Introduction Are You Quick Enough with Your Decision-Making? 73% of Businesses Say No. In today’s data-driven landscape, a whopping 73% of businesses confess they find it tough to make quick, informed decisions because their reporting tools are outdated or just not cutting it. Are you in the same boat? If yes, it might be time to rethink your strategy for gaining business insights. Meet Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central—a real game-changer for companies looking to turn their data into actionable insights. While many ERP systems come with basic reporting options, Business Central shines with its customizable reports that offer real-time data, greater flexibility, and predictive insights. In this blog, we’ll take a look at five standout reports in Business Central that not only provide essential insights but also empower your business to make quicker, smarter decisions. These reports are crafted to keep you ahead of the competition and help you hit your business targets—without the hassle of complicated customizations. Let’s jump in and see how these powerful reports can revolutionize your operations! 1. Dimension-Based Reporting: Custom Insights Without the Complexity Business Central makes that easy with dimension-based reporting. It allows you to slice and dice data across custom dimensions such as department, product line, project, or location. You don’t have to adjust your chart of accounts for every new need—you just define dimensions and filter reports accordingly. Imagine the insights: Want to know how profitable a particular product line is in a specific region? Or how a department is performing across multiple locations? With dimension-based reporting, you can quickly analyse performance across all these areas. 2. Account Schedules: Build Custom Financial Reports Without External Tools If financial reporting feels rigid or limited with your current system, then you’ll love Business Central’s Account Schedules. Picture this: You’re able to customize income statements, balance sheets, or cash flow reports to match your exact business needs. Whether you want to compare actuals vs. budgets by department or break down profitability by project, Account Schedules gives you the flexibility to design these reports yourself. 3. Seamless Integration with Power BI: Turn Data Into Visual Dashboards Are you tired of static reports that don’t tell the full story? Business Central’s seamless integration with Power BI allows you to transform raw data into rich, visual dashboards that offer deeper insights. You can create interactive, real-time dashboards that not only display your data but also allow you to drill down for detailed analysis. 4. Embedded Excel Integration: Collaborate and Update in Real-Time Do you find yourself constantly exporting data to Excel, only to struggle with re-importing it back into your system? Business Central solves that with its embedded Excel integration. Imagine this scenario: You export your financial data to Excel, update it with your team, and then push the updated data back into Business Central—with no data loss or formatting issues. The integration keeps all your financial and operational reports intact, so collaboration is seamless. 5. Cash Flow Forecasting with AI: Predict the Future of Your Finances How accurate are your cash flow forecasts? With Business Central, you get AI-driven cash flow forecasting that goes beyond simple historical analysis. The system uses machine learning to predict future cash flows based on past data, outstanding receivables, and planned expenses, giving you a clearer picture of your financial future. Ready to See These Reports in Action? These reports are just the beginning. With Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, you have a powerful tool that helps you make smarter, quicker decisions and stay ahead of the competition. Interested in learning how Business Central can transform your reporting? Reach out to us today for a personalized demo or consultation at transform@cloudfronts.com, and let’s explore how we can tailor these reports to fit your business’s unique needs.

Introduction In Dynamics 365 Business Central, processing a customer refund is a simple yet important task that ensures accurate financial management and customer satisfaction. Whether a customer has overpaid or requires a refund for another reason, Business Central provides a straightforward process to handle these transactions efficiently. In this guide, we will walk you through the steps to issue a refund, including verifying customer details, applying the refund, and processing the payment. Steps to Process the Refund Issuing a refund in Dynamics 365 Business Central is straightforward, but it’s important to ensure you select the correct document type. 1. Verify the Customer: Start by confirming the customer who will receive the refund. Access the customer list and click on the balance amount to view the customer ledger, which displays only the open or outstanding items. Note the customer number and the amount to be refunded. 2. Navigate to the Payment Journal: Open the Payment Journal and select the appropriate batch to use. Add a line for the refund to the customer, ensuring that the Document Type is set to “Refund.” 3. Apply the Refund: To apply the refund to the outstanding payment, click on “Apply Entries” in the Action Bar. Select the line you want to apply the refund to, then click on “Set Applies-to ID” in the Action Bar. This will fill in the Applies-to ID field for the chosen line. Click OK to close the page. 4. Process the Payment: Finally, process the payment. Whether you’re using a computer check or an electronic payment, follow the same steps as you would for paying a vendor. Once everything is completed, post the payment. 5. Customer ledger entry for the refund showcased above Conclusion Processing customer refunds in Dynamics 365 Business Central is a straightforward process that enhances financial accuracy and customer satisfaction. By following the outlined steps—verifying customer details, applying the refund, and processing the payment—you can ensure that refunds are handled efficiently and correctly. We hope you found this article useful, and if you would like to discuss anything, you can reach out to us at transform@cloudfronts.com

