Additional Options

All these options can be added at the time of purchase or later on as required.

 

EDI- Electronic Data Interchange

EDI can be defined as “the exchange of business data from one organisation’s computer application to the computer application of a trading partner.” EDI is used in many industries and in the last few years has been actively encouraged and promoted by merchant trade organisations like the BMF as well as buying societies like NMBS and UNIMER.

 

EDI has many benefits including:

 

• Remove document re-keying - Reducing labour costs, eliminate re-keying errors, faster document processing, instant document retrieval.
• Eliminate paper - Trading electronically cuts down on paperwork saving stationery, document storage costs, lost documents and postage costs.
• Reduce lead times and stockholding - Documents are processed faster, speeding up payments and reducing lead times.
• Improve trading relationships - Accurate documents help ensure accurate supplies.
• Competitive edge - Being able to trade electronically makes your company a more attractive option from your suppliers’ point of view.

CounterAct has all the facilities required for merchants that wish to trade electronically. Many of our users are already seeing the time and cost savings in trading via EDI.

 

Atlas / GXS Freeway — receives purchase invoices from suppliers, either through a buying society portal (NMBS, CBA etc) or direct from a supplier by an ftp transfer and translates the incoming invoice files into their standard .csv layout. Atlas/GXS Freeway will check that they are for the right customer and transfer them to a directory onto the CounterAct server. (Requires sign up with Atlas/GXS Freeway)

 

 

 

 

Electronic form design

CounterAct comes complete with all the necessary templates to print all your company output. These are typically printed on laser printer onto headed paper or multi-part stationery on impact dot- matrix printers.

 

Impact printers are a cheap and reliable method of printing and are ideal where high volumes are involved, for example the monthly printing of account statements. Where higher quality output is required, for example, customer letters or customer quotations, data can be merged and formatted into Microsoft Word and printed on a laser printer.

 

However, there is another option: Db Form is a white paper printing solution that fully integrates with Counteract and automatically prints high quality business documents onto plain paper on laser printers. This option means that a company can design its own output and dispense with all its pre-printed stationery.

 

• Print on plain paper saving pre-printed stationery costs.
• Change stationery as and when required - new branch, telephone number change etc.
• Laser output giving a highly professional image.
• Integrate bar codes for automatic scanning of proof of delivery (see other option).
• Supports OMR marks on all documents so can be used in conjunction with mailing machines.

Automatic fax

Save time by sending faxes direct from CounterAct. Purchase orders, invoices, remittance advices or quotations can be faxed from any screen within Counter Act via a supplied central fax server (dedicated telephone line required).

 

 

Automatic email of invoice / statement / remittance runs

CounterAct also has an option that allows users to email customer invoices and statements.

 

The method of invoicing - post, fax or email can be set by customer/supplier so in one print run the recipient receives their documents by their preferred method of communication. Emailing or faxing these documents saves both print and postage costs.

 

Scanned proof of delivery / collection

CounterAct has an option that allows for signed documents to be scanned in a batch and then saved within the system for retrieval in case the customer asks for proof of delivery or collection before paying their invoice.

 

Advice notes can be printed with a unique barcode that our scanning software recognises. The document is filed against this unique number and so can be easily retrieved if required. Documents are stored as PDFs so can easily be reprinted, faxed or emailed as required.

 

CounterAct includes the necessary reports to check that documents have been successfully scanned and stored before the order is confirmed for invoicing.

 

 

 

Mobile stock take

CounterAct allows for the counting and loading of stock information from Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. Excel is a standard feature in Microsoft Office Mobile, available on most handhelds. So you have a wide choice of hardware available on the market. Whichever suits you best!

 

Electronic signature capture device

This option allows users to capture electronic proof of collection for printing out and storage on CounterAct. The customer signs for the goods on the electronic pad and the signature is stored against the document.

 

If a customer queries whether a collection took place, the signed proof can be easily faxed or emailed to them straight from CounterAct.