Before you start using Mekashron Business for managing your sales, you will need to customize a few settings.
In this section we assume that you have already installed Mekashron and that you are logged in as the admin user into the main screen. You may already have set up your other users and created or imported your entities, as these can be shared across multiple Businesses in Mekashron.
This section will cover how to customize your business options, and includes:
1 - Business Settings
With Mekashron Business you can have multiple Businesses. To set up the preferences for each Business, select Sales from the main Mekashron menu, then Settings -> Business Settings as shown below.
Figure 1.1 - Accessing the Business Settings in Mekashron
This will bring up the main Businesses screen, shown below, which enables you to add and manage businesses in Mekashron.
Figure 1.2 - The main Businesses screen
To start, either click the Add Business icon or simply double-click on the first blank line in the grid. You will be presented with the Business Form as shown below.
Figure 1.3 - The Business Form
The fields on the Business Form:
- Profile:
- Business Name - this is the only field that you must complete in order to Add a Business. All the other fields are optional.
- TIN/EIN - Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) or Employer Identification Number (EIN). You may wish to record this against a Business for legislative or tax reasons.
- Sales:
- Tax - Sales Tax Rate - The percentage tax to be added to orders, if you have a compulsory sales tax in your area.
- Documents Language - Select your preferred language for Sales Documents such as invoices. Your language options are currently English, Hebrew or Chinese.
- Address
- Address - The building name or number and street address.
- City - The city the business is based in.
- Zip - The postal or Zip code for the business.
- Country - The country in which the business resides.
- State - The state or county.
- Phone - The main telephone number for the business.
- Fax - The fax number for the business.
If you make a mistake, you can use the Cancel button to exit without saving your changes. Otherwise, once you have completed the Business Form, click OK, and a summary of the business you have just added is listed in the Businesses screen. You can add further businesses at any time.
Figure 1.4 - The list of Businesses that have been set up in Mekashron
In the Businesses list you can see a summary of each business, including the:
- Business Name
- EIN
- Vat - i.e. the sales tax rate you have set up for the business
- Language
- Phone
- Fax
To view or edit a business, simply double-click it in the list or select it and click the View/Edit button.
To delete a business highlight it in the list and click the Delete button. You will be asked for confirmation before the business is deleted from your list.
Once you have set up each of your businesses in Mekashron, these will be remembered by the system. You will be prompted when logging into the system to choose which business you wish to log into, as shown below, and then once inside the system, you will automatically be working with the settings and data for this particular business.
Figure 1.5 - Selecting a Business to log in to
2 - Currency Information
If you make sales in multiple currencies, this portion of the setup for Mekashron will be of particular importance to you. From the main Sales menu select Settings -> Currency. By default Mekashron is installed with a single currency, US Dollars:
Figure 2.1 - The Currencies screen showing the default settings
From the currency screen you can add as many different currencies as you require, so that they are available to you in other parts of the Mekashron application. Simply click on the middle dropdown and select the country and currency that you wish to add from the pre-populated list.
Figure 2.2 - The Currencies drop down list
Mekashron will automatically populate the currency Symbol in the left-hand column of the grid for you as shown below.
Figure 2.3 - Mekashron has populated the currency symbol on the left
Then you can either manually enter the current US Dollar exchange rate in the right-hand column headed Rate(USD), or select the Refresh Rate button.
Figure 2.4 - The Refresh Rate button
This is an especially useful facility within Mekashron - when you click on the Refresh Rate button Mekashron automatically connects to the internet and downloads today's exchange rates for all the currencies in your list, and updates them within your system.
Below is an example where multiple countries and currencies have been added to Mekashron.
Figure 2.5 - Multiple Currencies in Mekashron
You can easily delete currencies from the list at any time by right-clicking on the currency you no longer wish to use, and selecting Delete as shown below:
Figure 2.6 - Deleting an unwanted Currency from the list
3 - Payments Information
Within Mekashron you have the ability to take payments directly from the interface. This is done by linking to your system. If you have a Credit Card processing application, or a Paypal module, you can link these to Mekashron to take payments quickly and easily from within the application.
You can have a variety of payment methods. These are set up by clicking on Sales in the main menu and then selecting Settings -> Payments.
Figure 3.1 - The Payments screen in Mekashron
By default Mekashron is set up for you with the following four payment types:
- Cash
- Cheque
- Credit Card
- Credit Card - Phone
.
The fields you will see for each payment type are:
- Payment Type - This is a drop down from which you can select one of the four available payment types.
- Title - A freeform field showing a descriptive title for the payment type. You can edit this if you wish.
- Payment Component - Here you can enter the name and location of a payment component file. These are programs that enable you to automatically process and record payments from within Mekashron.
The Payment Component option enables you to customize Mekashron to link directly to a Payment Component that you may have installed on your system. If you do not already have custom payment components for the payment types that you process, please contact us at Mekashron to request the payment components that you require.
To select a payment component, click on the Payment Component field to activate it:
Figure 3.2 - The Payments Component field
Then click on the browse button at the right of the field and select the payment component that you wish to associate with this payment type:
Figure 3.3 - Selecting a Payments Component
Click Open to return to the Payments Setup screen, where the path to your Payment Component is now shown as you can see below:
Figure 3.4 - Credit Card Payment Type with Payment Component path
At this point please be sure to either hit enter on your keyboard or click on another field in the grid so that the path to your Payment Component is saved.
Next, you must right-click on the Payment Component and select Component Properties:
Figure 3.5 - Setting the Payment Component Properties
This option will bring up the screen necessary to enter any options or settings that the specific Payment Component you have installed require. These options may include settings such as a directory on your network or, for PayPal for example, an email account.
If you do not accept one of the available payment types you can delete it from the list by right-clicking on the icon at the left of the payment type and selecting Delete as shown below.
Figure 3.6 - Deleting a Payment Type
If you delete a payment type and then later on you reinstate that method of paying as an option in your business, you can come back to this screen and insert the payment type by selecting it from the dropdown and adding a Title and a Payment Component.
4 - Summary
Mekashron allows you to set up multiple Businesses, each with specific details and settings including Currency and Payment information.
You will have the option to choose which business to work with when you and your users log into Mekashron, via the drop down as shown below.
Figure 4.1 - Selecting a Business to log in to
Note that any work that you do on sales such as recording orders or setting up sales campaigns are only recorded against one business.
However, the following types of data are shared:
- Users
- Entities
- Inventory / Products
... when you set the above items up then they are available across all of your Mekashron businesses to maximize the power of the application and your own productivity.