Introduction: The 2024 Wave 1 release of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central introduces a new feature called Page Scripting. This tool is designed to enhance User Acceptance Testing (UAT) by allowing users to record and replay their actions within the Business Central. This capability streamlines the UAT process by automating repetitive tasks and ensuring consistency across tests. Capabilities and Usage: The Page Scripting tool, records user interactions such as opening pages, entering data, and navigating through the system. These interactions can be saved and replayed, making it easier to validate the system’s behavior under various conditions. The tool records actions in a YAML file format, which can be shared and reused, promoting collaboration and efficiency. Let’s get started with how page scripting works: – Setup: To use the Page Scripting tool, users must have specific permission sets assigned. – Once these permissions are in place, users can access the tool by navigating to Settings and selecting the Page Scripting (Preview) action. The tool pane appears on the right side of the screen, allowing users to start a new recording or open an existing one. – When the user clicks on Page Scripting action, following screen opens up: – In that, user have an option to start a new recording or open existing recording. – User can start a recording by clicking on “New recording” or “Start new” button. – When user clicks on ” Start New/New recording” following page displays: – When new recording is started it captures every user action and input, including interactions with custom or third-party extensions. Users can track their steps, such as opening the Customer List page, selecting a customer record, and entering new sales prices. During the recording, users can delete the last recorded step if needed and can stop and resume recording as necessary. For Example: – Once all the steps are completed, user can stop the recording and save the file in YML format. – If the user wants to replay the recording, then simply user can click on open recordings, select the saved file and all the recorded script will appear on the right screen. – A recording can then be played, and all the recorded actions are executed in the web client. User will see an indicator if an action is succeeded or not as shown below: – User can Click on “Play” action, the system will automatically run the whole script and indicate (a green tick) if successful as shown in above image. Conclusion: In brief, the Page Scripting tool in D365 Business Central enables advanced customization, allowing users to optimize workflows, enhance user experience, and drive efficiency within the system. This tool offers valuable flexibility for businesses to tailor their operations to their unique needs and goals. We hope you found this article useful, and if you would like to discuss anything, you can reach out to us at transform@cloudfronts.com

Introduction:  Many Businesses supports buying and selling items with different unit of measures. How to configure this in Business Central without showcasing your inventory in decimals. Let’s take an example: We will be buying the goods always in dozen whereas we can sell the items in PCS or CARTONS. Steps to achieve the goal: 2. Once the base unit of measure is set to PCS. Go to the Item Unit of Measure page by click on Related-> Unit of Measure. 3. By default PCS line would be set to 1. Add new line enter DOZEN and next right 6 which means 1 dozen has 6 PCS. 4. Next line add CARTONS and enter the qty per unit of measure as 72. which means 1 Cartons has 72 PCS in it. 5. Once the above lines have been set. Let’s pass Item journal where will be increase the inventory by dozen and sell the items in PCS and CARTONS. Ideally the inventory would be shown without any decimal value. 6. Below is the explanation how system would calculate into PCS as when you buy and sell in different items. 7. Purchase 100 dozen which is 600 PCS. This would be converted by Business Central itself. As we have defined 1 dozen as 6 PCS. 8. Sales 7 Cartons which is 702 PCS. This would be calculated by Business Central itself as per the Item Unit of Measure configuration where 1 cartons is 72 PCS. 9.Once the above transaction is posted the inventory would be whole value without any decimal. Conclusion:    Thus, we saw how we can use alternative Unit of measure in Business Central. We hope you found this article useful, and if you would like to discuss anything, you can reach out to us at transform@cloudfronts.com

