leave this field blank to include all Sales and Rental Groups in the exported spreadsheet.
• Enter a single specific Group for the output, or select it from the Group Search window.
• Type SEL to make a selection of Groups to include in the spreadsheet, as outlined in Select Groups.

Note: If the Set, Class, and Group selection filters are enabled but are all left blank, then all records will be included.

PRODUCT , "ALL" OR "SEL"

This field only applies if one of the Class/Group/Tag Cost restructure options is selected for export.

• Type ALL or leave this field blank to include all bulk and non-bulk rental products as setup in Rental Inventory.
• Enter a single specific Product number for the report, or select one from the Product Search window.
• Type SEL to make a selection of products to include in the report, as outlined in Select Products.

PRODUCTS

This field only applies if the Class/Group is selected to be restructured.

Select one of the following product filter options:

• Select Rentals to only include Rental Inventory in the spreadsheet.
• Select Sales to only include Sales Inventory in the spreadsheet.
• Select Both to include all products in the selection range.

DATE FORMAT

The date format is information only, and displays as defined for your company in the Company Information.
All dates on the spreadsheets must be entered in this format including the slashes to separate the values.

i.e. North America = mm/dd/yyyy , European = dd/mm/yyyy

IF NEW GROUP EXISTS

This field only applies when importing Groups/Rates data, and can be used to update the data in the Groups table.

Check each applicable box if the data from the "old" source Group, should replace the same data in the "new" target Group.
Uncheck each relevant box for data that should not be copied.

The fields that can be updated in Groups include:

Group Description
Kit and Suggested Sales List codes
Rates, Special Rates and Pricing
Group Services code Maintenance

Note: When multiple "old" Groups are merged to the same "new" Group, if the information cannot be merged (e.g. Description, Kit, SSL) the information for only the last Group to be copied will be reflected in the "new" target Group.

Finished?

Click ACCEPT to proceed with the export or import action, or CANCEL to abort.

ACTIONS:
Additional actions provided by buttons on the Restructure Class/Group screen include:

• Review the Rules:
  Click RESTRICTIONS button to review the rules associated with successfully importing the Class/Group and Groups/Rates information to update the data base.

• Update Non-Bulk Rental Product Descriptions and Deleted Unused Groups:
  Click GROUP CLEANUP button to access the following two utilities in sequence:

  1. Change the description of all non-bulk rental products in selected Groups to the Group description, as outlined in Copy Group Description to Non-Bulk Rentals.
  2. Remove selected Groups that are no longer used from the Groups file as outlined in Delete Unused Groups.