Lesson 20-- Reports

Goldenseal small business software includes a variety of Reports that show you valuable information about your business. Reports are a useful management tool that will help you to run your business more smoothly.

This lesson shows you how to view and use Reports.

Contact Log Report

To see a simple report of meetings and phone calls, follow these steps:

  1. Choose Contacts from the Reports menu, then choose Contact Log from the submenu.
  2. Click the Update button.
  3. You'll see the standard report, which is a simple list of all Contact Log records.
  4. To see more detail about a contact, double-click on its row. Goldenseal will open a regular browser window that shows the item.

HINT: Sometimes a report is the fastest way to locate a specific record.

Date Ranges

The Date Range popup field lets you see items within a specific time period. To use it, follow these steps:

  1. Enter a different value into the Date Range field.
  2. Click the Update button.
  3. You'll see only those contact that were made during the entered time period.

The Date Range popup includes a large selection of common time intervals. You can also use a custom range and enter any starting and ending dates.

Date Field Choices

Many accounts and transactions include more than one date. To set the specific date field that is used for the date range, follow these steps:

  1. Turn on the More Details checkbox. It shows you additional controls that give you more control over what is shown in the report.
  2. Choose a different date in the Date Field popup field.

For example, in estimates you can find date ranges based on the date entered, start date, completion date, or date that the estimate was paid.

Item Ranges

The Item Range popup field lets you see items with a specific completion status. It also lets you see items that have been found or flagged.

To use an item range, follow these steps:

  1. Turn on the More Details checkbox. It shows you additional popup menus that give you more control over what is shown in the report.
  2. Choose All Items from the Date Range popup menu.
  3. Choose Special Items from the Item Range popup menu.
  4. Click the Update button.
  5. You'll see only those items that have special status (in this case, items with Urgent status).

Sorting Reports

If you'd like to see a simple report in a different order, click the Sort button.

You can sort the contents of a simple report by any column, in ascending or descending order.

Report Breakdowns

The Breakdown popup menu allows you to group report items into sub-headings. For example, to see material purchases grouped by supplier, follow these steps:

  1. Choose Expenses from the Reports menu, and choose Material Purchases from the submenu.
  2. Turn on the More Details checkbox.
  3. Choose Supplier in the Breakdown popup menu.
  4. Click the Update button.
  5. You'll see a listing of all purchases grouped by supplier.

Condensed Reports

Use the Condensed checkbox to view a report in condensed form. A condensed report shows totals for each subheading on a single line.

To view total purchases for each supplier, follow these steps:

  1. Turn on the Condensed checkbox.
  2. Click the Update button.
  3. You'll see totals for each supplier on a single line.

Date Breakdowns

Reports can show a breakdown by day, week or month. For example, to see purchases for each week, follow these steps:

  1. Choose By Week in the Breakdown popup menu.
  2. Click the Update button.

Match Field

Use the Match Field popup menu to display only those items that match a particular value in a field. The results are similar to what you get when you use the Find commands.

For example, to find contacts that have a specific 'action taken', follow these steps:

  1. Enter Action Taken into the Match Field popup menu.
  2. Enter Still Needs Attention into the clairvoyant field to the right of the Match Field popup.
  3. Click the Update button.
  4. You'll see all contact records that still need attention.

To find all contacts with a specific customer, follow these steps:

  1. Enter Account into the Match Field popup menu.
  2. Click on the Account Class popup, and choose Customer Accounts.
  3. Enter a specific customer into the clairvoyant field to the right of the Match Field popup.
  4. Click the Update button.
  5. You'll see all contact records for that customer.

Schedule Report

Most reports show transaction or account records, but there are also a few specialized reports which show other data.

For example, to view a project schedule, follow these steps:

  1. Choose Projects from the Report menu, and choose Schedule from the submenu.
  2. Enter an estimate into the Estimate field.
  3. Click the Update button.
  4. You'll see a project schedule. It lists the items in the estimate breakdown, with a start date and time, and a completion date and time for each item.

HINT: If you don't need to see the start time or end time in your schedules, use the Custom Layouts command to remove those columns from the report table (see page 138).

The Date Range, Item Range, Breakdown and Match fields don't apply to specialized reports, since they use their own methods to fill the report.

Tool Report

To see a list of tools for a project, follow these steps:

  1. Choose Projects from the Report menu, and choose Tool List from the submenu.
  2. Enter a project into the Project Account field.
  3. Click the Update button.
  4. You'll see a list of project tasks, with the tools that are needed for each.

Goldenseal fills the tool list from Assemblies which contain tools in the components.

Itemized Estimates

To see a report that shows the items in an estimate arranged by category and subcategory, follow these steps:

  1. Choose Projects from the Report menu, and choose Itemized Estimate from the submenu.
  2. Enter an estimate into the Estimate field.
  3. Click the Update button.
  4. You'll see estimated costs arranged by category and subcategory.

To 'condense' the report so it only shows totals for each subcategory, follow these steps:

  1. Click the More Details checkbox to see more controls.
  2. Turn on the Condensed checkbox.
  3. Click the Update button.

Printing Reports

To print a report, click the Print button.

NOTE: To change the format for printing, use the Custom Layouts command (see Lesson 21). You can use a fixed printing format, or you can use the Page Setup options.

Saving Reports as Text

To save the data in a report, click the Save As Text button. You'll be asked to save a file onto your computer's hard drive.

You can open the file with any spreadsheet or word processor program.

HINT: If you want to format a report in a special way, it may be easier to save it as text and then format it in a spreadsheet program.

Other Reports

There are over eighty other reports available under the Reports menu.

Most are tables that show your accounts or transactions, similar to the Material Purchases report.

The full version of the Goldenseal business management software also includes financial reports such as a Balance Sheet and Income Statement.

In the full version you can also use the 'quick report' commands to see a quick summary of accounts payable, job costs, accounts receivable, undeposited funds and payroll.

Finishing Up

This lesson has shown you how to view reports and change the information they include.

The next two lessons will show you how to customize the contents of your reports.

You might want to take a break now and do something you haven't done for a while. Do you have a musical instrument in the attic? Has it been years since you played your air guitar? When was the last time you went out dancing? Did you know that fun is the leading cause of laughter?

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