Introduction: Creating a tenant in Microsoft Entra-ID or Azure Active Directory (AAD) is a simple process that can be accomplished through the Azure portal. The portal serves as a centralized hub for managing Azure Active Directory and executing various administrative tasks, including the creation of a new tenant. Additionally, this blog will cover how to create a user and grant them permissions. Pre-requisites: Steps: Sign in to Azure Portal. Navigate to Microsoft Entra ID tenants: Select “Create”: Choose the type of tenant: On the Basics tab, select the type of tenant you want to create: Click Next: Configuration to proceed. Provide the necessary information: Organization name: Type your desired organization name (e.g., “Cloudfronts”). Initial domain name: Choose an initial domain name (e.g., “cfblogs”). Country/Region: Select your desired country or leave it as the United States. Review and create: Your new tenant is created: Check your user account: User can change their User Principal Name (which is generated by the system) by clicking on user e.g. “Shubham Prajapati” Now Sign in to Business Central Business Central Sign In | Microsoft Dynamics 365 Now put the User principal name As password was not set during tenant creation. Go to > Forgot Password After setting up the password you can successfully login to your Business Central Now Go to Settings > Admin Center Now Click on Upper Left Corner > Admin Go to Active Users > Click on the user which you want to give permission to access central, then go to Licenses and apps and select Licenses > Save changes Once permission is provided Go to Users page in business central and click on Update users from Microsoft Now the user is being updated, to give environment permission click on the user whom you want to give permission To give environment permission to user click on New Line > Select appropriate permission to user Conclusion Thus, in this blog we saw how to create a tenant for business central and how to add users and give permissions to them. Thank you for reading hope this helps!

Introduction: The Transfer Environment feature in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central allows you to seamlessly move an environment from one Microsoft Entra tenant to another. Here are the key points: Purpose: Self-Service Process: Steps: This streamlined process enhances flexibility and efficiency for managing Business Central environments across different tenants. Pre-requisites: Steps: 2. We are going to transfer “Shubham” to different tenant. Click on “Environment Transfers” 3. Go to Transfer Environment. 4. Select the environment that you are going to transfer and enter the Destination Tenant id. It is also possible to schedule the transfer within 2 weeks and set the time when it should be transferred. 5. Now go to Destination Environment > Admin Center. 6. Click on Environment Transfer > Receive Environment. 7. Enter the Source Tenant id (source from where the environment is to be send). Click on Next. 8. After that in Pending Incoming transfers the Environment will be displayed. Now just click on the Environment and Confirm. 9. The Environment is being successfully transferred. Note: If the destination tenant already has 1 Production environment and 3 Sandboxes, environment transfer is not possible. For successful transfer, the destination tenant must have no existing production environments (if you are transferring a production environment) or fewer than 3 sandboxes (if you are transferring sandbox). Conclusion: In conclusion, this blog has provided valuable insights about how to transfer environment in business central. Thank you very much for reading. I hope this helps!

