Pastel Bank Manager Module

[J7J]

Hi,

I just wanted to get an idea of the general feeling about this module...

Do you use it often?
How much time does it save you (%)?
Is it worth the cost?
Any other comments?

Thanks!
J7J

[Martinco]

I have never used it but does not mean you should not. I guess it depends on your needs.

[Neville Bailey]

Do you use it often?

Yes, as a Pastel consultant, I use it all the time!

How much time does it save you (%)?

That depends on your circumstances - if you have lengthy bank statements, with a lot of repetitive transactions, like debit orders and EFT payments and receipts, then it can be a tremendous time saver, not to mention the benefit of more accurate and consistent allocations.

Is it worth the cost?
Any other comments?

Yes, it is, if you are in the situation I've described above. Just one word of caution, which Pastel do not make very clear in their fine print, is that you need to be an active Pastel Cover subscriber, on your entire Pastel system, in order to keep the Bank Manager module active! The same applies to the Cash Manager module, by the way.

[KimH]

Slightly - I collected my Pastel Accounting Xpress upgrade yesterday and I am totally thrilled to see it has a Projects module. Happy days

Yes,... I know I'm weird

[Neville Bailey]

Kim, sorry to burst your bubble, but the new Project Tracking module is only available as an add-on module for Pastel Partner, not for Pastel Xpress.

Although you can see a reference to the word "Projects", it is merely a renaming of the old Cost Codes utility, which has and still exists in its current form in both Xpress and Partner.

The Project Tracking module, however, is a massive enhancement of the old Cost Code utility, allowing you to have multi-levels of projects, together with budgets and full income statement reports.

Posted from my BlackBerry using BerryBlab

[BusFact]

Do you use it often?
How much time does it save you (%)?
Is it worth the cost?
Any other comments?

My book keeper uses it every month.

I think Neville answers the question quite well as it all depends on how often the items on your bank statement are repeated and how many items you have.

I find it to be a wonderful innovation from Pastel, but again as Neville mentioned, Pastel require me to be part of their annual Cover Subscription. And this is where I lose my sense of humour. Their cover offers me free support (haven't used their support this century), all upgrades (oh joy, I get to re-buy their software program each year even if there are no significant improvements in the next version - sorry, but I'd rather wait for an upgrade when a new version benefits me significantly) and you get their newsletter.

So essentially I'm paying over R6k a year in order to receive their spam, which I have yet to read.

That said, its probably worth it to me as I have paid it for the last 2 years just to have the bank manager module. It does leave a bitter taste though. I am continuously looking for other accounting packages who do the same thing. The closest I found was Econo Accounting, but then I lose out on other Pastel features.

[KimH]

Kim, sorry to burst your bubble, but the new Project Tracking module is only available as an add-on module for Pastel Partner, not for Pastel Xpress.

Although you can see a reference to the word "Projects", it is merely a renaming of the old Cost Codes utility, which has and still exists in its current form in both Xpress and Partner.

The Project Tracking module, however, is a massive enhancement of the old Cost Code utility, allowing you to have multi-levels of projects, together with budgets and full income statement reports.

Posted from my BlackBerry using BerryBlab

It's an awesome improvement all the same and will make my life just a tad easier

[J7J]

Thanks for the input! Appreciate your time.

[J7J]

I went ahead and got the Bank Manager Module - I am so chuffed! Already saved me a lot of time :-)

One thing that I noticed - it does not seem to pick up "duplications" of entries on the bank statement - ie. if a transaction is included on 2 different imported bank statements, you can code this transaction twice and import it twice and then update both batches containing the same transaction. Is there a way around this or do you just have to manually check that you are not duplicating transactions?

[Neville Bailey]

J7J, I'm glad you are happy with the Bank Manager module, but I need to give you a little rap on the knuckles for not asking me for a quote before purchasing the module!

Anyway, to answer your question - you are correct in that you need to ensure that imported bank statements do not overlap, as the module does not (yet) have the ability to pick that up.