Introduction: It is crucial for the management team to track the client’s utilization of the system as a key metric for assessing the project’s success and the value it brings to the client. To facilitate this monitoring process, I have developed a utility that can automatically generate and send reports to the management team, detailing the number of records created in specified tables. For example, during the initial master data upload phase, 1500 data added into the Customer table. Subsequently, over the following month, this figure increased to 1750 and then to 1950. Such trends signify that the client is utilizing the system in line with expectations. Pre-requisites: Configuration: Usage Statistics Setup Page: This page, contains two main fields:- Collect Statistics (Boolean) and Mail Recipients (which contains email id’s to which the report has to be send) and one more field that is primary key field is added in table but not in page and it is set to code due to which the header we get as required in Usage Statistics Setup Page. The datatype of the field primary key is set to header because the default number of code is null. Regex is used for pattern matching. Here, email validation is added on Mail Recipients. User can enter multiple email addresses in this format eg. abc@gmail.com;xyz@gmail.com. If the Collect Statistics is enabled than only you can process further and there should be at-least one mail id present in Mail Recipients. Usage Statistics Configuration Page: This page contains the actual data from which the data will be passed and report will be generated. The list and the card pages are also created with same fields. The “All Object With Caption” is used for viewing all object details in the system. The trigger lookup is used to get the table no. and table name at runtime. After fetching the specific table no. and table name, fields will filter according to the filter field 1 value, same goes for filter field 2 value. (filter field 2 is added according to the requirements.) The FieldsDisplay procedure is used to retrieve field no. and field name of the according to its record. In Filter Field 1 Name any field can be selected and filter field 1 value must be set according to that field. Create Statistics Report: This report is designed to automate the generation of usage statistics based on configurations specified in the “Usage Statistics Configuration” table. The report is flagged as “ProcessingOnly,” indicating it is intended for background processing rather than direct user interaction. The dataset within the report contains a data item with an “OnAfterGetRecord” trigger, which executes after each record is retrieved. This trigger is responsible for processing each configuration record, applying filters, and updating or inserting records into the “UsageStatistics” table. Additionally, the report features an “OnInitReport” trigger that checks the “Usage Statistics Setup” table to ensure that statistics collection is enabled. If this condition is not met, an error message is displayed, and the report exits. In essence, this report streamlines the creation of usage statistics in Business Central, adhering to specified configurations and ensuring the necessary setup conditions are satisfied before processing. Usage Statistics Page: After filter the number of records the data which will be generated will be displayed in this table. List will also be created with same fields. In Record Count the number of values are there which satisfies the filter condition. Send Statistics Report: This report is designed to send usage statistics via email. Let’s break down the code: The report begins with specifications such as its application area, caption, and usage category. Notably, it is marked as a “ProcessingOnly” report, indicating it is intended for background processing rather than direct user interaction. The OnInitReport trigger executes when the report is initialized. It checks settings in the “Usage Statistics Setup” table, ensuring that statistics collection is enabled (“Collect Statistics”) and valid mail recipients are specified (“Mail Recipients”). If these conditions are not met, error messages are displayed, and the report exits. The main functionality is in the OnPostReport trigger, which executes after the report is processed. It performs the following steps: Email Excel Sheet: In this, on 22nd date after applying the filters the output is given and on 24th it again checks by applying same filter since new data was not added in the respective table that’s why it is showing the same data. Conclusion In conclusion, the automated reporting tool plays a pivotal role in monitoring client system utilization, revealing encouraging trends such as the gradual increase in customer records. These insights affirm the project’s success and underline its value to the client, reinforcing our commitment to proactive monitoring for continual optimization and client satisfaction.

Introduction: A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Opportunities and Processing Sales in Business Central Pre-requisites for creating Sales Opportunities: Create Sales Opportunities You can create opportunities from the Opportunity List page. Typically opportunities are created from a specific contact or salespeople. Globally search “Salesperson” and select related link. Select the salesperson from the list for whom you want to create an opportunity. On the salespeople card page, select opportunities action –> selected salesperson opportunities page will open up –> user can create new by clicking on New action. If opportunity is created through salespeople then salesperson code is automatically generated. Globally search “Contact” and select related link. Contacts list page will open up, user can select the contact for which opportunity has to be created. Click on Home –>Create Opportunity for new opportunity. Click on Contact–> Open Opportunity (To view existing opportunity of selected contact) If opportunity is created through contact then contact name is automatically generated. No. – This field is auto generated based on the set no. series. Description – Description of the opportunity. Contact no. – User can select existing contact or create new. Contact name: Contact name is auto generated based on contact no. Phone/mobile/email: Auto generated from contact card page. Contact company name: This field is auto generated from contact card page Salesperson code: if opportunity is created through salesperson then this field is auto populated, if not then user can manually select the salesperson. Campaign no. User can select specific campaign to link with the opportunity. Priority: The default priority is set as normal. Other priorities are Low and High. Sales Cycle code: This is a setup. (To know more refer part 1 of this blog) Status: The status field is updating automatically. Closed: Specifies if the opportunity is closed. Creation date: Opportunity creation date  Date Closed: Specify the date the opportunity was closed. Segment no.: User can link segment to the opportunity. (If any) Sales cycle stages To start the sales cycle, user can click on “Activate first stage” To move an opportunity through sales cycle stages: Sales cycle stage is automatically updated Fill in the rest of the details as necessary. To Close opportunity When the negotiations are finished, you can close the opportunity. When closing an opportunity, you can specify whether it was won or lost, as well as why it was closed. To specify a reason, you must set up closed opportunity codes. To Create Sales Quote To Create Sales Order To Delete Opportunities After you have deleted an opportunity, it is removed it from the Opportunity List page. Conclusion Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central provides a robust framework for creating opportunities and processing sales seamlessly. By following this step-by-step guide, you can harness the full potential of Business Central to optimize your sales processes, enhance customer relationships, and drive business growth. Hope this helps!

Introduction Invoices and shipments are frequently handled differently by different businesses. Processes, for example, can range from one person posting everything on a purchase order to numerous employees working on their own sites. On the User Setup page, you can now select how each user can handle invoices. Steps to achieve the goal 1. Go to User Setup select the users you want to give this restriction and then there are two columns Sales Invoice publishing Policy and Purch. Invoice Posting Policy 2. There are three values in these options Below is the impact of the above three options in different documents of purchase and Sales transactions. Document Option 1: Allow Option 2: Prohibited Option 3: Mandatory   Displays a series of options Confirmation dialog Confirmation dialog Sales Order Ship Do you want to post the shipment? Do you want to post the shipment and invoice?   Invoice       Ship and Invoice     Sales Return Order Receive Do you want to post the receipt? Do you want to post the receipt and invoice?   Invoice       Receive and Invoice     Inventory Pick Ship Do you want to post the shipment? Do you want to post the shipment and invoice?   Ship and Invoice     Purchase Order Receive Do you want to post the receipt? Do you want to post the receipt and invoice?   Invoice       Receive and Invoice     Purchase Return Order Ship Do you want to post the shipment? Do you want to post the shipment and invoice?   Invoice       Ship and Invoice     Inventory Put-away Receive Do you want to post the receipt? Do you want to post the receipt and invoice?   Receive and Invoice     Warehouse Shipment Ship Do you want to post the shipment? Do you want to post the shipment and invoice?   Ship and Invoice     Note: If you are trying to post invoice transactions from the general journal the above restriction would not be used in the General journal table. Conclusion Thus we saw how we can restrict the users to post the purchase and sales transactions. Thank you very much for reading my work. I hope this helps!

Introduction Hi, Readers. Today I would like to talk about How to create a Business Central free trial tenant. References https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/microsoft-365/enterprise/office-365-e3?activetab=pivot:overviewtab Steps: Step 1: Search Office 365 E3 on Google or click on the below link. https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/microsoft-365/enterprise/office-365-e3?activetab=pivot:overviewtab Click on the Free trial Fill in personal details which are required Step 2: In the next screen, enter the domain you want example bclearning.onmicrosoft.com Set a password and click on Next Step 3: Enter Any Registration no. (Ex. Any Unique no.) You have successfully created an Office 365 account. Ensure that you are logged in with this account. Step 4: Now you need to open this link in your browser https://businesscentral.dynamics.com/ Click on Continue. Step 5: You can create multiple users here. If you don’t want it, just select the skip option. Here is your Business Central free trial tenant. Now you can explore Business Central. Hope this help. Thanks for reading.